
Warning Signs You're About to Be Laid-Off - mixmastamyk
http://www.geekademy.com/2015/11/warning-signs-youre-about-to-be-laid-off.html
======
myth_buster
When you try to enter office's multi-level parking but your access key doesn't
work.

When the Director/VP/Head says "even though the market has turned, we have
_no_ plans to lay people off"

When you receive a notification that your <enter company's source control>
privileges have been revoked.

When you see a voicemail (or tweet in case of Twitter) from HR around Friday
afternoon/evening or early Monday morning.

When you apply for vacation but the request is denied for unspecified reasons
("We may need you here during that period").

When your manager keeps postponing your ++year() roadmap meeting requests.

~~~
gtrubetskoy
>> When you see a voicemail (or tweet in case of Twitter) from HR around
Friday afternoon/evening or early Monday morning.

Not quite - layoffs usually happen on Thursdays (so that any problems/issues
can be sorted out on Friday), last week of the second to last month before the
end of the fiscal year (so that severance pay is booked in this fiscal year),
but never on a payday week (too much work for payroll).

~~~
myth_buster
I was partly referring to this
[https://twitter.com/bartt/status/653946266938818561](https://twitter.com/bartt/status/653946266938818561)

------
jacquesm
Personal experience: when you are working late and you hear suspicious noises
in the executive quarter. After arming yourself with a nice long bar of metal
you come across the CFO who is hurriedly packing all the expensive computers
into the back of his car. When confronted he offers to pay you your
outstanding invoice cash in return for your silence...

------
potatoman2
I'd say watch out for a meeting that's so important that it's split into two
groups, and you're in the first group.

~~~
arethuza
I had the unusual experience of having everyone else in the office being
summoned to an HR meeting and me left at my desk as I'd already resigned...

~~~
nostrademons
I once got called at home the Monday after I'd left a company to hear that I'd
been "laid off". The previous Friday had been my official last day (planned
exit, I was going off to college), but I had banked a bunch of unused vacation
days, and they were calling to let me know that they wouldn't be able to pay
out the remainder of my vacation pay.

Much later, when I got into the workforce for real, I learned that I could've
collected unemployment checks for this, and that if I'd played my cards right,
I could've been drawing unemployment for my first year at college. Ah well -
one of my coworkers told me "If you'd done that, I might have to hate you.
Unemployment is for workers who need it, not college students who take a gap
year at a dot-com."

~~~
ac29
>if I'd played my cards right, I could've been drawing unemployment for my
first year at college.

What state was this in? That is certainly illegal in California, and I would
assume most states, though people do get away with defrauding the system.

~~~
nostrademons
It was Massachusetts. A number of people told me later that I could've
collected, and a quick glance through Massachusett's Unemployment Insurance
FAQ shows no mention of being a student other than UI not covering student
work-study programs for financial aid:

[http://www.mass.gov/lwd/unemployment-
insur/resources/questio...](http://www.mass.gov/lwd/unemployment-
insur/resources/questions-and-answers/claimants/eligibility.html)

I didn't because it never occurred to me - as far as I was concerned, I left
my job normally to go to college and they just didn't pay out the vacation
pay. I wasn't hurting for money then or now (I was still living with my
parents at the time), so I don't really regret it, but it does appear to be a
real, genuine loophole in the system.

------
cableshaft
When everything has been "We have to work really hard and long hours just to
keep the startup alive!" (we were working 60+ hour weeks every week) and
suddenly there's nothing to work on, and you're told you can take a few days
off, and the boss is suddenly a lot harder to get ahold of (he worked in the
parent office and came by to visit as much as possible).

...the next time you see your boss in person might be to tell you the apps he
pretended were successful didn't actually make any money and he has to close
the company down.

------
cableshaft
When you make a hotel reservation to go to a conference in three weeks
(Nintendo conference in Los Angeles in my case) and the parent company calls
and tells your boss "Wait! Don't make any travel plans! Also, we're going to
visit in two weeks!"

....yeah, we basically twiddled our thumbs for two weeks until they came by to
pack up our servers and fire everyone.

------
koz1000
When your company sends a press release about the layoffs to the wire services
and it accidentally gets released 24 hours before the event.

------
noarchy
One-on-one meetings suddenly scheduled after management themselves have been
in meetings for an unusually long time.

------
awjr
The one that got me, was the German company I was working for was bankrupted
by the president of the company as a key sale of the software product fell
through. He did it on December 23rd, before any of the directors could
intervene (A quirk of german company law).

I found out on the phone on the 28th while back in the UK. Fun times.

