What was your worst layoff experience?

[Modem Butterfly]

Mine was about five years ago, when I was working for a large IT company that had boomed and was about to go bust. One of our accountants had created a spreadsheet with everyone's salaries and calculated the potential impact on their departments their departures might have. The accountant had helpfully included a small note indicating that the lower the percentage, the lower the impact, and the higher the "ROI" for the RIF (reduction in force). ROI? On a RIF?

I wasn't on the initial list, but there was about three days when everyone in the company could see it coming. Morale went right into the crapper.

Later that summer, as I was preparing separation paperwork, I found my own walking papers in the stack. My boss said, "Oops, you weren't supposed to see that," I got the supreme displeasure of training a 21 year old file clerk to take over my position. Two weeks later they asked me to come back as a contractor for 1.5 times my old rate. The company no longer exists, but I'm still rather bitter about the whole thing.

[flamingyouth]

1. I lost a job where I made $100 a week ... in 1991

It was a crappy part-time job working for a local trade newspaper, but nonetheless, my take-home pay barely covered my travel costs and dry cleaning bills. :eyes:

[Mr. McD]

2. 1984

The company closed down our shop with one weeks notice. They moved to So. Cal. and went non union.

[loudestchick]

3. I was working for a mortgage bank in refinance 10 yrs ago. The rates went

up and we all got laid-off...entire dept. The severence package was 2 mo salary but the insurance coverage went away. The bad part was...I was 4 1/2 months pregnant with my first child. We had to pay for my maternity care and delivery out of pocket. I hadn't been laid off long enough to qualify for assistance...I'd already made too much money that year...my husband's job had no benes. It took us 3 years to pay it off.

[Modem Butterfly]

4. Oooh. And that was before COBRA wasn't it?

Thanks again for COBRA Mr. Clinton!

[loudestchick]

8. Indeed it was. Try getting someone to hire you when you're obviously

pregnant. They never came right out and said it...that would be illegal...but they'd size me up, do the math, and suggest I try back with them "in say 8 months?" I wasn't laughing.

[trof]

11. Similar situation, but insurance paid.

Miz t. was about 5 months pregnant when I was laid off from TWA the second time. We lost our medical coverage but since she was pregnant before the layoff they covered her maternity expenses.

[slackmaster]

5. Five times and every one has been GREAT!

I've been laid off of jobs that were supposedly permanent, full-time positions on five occasions. The first one was in December 1981. Each of these passages has seemed at the time like the best thing that could have happened to me.

I wasn't on the initial list, but there was about three days when everyone in the company could see it coming. Morale went right into the crapper.

I know that feeling well. Sometimes I feel a little sympathy for people who are very young and have never been canned before, and for older ones who have been at the job for a long time. For me, the early exposure to the impermanence of jobs (I was 23 in 1981) have made me rather invulnerable to those feelings.

I view my relationship with an employer as a two-sided contract. I give of my time, intellect, communication skills, etc. and they pay me money. Either of us is free to walk out of the deal at any time.

My boss said, "Oops, you weren't supposed to see that,"

How embarrassing for the boss. Now that individual is your personal laughingstock for the remainder of your employment.

Feel free to bail out at any time, unless doing so would jeopardize your severence or whatever.

[DeposeTheBoyKing]

6. I've had two; which do I pick?

I was laid off from a clerical job at a local cable TV company on my 17th birthday. The big kahuna always got employees birthday cakes; when they called to tell me not to come in I thought they were getting my cake. Turns out I was being let go. My dad, ever the protector, called to lay into them about laying off a girl on her 17th birthday.

The other layoff was a reduction in force at the hospital I worked at in 1986. I was living with two other girls and decided to move back home to pay off some bills; five days later I was laid off. My mother cried; she thought I was psychic and knew that something was going to happen to her and that's why I was moving back home. Well, the something did happen and I was laid off; but a month later she was diagnosed with terminal colon cancer, so maybe she had something after all.

[Nikia]

7. I wondered how morale is at those companies

When they know that they are going to be layed off in the near future or even worse, that the plant or business is going to close in a few weeks or months. How could you really be motivated?
I have only been layed off once and I knew that I'd be layed off when I was hired because they had a busier time and a slower time and I was hired for the busy time. Still, when I was notified 3 days before my last day, I broke down into tears.

[Modem Butterfly]

10. I was the corporate recruiter, and I hired most of those people

Some of those folks came from really strong, stable companies, too.

I went through a period of several months where I had difficulty sleeping at night. The whole experience made me get out of recruiting altogether.

[Bombero1956]

12. back in 1977

I was working at our local civic center. I had taken the entrance exam for the fire service earlier that year and somebody at the company found out about it and laid me off 5 days before Christmas. I got lucky and was hired the following February but had no money for the holidays or to pay rent because my unemployment checks ($50 a week) didn't start until after I was hired. My landlady who was like a second mom to me let the rent slide until I started getting paid again. The funny thing was that at the end of my first week as a firefighter I found 2 checks in my mail box, the first and last checks I have ever gotten.

