They cut hundreds and closed two plants; it was a blood bath. I’m okay, but many longtime friends are not. There are a few I still haven’t heard back from, so I don’t know.
I’ve been with this company, in one capacity or another, for more than a decade. I’ve weathered layoffs, and acquisitions, and divestitures, and I’ve still not ever seen anything on this scale. It was horrifying.
And we’re in relatively good financial shape – paying out a higher EPS (earnings per share) than YOY (same time last year).
So I send my thoughts out into the great void tonight, and hope my friends, and everyone devestated by the current economy, will pull through without too much lasting damage. It is not much of a wish, I admit, but I think it is the best we can hope for in the short, or perhaps even medium, term.
It is the very definition of “sucks out loud.”
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Wow. You’ve survived prior RIFs at your company? My hats off to you. I’m subject to a potential layoff and I’m going nuts. I don’t know how you handled them. I’m glad you were spared the most recent layoff though. My heart goes out to your friends and colleagues who weren’t so lucky. Do you know whether they received a severance? Hopefully their unemployment is only temporary. This economy is so scary.
There wasn’t much to the severance – COBRA information, stipulation to unemployment, and one week’s salary for every year of service. This package went up to and included my GM. He might be able to negotiate something else, though I doubt it, but certainly none of the others will.
My secret to surviving the RIFs is probably a bad strategy. I am ridiculously underpaid. In the booming, or even gently slowing, economy, replacing me just wouldn’t have been cost-effective. Now, well, I think it’s a crap shoot for everybody.
Hang in there. I know waiting for the axe to fall can be beyond stressful, just take care of yourself as best you can.