So my contribution: "When it appears the directors bet the company on a single
sale and failed."

~~~
goldenkey
Honestly, I think that is what you heard down the grapevine. Sounds like a
cover up for something much more heinous. Was this information public/private,
how did you find out? (Not attacking your trust, just sounds a bit odd to me)

~~~
awjr
I flew back and collected my stuff, even going back to the office. The place
was dead and I met with some of the people. They were in utter shock. Over 30
people's livelihoods destroyed.

~~~
goldenkey
Really terrible. Since working at a corporation, I no longer look at Dilbert
comics the same way. Man, so much waste, so much lack of backbone, so many of
the wrong people in the right positions. I'd really like to read a book that
explains why almost every corporation, aside from maybe a select few, have the
"oh-thats-just-a-quirk-of-XYZ-leave-it-alone-not-worth-getting-fired-over."
You basically end up getting a workforce that does the bare minimum to say
they are still working. I mean, I talked to my manager the other day, an
abusive one at that, and I told him, just do it already, fucking fire me. But
he says he can't. I will just be "purged" by the performance review process..
What a fucking joke.

------
coldcode
When the CTO stands up and says "there will be no layoffs" it's time to clean
up your resume. Happened to me twice.

------
cableshaft
When you're a contractor and a project you were working on gets cancelled
internally, the only other developer leaves for greener pastures, and suddenly
your boss takes an added interest in everything related to your work, and
makes sure to get the passwords for various things.

... you might get a call as your driving home from work that day to tell you
not to come in to work the next day because your contract has been terminated,
and they'll ship your desk contents to you, eventually.

~~~
LanceH
Or you get that call telling you not to come in the next day. Then a day later
they call you telling you need to bring the computer back in right now.

What follows is a back and forth exchange of "I'll bring it in when I feel
like." "That's unprofessional." "You mean unprofessional like having someone
do something for you when you're not paying them or laying someone off by
email unprofessional?"

------
jobu
Cancelling the company Christmas party has been the sign of a death spiral for
two companies that I worked at.

~~~
amyjess
A similar anecdote from one previous employer: at that company, we had a lot
of remote B2B sales people all over the country and even one overseas. On rare
occasions, there would be a sales meeting where all the sales people come in
to meet with the top executives personally and discuss strategy.

Well, my first couple of years at the company, there was a sales meeting to
coincide with the Christmas party. Basically, all of the sales people were
flown in to attend the Christmas party and they justified it as a business
expense by having a strategy meeting sometime that week. One year, that didn't
happen. I mentioned offhand to somebody "too bad the sales guys couldn't make
it", and I was outright told that they skipped out on the sales meeting to
save money. So we had a Christmas party, but we cut back the invitations.

That was no surprise, given the events of the previous few months. They had
been actively trying to shrink the company by attrition; i.e., letting
employees quit and declining to hire a replacement. I also don't know anyone
who got a raise that year. We ended up losing a lot of people just from that
alone. They also fired a bunch of sales guys for underperforming and hired a
bunch more who were almost exclusively paid on commission... and I'd heard
that the CEO specifically intended to flood the company with commission-only
sales hires because he didn't have to pay them more than peanuts unless they
brought in money.

The next few months were brutal. January opened up with two executives being
fired -- while the actual _reasons_ for the firings were because of a power
struggle, they weren't really replaced. One of them had his power distributed
among the people who reported to him, and another was replaced by "promoting"
multiple existing employees while still making them do their previous jobs.
One of those was fired only a few days after being promoted, too. The next
month, I was laid off. I heard through the grapevine that shortly after I was
laid off, they laid off another guy and closed the entire India office,
letting everyone go except one or two employees who were transferred to the
home office.

------
hwstar
When you are asked to sign a non-compete agreement, or agreement to use
binding arbitration where no such agreement was in place before.

When your supervisor isn't interested in keeping you busy.

When suppliers call you instead of accounts payable because no one in accounts
payable is answering the phone.

When you can't get approval from the top for ANY large purchase requisition.

When the VP of HR is extremely busy just before really bad quarterly results
are announced.

When the CEO of a California-based Corporation is overheard in the hallway
bitching about onerous employment laws.

When there are lots of unfamiliar people walking around the place in suits,
and a lot of closed door meetings.

~~~
koz1000
Closed door meetings with odd combinations of managers that don't normally
meet is a HUGE red flag.

------
mahouse
When you wake up to this
[https://twitter.com/bartt/status/653946266938818561](https://twitter.com/bartt/status/653946266938818561)

~~~
seivan
Wow that's brutal, especially the Github subject but from what I gathered he
missed a call that went to voicemail.

------
tiredwired
Your manager wants to add an admin account to the laptop you have been using
for over a year.

------
jambo
When the CEO puts "restructuring meeting" on the shared calendar accidentally.

------
grabcocque
"It's not you, it's us. We still want to be friends."

------
cableshaft
When you get asked to wait two weeks because the main client hasn't paid yet
because their assets aren't "liquid enough" (the client said that to everyone
himself). And then they ask you to do it again a month later.

...you might get called in to be told the company can't afford you anymore and
get laid off with two-thirds of the staff.

------
rfdave
When you move into a New (New Lease/New Construction) building for the
organization. Two for Two so far in my career.

------
peteretep
Warning sign you're getting bought: someone asks for the licenses of all the
open-source libraries in your stack...

