You’re Just a Row in an Excel Table
I’ve only been made redundant once in my career, but I could see it coming, prepared for it, and jumped straight into full-time consultancy. However, my weird brain still surfaces it sometimes in the early hours of the morning when I can’t get back to sleep, along with other ‘failures’ in life. (It wasn’t a failure; I didn’t ‘fail’.)
The thing is, though, that working for any hierarchical organisation, whether it’s for-profit, non-profit, or otherwise, means that you have very little power or say in how things operate. What I liked about this article was how well it explains the difference between how you enter and how you leave an organisation.
The Stoic philosophers tell us that in life you should prepare for death. I don’t think it’s unreasonable in our working lives to also prepare for endings, and do them on our own terms.
For those like me who’ve experienced layoffs, work has become just that—work. You do what’s assigned, and if your company squanders your potential or forces you to waste time on unnecessary projects, you simply stop caring. You collect your paycheck at the end of the month, and that’s it. This is the new modern work: no more striving to be 40% better every year.
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I’ve wanted to write about this topic for a long time, but it’s been difficult to find the energy. The subject itself is a deep disappointment for me, and every time I reflect on layoffs, it makes me profoundly sad. It’s a stark reminder of how companies treat workers as disposable. Before you join, they go to great lengths to make you feel valued and excited to accept their offer. You meet multiple people, and some even offer signing bonuses. But when layoffs come, you’re reduced to a name on a list. During the exit interview, a random person from the company reads a prepared script and can’t answer your questions. The HR team that once worked to make you feel valued doesn’t even conduct an actual conversation with you. That random person becomes the last connection you have to a company you spent years at.
Source: Mert Bulan
Image: Mitchell Luo