The Big Layoff 2023
What you see is s screen grab using the snipping tool for the image search term 2023 Layoffs. As the weekend is coming to a close and I felt an urge to write about this topic, not because I am a cybersecurity expert or a financial advisor but simply as an employee.
So as I recall the recent surge of layoffs probably gained notoriety due to Elon Musk firing 80% of his newly acquired "freedom of press" loudspeaker of the 21st century tool called Twitter. Yeah I can write about this dude and his ambitions but no that is not what I want to write about. Since then other financial speculators started forecasting the big down in economy, the fear of losing so much capital bla bla bla and companies shareholders who love people for sure but the numbers in their bank accounts matter a lot more. I mean we are after all talking about "big wealth hoarders" ability to make more wealth and in doing so making more jobs eventually or so the story goes. The word on the street is "layoff" so unless everyone layoff significant number of employees there is no sustainable future for the companies to carry on making more profits and grow and remain the best. Yeah of course.
I think the employed people especially in a highly skilled area are not short of jobs and these kind of layoffs actually do play a really good part in the lifecycle of an economy to rebound stronger than before, what I am trying to discuss here is the process which is currently at play and how that can impact lives negatively if certain actions are not delivered in a controlled way.
Working in the UK (and EU until we got the Brexit), I somehow got accustomed to many built-in safeguards deployed by the governments in the EU. I used to think its a bit too much and it seems more like red-tape and burden on the business, having said that I have obviously lived my life here too and I feel that the European model offers the sense of security which our American friends don't seem to get (in general for all jobs not just high paying highly skilled jobs). Since living, working and establishing my household here in Europe I have come to realise that what matters is not always the "bottom line", actually what matters is how you treat people, how you create communities of happy thriving towns and cities, how you ensure that businesses are just a tool to ensure that state of human civilisation is built. Businesses core cannot only be about profits it has to have the human and environmental moral compass which guides it.
Sadly the USA is lacking far behind Europe when it comes to healthy, happy families (for all its citizens). Those who have and those who don't has increased over the past decades, cities are thriving in some neighbourhoods only while other neighbourhoods are so deprived that you cannot imagine going there even in daytime. I won't even discuss gun laws but I will remember looking at a sign board on the door of one of the companies I worked for in Chicago which said "Guns not allowed" it was a shock for me to even see that as a sign becasue for me common sense was who would thinking of brining guns to work casually. Anyways I digress from the main topic I set forth for myself (apologies :))
Now coming to leadership, for me any organization is like a ship. There is Captain, there is techies running the engine, there is HR recruiting new team members for cleaning, cooking etc. Now every journey the ship takes we keep true to our core values and try to achieve goals as best as we can while the Captain keeps us safe from the rough seas or unforeseen situations. We get to do the jobs we are either assigned or happy to do and work through our days making sure the ship keeps afloat and running better than any other ship in the sea.
What I see with current layoffs is lack of true leadership, as all the different stories I read from friends and ex-colleagues in different organisations is that they worked really hard for 13 years, 10 years, 5 years in USA and one fine morning they are just not able to login and do their jobs only to find out that actually "Your services are no longer required". I fail to see the human element in these situations. I look at the few shares I have in these companies and I see their value increase every time a Layoff is announced, which even makes it harder for the human inside me feel that these humans are now being treated like numbers. They have names and they have families and they have committed to do good for the common objective and now that the seas ahead look a bit rough or even more rough, just because the leader/captain can't or doesn't have the ability to think differently asks the so called "dead weight" numbered employee to jump the ship because we may fail if something bad was to happen in future. I think that is not called leadership, I think that is called saving the metal ship from any damage in rough seas so shareholders don't shout at the prospect of losing some revenue and the value is clearly not the humans in that ship who worked tirelessly to keep it afloat.
The example above is mainly at the US employment norms and the power within the hands of leadership to pull the plug from the "matrix reality within the company". This is where I agree more with the norms set in Europe where redundancies do happen but they happen in a way where people don't feel like "dead weight" thrown off the ship. They feel like humans where they are consulted and asked if they volunteer to leave and should no one steps forward then select and even then try to find ways to lessen the blow.
Anyways I don't see these layoffs going away too quickly, so for those of you who have managed to read my brainwaves this far let me tell you that I do see positive in all situations now. This time will pass and everyone who is impacted today will find better fulfilling jobs or even create new businesses but what people wont forget is the cold manner in which they are treated if they are treated like that. So for those who are decision makers in any organisation my message to you is that you make sure you communicate with your crew/employees the options ahead, you get everyone to understand how difficult a situation it is, you lead with example, you take ownership of the decisions you made for the ship to be in that position where you now have to throw some weight in the sea. So you as a leader if you want to continue with dignity then treat people with dignity and respect, American model is not the way to do that in my opinion, European model is better but the best model is where you keep humans in the centre of your business along with profits of shareholders not just the latter.