Company Will Lay Off This Person, Asks Them To “Remain Professional” And Train The Replacements

Change is welcomed and is beneficial if you are ready for it and were preparing for it. But when it comes in the form of being kicked out of your job, it brings more stress and anxiety than hope for a better tomorrow.

This is what a redditor is experiencing and to make matters worse, they are forced to train their replacements, making them enraged and guilty at the same time for not wanting to do it, so they turned to the internet for some consolation.

More info: Reddit

The Original Poster (OP) turned to the antiwork community on Reddit with a request for advice to deal with their guilt and anxiety. Having in mind the community they came to, it’s clear that the guilt and anxiety are caused by their job.

It all probably started with a morning like any other, but the Teams meeting the OP joined brought bad news. The redditor and a bunch of other people are being laid off in two months, but until then they should “remain professional”, carry on with their work and train their replacements.

People in the comments were terribly confused how this can be counted as a lay-off if the OP and their coworkers are being replaced. They also didn’t understand where the company found the audacity to ask the people they were firing to train their replacements.

Understandably, the OP was not in a mood to train their replacements or work at all, allowing the company to deal with angry clients and piles of work increasing in a geometric progression. At this point the only thing they should care about is looking for new jobs while getting paid to do nothing for the last weeks at their work.

However, the OP can’t help but feel guilty for doing nothing and being away from their laptop despite how horribly their employer is treating them. At the same time, when they do open their laptop and see all the tasks that need to be done, they get overwhelmed with anxiety.

Bored Panda reached out to Kori Burkholder, a purpose driven career coach for young corporate professionals, and she told us that it is very possible to feel guilty after not performing your best even if a company treats you poorly because it mostly depends on the worker's personality and work ethic, "By nature, some professionals want to do a good job and deliver, feel purposeful, and contribute. So, slacking off might go against their nature, so it is normal to feel a sense of guilt."

Also, according to certified career and life coach Allison Task, the OP's situation is a very confusing one so no wonder their feelings are mixed up, "It's unusual to be fired and expected to work. That's not firing. So it's confusing, and if you have a decent work ethic, you want to do a good job. So it's odd to be asked to work and told you are fired at the same time. So you feel like you're doing something wrong, when in fact the employer has set you up to be confused."

Actually, Allison has never heard of a situation like this. She explains that "Being fired implies you've done something wrong and there's an immediate consequence. Being laid off indicates that the organization has a mistake, there's some bloat, and they wish you a gentle landing usually with a package." But in OP's case they are not getting any severance or benefits, nor they are let go the same day, so her best advise would be consult an employment attorney.

Many people in the comments thought that there is no point in putting effort into working after being betrayed by your company like that but even though Kori understands that "when the company tells them 2 months in advance of their layoff, with no severance, and they have to train their replacements, it gives them zero incentive to do good work," she would still advise to do your best even in the last months, weeks or days of your work days because you don't need to burn that bridge.

The Career Coach elaborated, "Doing your best to finish strong will be a good look for you and make you feel proud, leaving your head high. You'll be able to use this time to network, get referrals from managers and others within the company, and be proactive in your job search. So that you know, people will notice and be more likely to make referrals for you."

Allison agrees that it is important to leave keeping a good image as an employee. Despite not knowing of anyone who needed to stick around after being told they're laid off or fired, she does see a lot of people sharing their experienced of being terminated on social media and she would suggest to leave gracefully, thank the people who worked with you and let you grow and also "Remember, your future employer will check this page, it's not a place to air drama."

"This kind of scenario is a tough one," Kori acknowledges, but there is always a solution and since the OP can't really work productively, they can take that time and look for new opportunities that will lead to an even better job.

Commenters on Reddit seconded the career coaches advice and many of them encouraged to not waste time in bed but look up job listings instead. They also tried convincing the redditor that there is no reason to feel guilty and tried to show their situation in different perspectives to make them see that.

Most likely a lot of them have experienced something similar too as according to Layoffs.fyi, in 2023, over 230k tech employees were fired, compared to 165k employees in 2022. And 40 percent of Americans have been laid off or terminated in any way at least once. From those, 28 percent were laid off in the past two years. It’s so common that almost half of Americans have layoff anxiety.

The part that bothered the readers the most was that the company framed the termination as a layoff, reasons for which may be “when companies aim to cut costs, due to a decline in demand for their products or services, seasonal closure, or during an economic downturn,” according to Investopedia.

If a company is hiring people to replace the workers they terminated because of costs, that doesn’t make sense, so commenters came to the conclusion that the company is paying the new workers less as the company most likely is moving the jobs overseas where labor costs are lower.

The New York Times states that OP’s situation is quite common: “In an effort to cut costs, many companies are shifting to cheaper labor sources: freelancers, temporary workers, even computer programs that automate tasks altogether.”

So if the company is only looking out for what’s best for it, the OP can relax and not beat themselves up for not having motivation to work knowing their end date. How would you have felt in their situation? Do you understand where the guilt is coming from? What would be your advice to calm down? Let us know in the comments!