As someone who has been laid off twice, I know that sometimes you can see the layoff coming, and sometimes you can’t (see Signs of a Pending Layoff for some of the clues).
But, one day you’re invited into an unscheduled meeting with your boss and someone from HR or invited into a conference room (or an auditorium) with other employees, and…
*BINGO* — you’re out of a job.
Perhaps your employer has done several rounds of layoffs, so you’re not really surprised. Or, perhaps you are part of the first group laid off.
Regardless, you are now officially jobless.
Getting Laid Off: Welcome to the Crowd of the Temporarily Unemployed!
As the old saying goes, “S**t happens.”
Interestingly, both of my layoffs were ultimately good for my career and my bank account. Positive results have happened very often for others, too, based on the many discussions I have had with people who had been laid off in their careers. I wish the same for you!
People are usually laid off for being in the wrong place at the wrong time in an organization which has decided it needs to cut expenses, specifically the people costs it has.
Do not expect logic in who gets laid off and who doesn’t, which departments survive and which don’t, etc.
Employers like to think that they have reduced their staff, carefully trimming the lowest performers and retaining the best. Not likely!
More frequently, the top performers are laid off because they are more expensive than the lower performers. Not logical (top performers make the orgaization more successful or profitable), but often a reality. Again, logic does not apply…
Often, layoffs are abruptly announced, and managers make across-the-board cuts as quickly as possible before the end of an accounting period. This is NOT “careful trimming.”
Being selected to be laid off most often is just bad luck. Don’t take it personally, and don’t feel like YOU are a failure. The reality is that your employer has failed. Not you.
If anyone has failed, it is the management of the organization. Don’t let the layoff destroy your confidence.
Do’s – Before You Are Laid Off
If layoffs are happening or if the feeling of many employees is that layoffs will be happening soon, get started. Don’t wait!
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Prepare.
You can do some things in advance to make your layoff less painful. Try to cover as many of the points in the Guide to Layoff Self-Defense, Preparing for a Layoff — Office, and Preparing for a Layoff — Home articles as possible.
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Begin your job search.
As carefully and quietly as you can, start looking for another job. Other employers will understand why you are looking for a job if other rounds of layoffs have already happened.
Don’t trash your employer in job interviews. Say something simple but honest, for example, “I’m ready for a change, and looking for an employer which offers the opportunity for career growth.” Then, ask a good question about the job to change the subject.
What To Do When & After You Are Laid Off:
Once you have had the official meeting and gotten the official notice that you have been laid off, collect your personal belongings from the workplace, and then…
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Get everything that is due you.
Ask about severance pay (one or two weeks per year of employment) and other accrued, but unused, benefits like commissions, bonuses, unused vacation and personal days, and possibly sick days.
Don’t forget expense reimbursement (mileage and other expenses for business travel), tuition reimbursement, healthcare and life insurance premium payments, and any other benefits your employer normally provides.
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Negotiate a benefit package.
Try to negotiate “outplacement” benefits – career coaching, resume writing and LinkedIn profile assistance, an office with telephone and administrative support, online support and access to specialized resources, etc.
There may be a “standard” package offered to everyone, but you may be in a position to negotiate more. You won’t know if you don’t try, and, at this point, what do you have to lose?
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IMMEDIATELY – Request a laid-off (not fired) employee letter from HR
This is a short letter on company letterhead from someone in HR, hopefully the director, stating that you were laid off as part of a larger general layoff and not fired because of any personal performance problems. Bring this letter with you on interviews, and include it whenever you are asked for your references.
If your employer’s layoff is in the news, you may not need it for your first post-layoff job search, but keep it handy for the later ones.
If they won’t do a letter on letterhead, an email from the email account of the head of HR (with full name and title on the message)
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IMMEDIATELY – Find out about continuing your health insurance coverage.
Ask for the details on continuing your medical insurance coverage (assuming that you were covered by your employer’s group health insurance at the time you were laid off). It’s called COBRA – an acronym for the federal legislation that set it up in 1986.
COBRA allows you to continue to participate in a medical plan, for a specified period of time, usually 18 months, but you will be expected to pay the full premium.
To find out if you qualify and/or if your employer doesn’t provide the information, be sure to ask your state’s Employment Office about possible COBRA coverage. Do NOT accept your employer’s opinion on whether or not you qualify for COBRA.
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IMMEDIATELY – Register for unemployment compensation with your local state Employment Office.
Even if you’ve received a severance pay package, be sure to register for unemployment compensation. If you wait too long to register, you may find that you no longer qualify, so don’t wait!
Don’t try to hide your severance benefits, and don’t wait to register.
Note: In some states, some employers do not qualify for unemployment compensation (e.g. small non-profits headquartered in another state), but check with your state’s employment office to find out for sure.
[Don’t pay a “service” to do this for you. That service is a scam, a waste of your money and time. Go to your local One-Stop Career Center and register to get started.]
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Have personal business cards made, or make your own on your computer.
You’ll need them for networking, to hand to potential employers, etc. See the Preparing for a Layoff – Steps to Take at Home article for more details. To protect your privacy, consider setting up Gmail and Google Voice accounts.
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Put LinkedIn to work for you.
You may feel very confident about your prospects for landing a new job, and hopefully you will land one very soon. But, these days job search is more complex in the past, and doing an effective job search on your own can be very difficult. Check out Guide to LinkedIn for Job Search for details and much more information.
