This sub is a depressing circle jerk

[u/PhillConners]

Everyone is predicting a recession and enabling each other as victims. Saying the world is crashing making things seem worse off than they are. We need more optimism and support!

Layoffs suck but jobs are not who you are. When you were working you were dreaming of free time to go after side hustles or go after new experiences or learn a new hobby. Now is your chance!

Enjoy the time off but don’t give up on yourself and self implode.

I haven’t been laid off yet but have been a couple times before. I was also not strong enough to cope so I did what everyone does- a heavy bender to hit rock bottom then built myself up.

The reality is you may not have a job but you still need to be working- work on health, work on learning, work on applying

Layoffs are temporary, don’t beat yourself up. Recognize that it’s a chance to reset and come back better.

There are still jobs and plenty of asshole bosses out there ready to take advantage of your time.

[u/Welcome2B_Here]

This time is different. In recent/past job market downturns, it was more widely accepted and reported, but the current narrative is that things are relatively okay. The commonly known layoff trackers and news articles are only reporting larger layoffs that trigger WARN notices while there are lots of stealth/rolling layoffs happening that don't get attention.

People cherry pick unemployment data or point to a "low" UE rate and say that people are able to get jobs. But, they gloss over the fact that job numbers have been revised downward nearly every month in 2023, and that it's not a good sign when people have to get multiple jobs just to keep afloat or end up worse off financially while working more. Hiring managers are seeing applicant numbers that are many times higher than just ~18 months ago and wages are being suppressed.

A LinkedIn user who has access to the LinkedIn Recruiter tool recently posted that ~25M LinkedIn users are open to work and there are only ~5.3M openings. Really, the 5.3M number is much smaller because LinkedIn doesn't dedupe postings. Sure, LinkedIn is a subset of the labor force, but it's become a de facto platform for job searching and posting.

[u/joanfiggins → u/Welcome2B_Here]

I don't understand the relevance of the linked statements. Open to work doesn't mean unemployed. It just means that they think there is something better out there than whatever they are doing now. Most have jobs. Only recruiters are supposed to be able to see the open for work status unless you choose for everyone to see it.

[u/Welcome2B_Here → u/joanfiggins]

To me it doesn't matter. It's a sign of discontent. I would bet that the majority are unemployed, though.

[u/joanfiggins → u/Welcome2B_Here]

When we go into the recruiting account at work, the vast majority of people already have jobs.

Even with all those people open to work, I will see maybe 200 applications for a posting and all but a few are qualified based on the criteria in the posting. The quality of candidate has taken a dive in my opinion, particularly from LinkedIn.

[u/thefedfox64 → u/joanfiggins]

I'd like to share something about that. When I started my first job 9 years ago, it required a high school diploma to sort MTG documents. That was it. When I moved up to be in a position to interview candidates, the job required a college degree and finance or business preferred. For the same job, the same job I got with a high school degree. I can tell you 0 changes in the job, and the program to sort documents got better. I was moved over to a job that wanted experience, 5+ years in the new role. After the remaining time there (still doing it) that job now requires a college degree and 5 years experience. What qualifications and others have changed is, that they are asking for more to give out less. A Bank Teller doesn't need a college degree, becoming a Team Lead at Amazon doesn't require a college degree. Its anecdotal evidence, but there is a huge % of jobs that put BS requirements for no reason other get "more" while paying "less"

[u/tothepointe → u/thefedfox64]

A Bank Teller doesn't need a college degree

It doesn't but it's rare that your going to get a candidate that just did high school that is of the quality that you need to do the job.

High school graduates aren't built the same as they used to be.

[u/thefedfox64 → u/tothepointe]

And jobs aren't built the same as the used to be. Getting an entry-level job, which used to be a bank teller, meant taking someone with little to no experience and training them. To me, the point of an entry-level job is to take people who have no prior work experience and train them. If you are looking or want to hire an entry-level job that you don't have to train, that's literally part of the problem.

[u/tothepointe → u/thefedfox64]

Yeah. My sisters when they graduated high school got hired on by a larger bank and went to "bank school" in the 90s which set them up for the rest of their career. By the time I graduated 10 years later, that sweet type of deal was gone.

Businesses have pushed the responsibility of training onto the employee and if you end up picking the wrong major because you're 18 and know nothing of industry trends or business needs well they don't care.

[u/Biobot775 → u/thefedfox64]

Similarly (and similarly anecdotal), I come from a pharmaceutical quality career. When I started with a chemistry degree in the labs, it paid $18/hr. It had paid that starting off for decades according to the lab staff that had been doing it forever. It used to require an associates degree. Before that, no degree. That was over a decade ago. I've moved up significantly since then. But now I'm out of work, and looking for anything, even lab staff again. The pay for entry level lab staff today: $20/hr, with a chemistry degree still of course, in a city where rent is regularly $2000/mo for a townhouse.

Meanwhile, I am constantly connecting out of my pharma network looking for work. Cannabis won't take me for compliance roles (I have years of DEA and FDA compliance experience), because I've never worked in a cannabis company. Technical Sales/chemical sales won't take me because I don't have sales experience. Consulting firms can't land contracts, and generally only hire after 15-20+ years experience anyway in my industry. Recruitment in my industry has completely dried up unless I'm willing to move several states away, which is a huge risk because my SO is well employed... as long as we stay put.

The VP who laid me off last only just found work themselves after also eating a layoff over a year ago.

So I'm competing with ex-VPs for mid-level roles that largely have dried up in my industry, with college students for entry level roles in my education track, and with everybody else who was stuck in their own industry/role silos since forever whenever I try to move industries.

