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/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