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Get support in your job search.
You may feel very confident about your prospects for landing a new job, and hopefully you will land one very soon. But, these days job search is more complex in the past, and doing an effective job search on your own can be very difficult.
A solitary job search can be demoralizing, too, with unanticipated and undeserved rejection happening on a daily basis.
A job search support group or job club can be extremely helpful in your networking, in understanding what works for job search, and in realizing you are not the only person being rejected for no good reason.
Each state has several American Job Centers, formerly known as CareerOneStop Centers, where you can find assistance and support.
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Catch your breath, and deal with your feelings.
You’ll probably be angry, hurt, scared, discouraged, and depressed, at least for a while. It can be a grieving process – we often identify with our employer. Sometimes our job is our identity.
Take a day (or a week) off to cry, if you feel like it, and rage at the unfairness of the situation. If it helps, and it does help many people, dump your anger out on paper. Write it down. Get rid of it so it doesn’t sabotage your job search. Then, unless you can afford to be unemployed, move on with your life and career.
Read the advice in Job-Hunt’s Job Loss Recovery section. Let author/expert Nan Russell’s Job Loss Recovery column help you deal with this loss so you can move on to the rest of your career.
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Take a few moments to count your blessings, every day.
Yes, a layoff often feels like a sharp blow to your ego, and it is. But, you have many blessings in your life! We all do.
When I was first laid off, I would name them in my head before I went to sleep to stop the voices in my head telling me I’d never find another job. I still do it, and, no matter how miserable a day has been, remembering those blessings keeps my spirits up. Hopefully, you will be helped too.
Your blessings likely include:
- A safe, warm, dry place to sleep.
- A roof over your head.
- Family members who love you.
- Friends who will give you moral support and encouragement.
- Food, water, electricity, telephone, Internet, and on and on and on
- . . . .
You get the idea – we all have MANY blessings we’re usually too busy to notice and appreciate.
Do NOT’s – Don’t Do These Things After Your Layoff
Some things are better not done!
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Don’t feel like you have failed personally.
You haven’t failed, except perhaps in your choice of employer or job or ignoring the proverbial “handwriting on the wall” that a layoff was probably pending. But, no one has perfect information or perfect vision about how an employer will evolve.
So learn from this experience, and be a bit more careful when you choose your next employer. [Read 50 Google Searches to Avoid Bad Employers and Layoffs for next time.]
Usually, you’ve just been in the wrong place at the wrong time. It happens (too often). No one — unfortunately — can eliminate the possibility of another layoff in the future.
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Don’t hide the fact that you’ve been laid off.
Millions of people have been laid off. If your employer was large and the layoff was very public, you won’t be able to escape it. So don’t try.
It can be an advantage — you won’t have to explain why you left your last job (or if you do, just say that you “left as part of a down-sizing that eliminated my job”). Many people (but, unfortunately, not all) will know that your effectiveness at your job had little to do with your job loss. That’s just how layoffs work.
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Do NOT consider yourself “fired. ”
That can be too demoralizing, and it’s NOT appropriate, either. Being laid off is different from being fired!
People are “fired” for a reason related to the employer’s negative perception of their work performance, also known as “for cause. ”
People are “laid off” because the employer has restructured the organization and eliminated that position. BIG DIFFERENCE!
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Don’t trash your former employer in interviews, networking conversations, or social media.
Be as positive and upbeat as you can be whenever discussing your former employer.
In discussing the last company that laid me off, my favorite phrases included “I learned a lot there,” and “I worked with some great people. ” All very true!
Of course, I also learned some very valuable things I don’t often discuss, like that I am responsible for my own career and future, that even good management teams can make strategic mistakes ending a company’s market viability, and that some co-workers are just co-workers but others are life-long friends.
I have always called myself a “graduate” of that company – not a “layoff victim”(!), because I really did learn quite a bit while I worked there. The layoff was my “graduation” as it was for thousands of others.
As they say, ” Fake it ’til you make it. ” After a while, you won’t be faking.
If You Have Been or Are Getting Laid Off, Look to Your Future!
Strangely, being laid off can be a good thing. We often stay in jobs we don’t like out of inertia – too busy, or not quite unhappy enough to make the effort to find a new job. A layoff pushes us “out of the nest” into an involuntary job search — which can lead to a better job, a promotion, a career change, and, even, more money and happiness! See Involuntary Change Can Be Good for another perspective.
More About Surviving Layoffs
- Guide to Layoffs and Layoff Recovery
- Signs of a Pending Layoff
- Layoff Preparations Where You Work
- Layoff Preparations at Home
- Do NOT Quit Your Job YET!
- Layoff Early Warning: 50 Google Searches
- Layoff Self-Defense – free eBook
- LinkedIn Settings for a Stealth Job Search
- Guide to a Stealth Job Search – finding a new job while employed can be risky!
About the author…
Online job search expert Susan P. Joyce has been observing the online job search world and teaching online job search skills since 1995. A veteran of the United States Marine Corps and a recent Visiting Scholar at the MIT Sloan School of Management, Susan is a two-time layoff “graduate” who has worked in human resources at Harvard University and in a compensation consulting firm. Since 1998, Susan has been editor and publisher of Job-Hunt.org. Follow Susan on Twitter at @jobhuntorg and on Facebook, LinkedIn.
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