GatewayRedbirds.com

You inevitably start hearing the rumors well before it happens (like the week before T-Giving, for crying out loud). Sleepless night before. Then driving to work the day you've heard the ax is going to fall is hell. Spend the morning looking over your shoulder waiting for HR to tap you on the shoulder. When it finally happens you're so relieved it's not you that you can't even properly console, even offer regards, to a compatriot of the last 9 years as he's leaving. This day sux.

Oh the office environment before layoffs - toxic. Horrible.

The dot com I worked for years ago was the worst. There was a wave of layoffs (150 people or so) then 6 or 8 months later another wave of layoffs. A bunch of people scared to death in their little cubes trying to look busy and worrying about their bills.

Horrible atmosphere.

That would be bad. An instrument repair company laid off the night once on me. Then they hired pretty much everyone back except me for the day shift. Not sure what they were getting at there...

I survived a round of layoffs due to a merger a few mos ago. Not fun.

Michael wrote:I survived a round of layoffs due to a merger a few mos ago. Not fun.

Obviously, this layoff was not meant to pare dead weight.

Yeah, they fired all the wrong people.

Michael wrote:Yeah, they fired all the wrong people.

They always do...

It would be much easier if "they" knew who all the GRBers were working in their midst. Actually, that wouldn't be funny because we'd all be unemployed.

Sorry about your friends, Tabasco. Last spring I was pretty sure I was going to get it because my friend who works at the same company called me from Ohio, as several of our peers had been chopped (EST). I was glad she forewarned me, so the shock was lessened.

15 years ago we had massive layoffs where I worked. They had given warnings, planned and prepared for it quite a bit. They had it so that a "coach" would escort the person out of the building. Our coach was "Betsy", and the guy in my office who chose not to go voluntarily was "Bob". Bob was extremely well liked, nicest guy in the world and a good family man. But dumb. Dumb as a brick. Dumb, dumb dumb. Company definitely made the right choice with him.

Anyhow, Betsy came to get him and broke down. Just couldn't take it, and the sight of watching Bob console Betsy as Betsy escorted him out of the office was just weird.

They timed it right before our bonuses. We were all mad and bummed about Bob, then we got our great bonus check and it was like "Screw Bob, Bob was stupid and deserved it". Then about two weeks later it sunk in that we were working like dogs, and that even though Bob wasn't too bright he did contribute. And picking up the slack sucked, and then we were like "Screw the company, I wonder how ol' Bob is doing".

I quit a year later, and we had cut so many people out that the day I turned my notice in I literally thought I was going to have to go to the president of Ameritech. They basically took out level 2 and 4 of the management tree, and my level 3 boss was in Indianapolis and gone. I honestly didn't know who to tell to eff off.

I was once laid off, after getting out of jail, for braking into the concession stand at the ball park where I worked. Well maybe that was fired and not laid off.......

i was also laid off for refusing to work on Sunday at a fish shop I worked at....wait that was a firing also......

I guess I have never been laid off!!!!