~~~
mackey
Or that a "board member" wants detailed write ups on your processes.

------
amyjess
Here's another one:

Executives leave the company, and their replacements have lesser titles and
are existing employees who have to continue to do their existing jobs in
addition to whatever function they absorbed. Bonus points if the executive's
function gets divided up among multiple employees.

------
themodelplumber
When a consultant comes in and interviews you about "what exactly you do,"
nodding generously and saying, "oh wow, yeah" every few sentences.

When management seems to continually allow ridiculous overreaches in employee
behavior, especially when such behavior is critical of management.

------
southphillyman
When higher ups who barely acknowledged your existence suddenly become very
interested in your future availability. Companies love to settle group layoffs
in 1 swell swoop. My multi week vacation may have bought my team more time and
more importantly another month of health insurance.

------
joezydeco
When all your external vendors and subcontractors are told to stop working and
ship back all materials.

~~~
jakejake
Also when external vendors start dropping hints to you that they haven't been
paid for their previous invoice (and you are not responsible for finances).

~~~
joezydeco
That's a great one.

------
amyjess
I got hit by II, back in 2010. They hired an intern, asked me to train her...
a month later, I was laid off.

Also, I knew a number of people who worked for a local video game company who
got the axe after their paychecks had been late for a while. They were all
complaining that they haven't been paid in about two months, and then one day
the CEO calls people into his office one at a time... 11 people were let go
that day. A bunch more got the axe about a month later. They weren't a big
company. It took a while for them to get their final paychecks, and I think
that was only because a couple of them threatened to sue.

(edit: just to make this clear, I didn't work at that video game company, but
several friends of mine did, and I got to hear the stories)

~~~
seivan
Sounds very similar to Crytek.

~~~
amyjess
It wasn't. The company I'm talking about was based in a suburb of Dallas and
only had the one office. In fact, I believe that after the layoffs they
actually got rid of their office for a while and worked out of the CEO's house
for a bit before they could afford to rent space again.

Much smaller and lower-profile than Crytek, though they still have their own
Wikipedia article.

By the way, even before the layoffs, the CEO was notorious for firing anyone
he felt had a "bad attitude", including a world-renowned living legend of a
developer who was suffering from severe depression and had been previously
hospitalized for a suicide attempt.

He was known for working his employees to the bone, developers regularly slept
at the office, and the company was a caricature of every overtime-happy game
developer. One of my friends took up smoking and was addicted for a few years
because the only way she was allowed to leave her desk was to go on a smoke
break and sitting in one place for so long was getting physically painful.
They also had a policy where no matter how late you stayed the previous night,
even if you were there until 3am, you had to be in by 10am the next day or
they'd dock you a vacation day.

------
stronglikedan
There was this one time that I suggested cross-training to reduce the bus
factor, and management went with it. I was being sincere, but I have to admit
that it was amusing watching everyone think they were going to be laid off
when we implemented it.

~~~
robalfonso
I am big on cross-training to avoid the bus factor! But everyone gets
paranoid, the problem is it needs to be ingrained in the culture to thats
"what you do" and not have it just pop up all of a sudden, thats what gives
people trepidation.

------
tesla
When your network login suddenly stops working.

~~~
tesla
Or, when you get a weird email from the payroll system about having just
withdrawn /exactly/ how much PTO you've accrued.

------
robodale
When the Director of HR and VP of Legal send a meeting request to you.

~~~
arethuza
Actually, I got a surprise meeting request with CIO and Global Head of HR (and
not even of his grim minions) - which I didn't think was good.

Got the meeting request while I was out of the office - got in to find my
account locked out...

Not good I think - but I was on 6 months notice so WTF...

Turns out I was being notified of a restructuring and a new boss and my
account being locked out was an unfortunate coincidence.

Mind you the entire office did get the bullet about a year later - I'd left by
that point as it was clear that something was up....

------
beachstartup
here's another sign you're about to be laid off: none of this happens, and you
haven't done any real work in months.

------
hyperliner
When you are told to stay in your cube and NOT MOVE.

Then people walk by and pat you and the back to come to another room.

Source:
[http://www.ihatedell.net/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=17...](http://www.ihatedell.net/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=17068)

(search for "day in 2001")

------
PMan74
When somebody needs to say "let's get all outstanding code checked-in ASAP!"

~~~
nevi-me
That one's in the article.

My contribution: when we have a new CEO and she starts asking how much revenue
cost centers generate.

~~~
PMan74
You misunderstand me - the fact that there is "outstanding code" should have
alarm bells ringing

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josefresco
An old one, but also be weary of private meetings with your boss on Friday.

------
arethuza
When a company that was previously very strict about line managers setting
yearly and half-yearly performance objectives suddenly doesn't set any....

------
jakejake
Having the entire team suddenly focus on a superfluous project like the
company intranet or any non-critical busywork. Not a good sign!

------
dghughes
Any announcements on a Friday especially before a long weekend.

------
rickyc091
Looks like I'm going to be laid off soon :'(

