The company I work for is looking to lay people off later this year. It's a stressful time for everyone involved, and no one quite knows what's going to happen. People are understandably worried, but my take is that I can't control it, so I'm not going to spend time worrying about it. Yes, I know that I could lose my job. But all I can do is do my job, and hopefully do it well. After that, I'll let the chips fall where they may. In fact, if I start getting too caught up in all of this, I give you permission to smack me to keep me honest about it all.
However, this attitude, combined with my natural smart ass tendencies, means that I tend to laugh at things that might not seem so funny to others. For example, we get email updates about news items pertinent to the company, and the most recent one had the following two (paraphrased) headlines right after each other: "Company well positioned for future, doing well" and "Company needs to restructure, layoffs coming." My first reaction was something akin to, "haha, somebody lied." Now, I know that it's possible for the company as a whole to be doing well and for a certain department/organization to be in trouble, and that's what's going on here. There isn't any shadiness going on (that I know of). Still, I couldn't help but laugh at the seeming absurdity of it all.
The next thing that made me crack up was an FAQ on a website pertaining to the mechanics of how they're going to deal with the layoffs. Notably, certain groups are excluded because they're key to keeping our operations running. That makes sense, even though it might rub people the wrong way. So, the FAQ had a question that looked something like, "if we're in this together, how come groups X, Y, and Z are excluded?" Remember, I deal with two and three year old kids all the time. In my mind, I automatically heard this being asked in one of their voices, and my natural instinct was to say something about sharing and taking turns. Again, it's a legitimate question, particularly if it involves people's livelihoods. Still, the way it was phrased made me laugh out loud.
The latest one actually involved the rest of my team, and it made them laugh, too. Remember how part of the company is hurting but other parts of the company are doing okay? We were in a meeting about this whole thing, and me being me, I jokingly suggested that we just add a "you guys are making us look bad" tax to all of the internal billing. The parts that are doing well pay more, we pay less, and we call it a day. It got a laugh out of everyone else in the meeting, my supervisor & his supervisor included, so I'm glad I was able to at least to lighten the mood a little. Sadly, those guys had already foreseen some wise guy like me coming along, so that plan is specifically outlawed. Foiled again.
So, at the end of all this, I kind of hope that the emails keep coming in. For one, the more information we rank-and-file peons have about the way things are going to work, the better. And secondly, and arguably more importantly, these emails & meetings are a great source of unintentional comedy.
However, this attitude, combined with my natural smart ass tendencies, means that I tend to laugh at things that might not seem so funny to others. For example, we get email updates about news items pertinent to the company, and the most recent one had the following two (paraphrased) headlines right after each other: "Company well positioned for future, doing well" and "Company needs to restructure, layoffs coming." My first reaction was something akin to, "haha, somebody lied." Now, I know that it's possible for the company as a whole to be doing well and for a certain department/organization to be in trouble, and that's what's going on here. There isn't any shadiness going on (that I know of). Still, I couldn't help but laugh at the seeming absurdity of it all.
The next thing that made me crack up was an FAQ on a website pertaining to the mechanics of how they're going to deal with the layoffs. Notably, certain groups are excluded because they're key to keeping our operations running. That makes sense, even though it might rub people the wrong way. So, the FAQ had a question that looked something like, "if we're in this together, how come groups X, Y, and Z are excluded?" Remember, I deal with two and three year old kids all the time. In my mind, I automatically heard this being asked in one of their voices, and my natural instinct was to say something about sharing and taking turns. Again, it's a legitimate question, particularly if it involves people's livelihoods. Still, the way it was phrased made me laugh out loud.
The latest one actually involved the rest of my team, and it made them laugh, too. Remember how part of the company is hurting but other parts of the company are doing okay? We were in a meeting about this whole thing, and me being me, I jokingly suggested that we just add a "you guys are making us look bad" tax to all of the internal billing. The parts that are doing well pay more, we pay less, and we call it a day. It got a laugh out of everyone else in the meeting, my supervisor & his supervisor included, so I'm glad I was able to at least to lighten the mood a little. Sadly, those guys had already foreseen some wise guy like me coming along, so that plan is specifically outlawed. Foiled again.
So, at the end of all this, I kind of hope that the emails keep coming in. For one, the more information we rank-and-file peons have about the way things are going to work, the better. And secondly, and arguably more importantly, these emails & meetings are a great source of unintentional comedy.
My officemate and I are getting a kick out of the FAQs, too. One guy recently posted something to the extent of, "You're giving me too much managerial gibberish, and I don't have an MBA. Quit trying to spin it like a politician, and spit it out like the Mississippi boy you claim to be." (He aimed this at our corporation's CIO, for others reading along.)
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