Negotiate Your Own Severance Package (Here's How)!

Dear Liz,

I'm a big fan of you and Human Workplace. I need advice. I'm in a bad situation at work. I've been at the company for four years and in my current job one year.

When I joined, our focus was on the mobile market. I ran two product groups that really put our company on the map. I got promoted to lead a development team, but there was disagreement in the upper ranks about which direction to follow. My stuff became less relevant a year ago and as a favor to my boss, our CTO, I took on a software quality and documentation leadership role under a new manager.

The problem is that my new boss is not someone who can work easily with a guy like me. I have a product focus and he's all about numbers. He's ten years younger than I am (I'm 42). He is a smart guy but has no ability to think outside his box. Over the past few months he's been signalling me none too subtly that he may not be able to use me on his team. I feel that if I'm going to be let go, the least I deserve is a solid severance package.

As much as my boss has hinted around about how he may not have a 'suitable role' for me, he hasn't said a word about a package to let me leave with a cushion. I need your advice, because although I was treated well for my first three years here and have enjoyed the ride very much, I don't like the fact that the people who benefited so richly from my work now seem to be shoving me out the door without even a thank-you.

I have thought about going to the CTO and asking for/demanding a hefty severance package if the company is going to release me, but I figured I'd ask you first. You seem to know how to help people get what they deserve. Got any coaching for me?

Thanks,

Arthur

Dear Arthur,

You have heard me rail about Godzilla, the scaly monster that plagues organizational life. Godzilla is the edifice of policies, rules, hierarchy and non-truth-telling that sucks the life out of way too many workplaces. It is important to remember that Godzilla runs on fear. Fear, in fact, is the heart of Godzilla. Fear keeps us from bringing ourselves to work all the way and being completely human there. There is fear threaded throughout your story, so a discussion of fear is a reasonable place to start.

It is hard to make big changes. You are forty-two, the perfect age to find a new professional hill to climb. I understand that at any age it's scary to think about stepping into the void. You've been in your company for four years and you've had heady, triumphant experiences there. It's not easy to say good-bye to that.

Fear can cause us to do wacky things, like divide the world into two kinds of people: those who are With Us and the rest, who are Against Us. You are doing that right now. You're on the side of right, having helped bring the company from Point A to wherever it is now. How dare this young 32-year-old punk stride in and tell you what's important, or toss you aside like a used styrofoam cup?

I understand your feelings. Every one of us reading or writing this column has been there.

The easiest country on Earth to emigrate to is the one called Indig Nation (a righteous place). When we decide we've been wronged, the adrenaline starts flowing and it flows with a mighty fury. I wish evolution would have just clipped off the righteous indignation gene when we came down out of the trees, because righteous indignation is a horrible thing. It gets us into fights and conflicts on a global scale, at work and in our own families. It springs from fear – fear that we aren't significant, or fear that we aren't right or smart or tough enough.

That's the worst one, isn't it, the 'tough enough' thing. Guys at work do the Great Ape battle routine to show one another who's a bigger badass. Women are no better. They snipe and stab one another in the back. Why all this hate, among normal and otherwise friendly people? It's fear.

We'd better start addressing fear at work pretty soon or it'll kill us – it's killing us already, between stress claims, prescription drug addiction and workplace violence. They're all different sides of the same coin – the problems that result when we view work as a ritualistic stage production where we lie to one another because we believe the script gives us permission to.

We have to learn to be honest at work, to bring ourselves completely there and tell the truth about what's happening around us and what we feel. We have community every other damn place people gather – at the bowling alley and the bookstore and the car wash. Why do we push the community out of work and make it forever a battle, a test, a proving ground?

Who does the energy called "I'm a bigger badass than you" ever help? You are caught in that vortex now. A severance check won't make you feel more appreciated, but we cling to things like that because the Religion of the Left Brain has trained us that money can salve human wounds. I want you to get money to go on your way, Arthur, but not because anyone owes it to you.

You asked for coaching. Please accept my suggestions knowing that they are given with empathy for your uncomfortable situation. You are not telling the truth all the way yourself. Taking a job to help out a buddy is a fear-based move. What was next in store for you a year ago, and what kept you from pursuing it?

Change is hard, I know. When we ignore a nudge from the universe, s/he comes back with a push, and the latest message from Mother Nature is the one your manager has sent you lately. It says "This isn't the right place for you anymore."

That isn't bad news, and your anger is misdirected. What is there to be angry about, after all? Your old boss suggested you take a job, and you tried it. Your new boss doesn't agree with your direction. That's fine. The energy has shifted.

There are millions of things for you to do in other workplaces, working on other projects. In your letter you don't touch on what you love to do, what you're dying to accomplish or what you're passionate about. Do you know? That's what life is always trying to teach us. Your manager is part of the grand scheme, gently scooting you back on your path.

You are angry that your boss has sent you oblique messages about the non-fit he perceives. Have you said "Thank you for sharing that concern, Gary."? You could have started a conversation about a civilized departure at any point, and you still can – that's what I advise you to do, right away. You will get your severance package, I predict, because you'll be completely human with Gary (my name for your new boss) and lift him up to the same human level. Here's the script for the conversation you might have with Gary.

You won't be aggrieved or petulant with him. Neither will you beg or grovel. You'll let Gary know that you see how this situation is uncomfortable for him. You'll ask whether he's game to talk about ways to break the logjam of non-communication.

You'll get your everybody-is-okay exit plan not because Gary owes it to you or because you did great things for the company back when and really deserve it. You'll work through this sticky human issue with Gary because both of you will be human with one another, something the two of you may not have done before. Both of your flames will grow!

I can't wait to hear how it all turns out. Write and tell us!

Best,

Liz

Did you miss the negotiation script Liz shared with Arthur? Here it is!

Human Workplace is a publishing, coaching & consulting firm whose
mission is to reinvent work for people. Visit us here to learn more about our 12-week
virtual coaching groups, Human-Voiced Resume and Pain Letter programs, one-on-one coaching and programs like Team Mojo? and Customer Service with a
Human Voice? for organizations.

PODCAST: Liz Ryan answers career and workplace questions (Help! I'm Underpaid? How do I compose a Dragon-Slaying Story? and more)

If the Human Workplace message resonates with you, please join us here. Join our LinkedIn group, too! Send our CEO, Liz Ryan, a LinkedIn invitation at [email protected] and FOLLOW Liz's columns here on LinkedIn.

Please LIKE our Facebook page!

Twitter: @humanworkplace

Ask Liz Ryan: Questions & Answers

1) What inspired the drawings in this story?

I started to draw a guy with his hand out and the boss putting an envelope in it, but there wasn't any emotion in that. I drew the person leaving with just the jeans and the money to get more forward energy and the power we associate with cash into the image.

I asked my 11-year-old what he thought the drawing was about and he said "Junk in the trunk?"

We are working on a course on conflict resolution, so the Soften badge has been on my mind. Too often in the business world, we don't teach people to soften at work. We teach them to harden and gather facts and data to support their position. We don't teach them to talk about blocked and tight energy between people, or teach them how to be human at work. We ignore the energetic side of work, the way the air feels -- the most important thing!

We pretend it doesn't exist.

So we are teaching people to overcome that unfortunate training most of us received, and remember how to be human even in sticky workplace situations.

2) What will the next story focus on?

Either political correctness or Employment at Will and illusory fake power, or both.

3) Any shout-outs this weekend?

Yes -- a shout-out to my sisters in Saudi Arabia who are driving cars. Friends in Saudi Arabia, what can the rest of us do to support Saudi women now?