this post was submitted on 09 Nov 2024
188 points (99.0% liked)

Asklemmy

43942 readers
553 users here now

A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions

Search asklemmy ๐Ÿ”

If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!

  1. Open-ended question
  2. Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
  3. Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
  4. Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
  5. An actual topic of discussion

Looking for support?

Looking for a community?

~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_[email protected]~

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] [email protected] 102 points 2 weeks ago (4 children)

I got fired when the company decided to downsize.

"How is that dumb?" you ask? That happened less than two weeks after I was hired. The boss man's speech indicated that that was the result of a long deliberation by corporate. So if you knew there could be layoffs any moment, why the fuck were you hiring?

[โ€“] [email protected] 32 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

This is usually done to keep things going as normal as possible for as long as possible. Once people start noticing something is wrong, the best people start looking elsewhere. Before you know it, not only is the company in financial trouble, but it can't recover because some of the best people left. At least one time I witnessed, the company was working on layoff plans and even limited bankruptcy, but at the same time negotiating with the investment firm that owned part of the company to get more money. If they got the money, everything would be fine. It wasn't till that fell through, they had to start laying people off.

[โ€“] [email protected] 6 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

As if the best people won't leave once the layoffs start

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

Right but you're trying to avoid them leaving before that in case you get a win and don't need to make the lay-offs. If they leave earlier the win you're hoping for may no longer be enough to save you.

[โ€“] [email protected] 6 points 2 weeks ago

Exactly. Companies are typically working on multiple conflicting scenarios because you don't know which it's going to be

[โ€“] [email protected] 14 points 2 weeks ago

Yup, I worked for a company that was laying off but they were still hiring because, "they had a hiring policy." Absolutely nonsensical.

[โ€“] [email protected] 9 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

What do you think would happen if the C-suite called HR and told them "we're about to announce a downsizing in 2 months, stop hiring people"?

[โ€“] [email protected] 13 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I worked for a company that did just that and it was the best way to do it because a lot of people left on their own.

[โ€“] [email protected] 5 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

The problem is that this way, your best people with the most options leave first.
Those you want to keep long enough to do the re-structuring and make the numbers on the books look good, so you can sell the company before it disintegrates completely.

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

Aren't those people also the first to be let go? They're the most expensive and you can maximize short term profits by letting go to expensive employees and hiring on cheap ones.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 2 weeks ago

Not always. I think the best people think they WON'T be let go and some others who don't perform, figure they are on the chopping block.

In our case it didn't matter because they wound up having four rounds of layoffs before shutting that location down entirely. So it really wound up being WHEN you were fired, not IF.

[โ€“] [email protected] 6 points 2 weeks ago

Because they're heartless.