[slackmaster]

15. People can continue to take pride in their work

Your professional reputation for sticking to a task even in the face of loss of your job can be seen as positive by future employers.

There's also the reinforcement of social interactions with people you have been working with for months and years.

Whenever I've had the option I've gone down with the ship. The workload gets lighter and goofing off gets better tolerated as the end nears.

[Modem Butterfly]

16. That's a good point. Plus, you might be able to buy company assets...

In the layoffs at the company that started this thread, we were able to buy all sorts of computers and equipment at fire sale prices. The deals got better with each round of layoffs. That was a nice "perk".

[slackmaster]

18. Sometimes you can do better than buying stuff

If you are in the right place at the last time you can get all kinds of stuff for free. This is especially nice with portable items like software installation disks and license agreements. I run Windows 2000 server on my home system for free and legally because I was able to get an upgrade from a beta version that the company was using.

I've scored lots of computer hardware and some furniture for the trouble of hauling it away.

[trof]

9. 1981

I turned 40 and started my third layoff from TWA.
I had thought that I'd moved far enough up the seniority ladder not to have to worry about layoffs again.
Then Patco (air traffic controllers) went on strike and Reagan fired them. Routes and landing slots were drastically curtailed in the interim and I was on the street again. It's the most depressing time I ever went through.

Luckily I was able to get at job with the FAA for the next 2 1/2 years until I was recalled to TWA. I took about a 70% pay cut and Miz t. had to go back to work.

[Bluzmann57]

13. 1996

The plant I worked in for 19 years decided to pull up stakes and move to Tennessee, and also Mexico. They lied about the Mexico move and were forced to pay more unemployment benefits. I hear they finally shut down the main plant in Chicago. The company? Brach's candy co., a company I still carry a grudge against to this day and always will. When they shut our plant down, I still believe it was to break the Union, because they had not done it before, despite trying. Screw that dogcrap company. Do not buy any of that crappy product. Please.

[Options Remain]

14. Sounds Familiar

I worked for a major backbone provider and went through 7 layoffs unscathed. On the 8th they literally had me doing nothing for a week before they told me. I confronted my boss about it and he told me I could skip and meet with him at the end of the week to finalize (while getting paid).

That company no longer exists either.

TearForger

[slackmaster]

17. And your story sounds familiar to me

At my last job I lasted almost 8 years. I made it through the first 5 major rounds of layoffs and they finally took me out on the 6th. I outlasted 6 of the 7 immediate supervisors I had during those years. The 6 all got laid off. Number 7 is still there (though the company got bought out it continues to operate much as it was before).

That company no longer exists either.

My resume makes me look like the Prince of Darkness. Every company that ever laid me off no longer exists as an independent firm. The one I walked away from has mutated to the point where it's almost unrecognizable, and nobody knows where my personnel records ended up. It's impossible to check up on my official employment records or contact former supervisors for all but the last job I had, and my current one.

[housewolf]

19. 2002

I was working as software testor on contract and arranged to have a 3-week vacation to go to Peru.

I left the office about 3:15 pm the day before my vacation started, ran errands and got home about 5pm. There was a message waiting for me that they were laying me off.

There I was, leaving the country for 3 weeks 12 hours later. Because I was on contract, my health insurance was cancelled immediatelly, so I was leaving the country with no health insurance.

They didn't HAVE to do that - they could have easily have waited and done it when I got back so that I could have immediately started looking for a new job and getting my health insurace straightened out.

Fortunately I didn't get sick while I was in Peru, but there was this pall hanging over the entire vacation that I'd just lost my job, and all the insecurity that went along with that.

Cruel, I thought it was.

[hunter]

20. I once temped for the Grim Reaper...

A big high tech government contractor got swallowed up by a bigger one and they laid off a bunch of people. I was hired by a temp agency to help in the "transition."

What I did was follow the Grim Reaper around to the offices of various engineers. Many of these guys had worked at the place forever, and they had a lot of their own stuff in their offices.

The grim reapers decided which stuff could go home with the laid off engineers, which stuff had to go to the shredders or the dumpsters, and which stuff had to stay.

It was my job to haul stuff around, and that included helping guys out to their cars.

Shudder.....

[miss_kitty]

21. I was 'Laid Off' after I trained two people making my same wage

how to do my job. I had years of experience (gardening) and schooling; by comparison they had none. I had to teach them how to exit the truck safely. Shit like that. They 'let me go' me the day I would have been eligible for medical and a pay rise. I was diagnosed with cancer 6 months later. CSers. Probably did me some kind of a favour, but they lied to Unemployment and said I was not 'knowledgeable enough' and did not have the experience. I hate them to this day.:grr: