Member-only story
From Layoff to Triumph: Ten Tips for Surviving the Post-Layoff Office
The pain is always temporary
I peered over the grey cubicle wall and was stunned by the silence.
There were 3 other project managers in my three-cornered cell block — today I’m the sole occupant.
Feels eerie walking into work and noticing the empty desks. No chit-chat about how your weekend was, nobody to go to lunch with, and nothing but silence as you clack away on your keyboard. The workplace has been shrunk to a microcosm — it’s just you.
Life is full of misery, loneliness, and suffering, and it’s all over much too soon. — Woody Allen
In the US technology sector over 30,000 people have been trimmed from the payrolls according to Crunchbase News. More layoffs are coming this year for IBM, Amazon, Nike, Intel, and Google. This workforce reduction train isn’t slowing down — it’s speeding up. More workers will be given a cardboard box to gather their personal belongings, get their access badges taken, and be ushered out by security.
You can’t help but think — those lucky bastards.
Why?
Because they don’t have to deal with the transformation of what work was when they were here and what company is now when they are gone. Here are some things I noticed…
