I Can See My Layoff From Here....

October 10, 2008…

There have been numerous articles about what to look for and how to recognize if your company or your job is in trouble. On the corporate level, of course, sales are down, revenue is down, profits are down, business sucks. On the personal side, you’re probably not in line for a promotion to the Executive Suite nor should you be counting on being around to collect that gold watch for 50 years of continuous service, if you start finding yourself out of the loop on office matters, are not being included in meetings, not getting a lot of “face-time” with the boss, and generally aren’t real busy. I guess we all kind of know this, but when it is happening to us or our company, we can tend to be hopeful and even overlook some of the signs. And with all fingers and toes crossed, that was how I approached my own situation.

All of the signs of course were there and then some. Business was slow. Even worse, our corporate management had made some questionable business decisions, which had earlier strained and drained resources and revenues, and now actually resulted in the loss of what was to have been a sizeable portion of our future business. I was a Professional Services Project Manager responsible for implementing and managing new business and clients, but there wasn’t any new business or clients. My role as a result had shifted to Production Support and Client Relationship Management for our one remaining large client. Some days I was real busy, other days not so much, and overall, probably not busy enough to justify my full time salary. On top of all this, we had just been acquired by a young, lean and mean competitor. Iceberg ahead!

Our first meeting with the new senior management came the day after the acquisition was finalized. The Chairman had flown in from Chicago with his Chief Administrative Officer, and met us all in the Board Room. The Chairman was young, almost too young even to be my son, and the Chief Administrative Officer wasn’t much older looking.

The Chairman talked about how they were a young, successful, aggressive company, not used to failure. They were out to “crush the competition”, and he was happy that our two companies were now together for the long fight. Then, he told us we would all be given temporary two month employment contracts and would have to immediately sign non-compete agreements which would last a year. Iceberg fast approaching!

This was all merely formality, we were told, just to cover everybody until the new company was firmly in place and the new organizations fully defined over the next 2 months. And over those next 2 months, the new management would be meeting with all of the employees to evaluate everybody and determine where everybody fit in. But, again, not to worry we were told, there was plenty of work and opportunities for everyone. Iceberg straight ahead!