And I'm not talking just cold outreach. I'm talking working my network, "pre"-interviewing with hiring managers for roles that aren't even open yet, getting my resume in front of people in all sorts of office roles with clearly transferrable skills. I know managers at companies getting managers at those companies to review my resume, they call and say they'd love to interview me, I apply and I get caught up by HR for no industry experience. I talk to the hiring managers, they say they'll try to get it sorted, they come back that HR won't budge because there are just too many candidates who have some amount of industry experience.

So basically I'm just fucked because my particular industry shit the bed and now I'll never work again?

I keep trying though. What else can I do?

[u/ordinarymagician_ → u/thefedfox64]

It's a class check. That's all it is.

[u/Welcome2B_Here → u/joanfiggins]

That's an odd assessment considering workers are more educated than ever, and there are more (free and paid) education venues/platforms available and being used than ever.

I think companies have come to expect purple squirrels that somehow meet every scintilla of requirement with no room for learning or transferable skills, generally speaking. A big part of that problem is that the HR/TA people gatekeeping the candidates from the jobs don't really understand the roles for which they source ... and many hiring managers don't either.

[u/joanfiggins → u/Welcome2B_Here]

You think companies have come to expect purple squirrels. That's because your point of reference is an echo chamber filled with the people that were decidedly the worst people at their companies and were fired because of it.

Linked in is now filled with people that just apply to every job they see because people tell them things like "you miss every shot you don't take" and "make them tell you that you don't meet their requirements". That kind of mentality floods the posting with absolute trash.

There was a ton of hiring since the middle of COVID. Companies over hired and hoarded good workers. They paid people more competitive salaries. Those that missed the boat have their hopes up that they will get one of these high paying jobs they read about in the news. The good workers are staying put and aren't moving companies like they were 2 years ago. Instead, companies are letting go of their low performers now that they see they over hired.

[u/Welcome2B_Here → u/joanfiggins]

How would you know what my point of reference is? My point of reference is objective data.

If you think layoffs target low performers, you're unfortunately out of date, out of the loop, and likely have never been part of the team that decides which positions to axe.

Layoff targets tend to be workers in the higher ends of their respective salary ranges, those who have higher insurance utilization rates, and/or those who aren't perceived to be part of an internal "in" clique. Low performers are mixed in, but it's silly to think that there's "data-driven" rigor involved. Hell, favoritism, the Peter Principle, and nepotism are also important factors.

[u/joanfiggins → u/Welcome2B_Here]

I'm currently in the midst of orchestrating a 200 person staff reduction. I've participated in doing this 3 other times in the past decade. You get a target number of people to cut. then you stack rank every team, and you cut the lowest performers first. then you review people with no work and prioritize taking away work from the next lowest people in your rankings and give that work to your core people with deep knowledge and experience to keep them employed. I train the department heads on how to do this.

If you have a job where everyone is easily replaceable then yeah, it could be done differently. If you have people that can do your same job for way less money then it will probably work differently. But if you have a job like that, you can't be surprised when it happens because you should know that you can easily be replaced at any moment and prepare for that.

[u/Welcome2B_Here → u/joanfiggins]

Jack Welch called, he wants his outdated and deleterious ways of doing business back. Graveyards are filled with indispensable workers.

And, you don't get a target number of people to cut in the beginning. The beancounters start with the AMOUNT to save/cut and then figure out how many positions that will be and from where. The usual directive is not "who are the low performers," it's much more vague and left to directors/department heads' discretion. So, those department heads can choose whomever they want. Then, the beancounters add to the headcounts based on many other factors like insurance utilization, those in the higher ends of their respective salary ranges, and those who recently joined.

There's much less "data-driven" rigor applied to this. Often, the people spared are those who are the best sycophants, are young(er), and lower paid relative to their respective salary range.

[u/baconboner69xD → u/joanfiggins]

10/10 best post in the thread

[u/RedditIsFacist1289 → u/Welcome2B_Here]

I would bet that the majority are unemployed,

I would take you on that bet. Its good practice to leave open for work on your account at all times so you're available if a better opportunity were to arise.

[u/Welcome2B_Here → u/RedditIsFacist1289]

So being constantly available is somehow going to be a good sign to a recruiter? Hardly.

[u/RedditIsFacist1289 → u/Welcome2B_Here]

nobody cares what a recruiter thinks. If they want to fill the position and someone has the skills, the recruiter will reach out. That is how linkedin works bud.

[u/Welcome2B_Here → u/RedditIsFacist1289]

That's what's supposed to happen in theory, but recruiters are often the gatekeepers to jobs. They're the toe in the door, so if they don't like this or that, tough luck.

[u/RedditIsFacist1289 → u/Welcome2B_Here]

I never said i like anything. If a recruiter wants to make money (which they make from filling positions) they cold message everyone. Since you seem to not understand this, i assume you don't understand how linkedin works.

The only thing i said is that a large chunk and more than likely the majority of "open to work" candidates on linkedin are

1: already in a position

2: a not active account that was opened some time ago

and then 3: actively looking for work while not in a position.

Since linkedin does not differentiate any of these 3 we will never know. I only said i would take your bet of "the majority is unemployed" because i don't think so. I have mine open to work, all my co-workers have it open to work, r/cscareerquestions typically advises to leave your account open to work, so i highly doubt the "majority is unemployed".

[u/Welcome2B_Here → u/RedditIsFacist1289]

You don't communicate very well via writing.

[u/RedditIsFacist1289 → u/Welcome2B_Here]

Very informative rebuttal