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Blunt Pain

My friend T is working with her leadership to finalize the list of folks in her team who will be laid off. It is clearly hard for her to do this - T and I have both been on the other side in the past and know what it feels to be laid off. What is more she does not agree with the rationale but has to go along with it.  T is fabulous people manager and any team she built and leads is fortunate to have her. 

But thanks to such capricious decision making and the diktats that come from so called "leadership" T feels like she is done with doing what she does so well. She does not want to be responsible for taking action on people she hired and developed over the years that she does not agree with. Maybe it has a lot to do with how such an event haunts the person personally and professionally.  

The person at the receiving end of the decision feels a myriad of emotions - I have gone through a layoff and know the stages of grief such an event produces. What we hear less about is how one like T copes with taking action on behalf of the powers that be - being the one to talk to the impacted person 1:1 and repeat the lines that she would have been coached to deliver. 

That is simply not what T is about - she is a kind, brave and honest person. Not one to resort to "approved" lines for fear of rocking the boat. I have seen her fight for her team, go up against difficult clients, call them out on their bad decisions and much more. I don't know what T is about if not breaking a lot of glass and making the right kind of trouble.

The only silver lining is that people even if laid off have options - perhaps it blunts the pain of being let go and to be the one who delivers the bad news.

What's more, a tight job market means that hiring managers can't afford to be so choosy. Job growth remains strong: The US added 223,000 jobs last month, more than forecast. Meanwhile, data shows there were about 10.5 million jobs available in November, outnumbering the 6 million unemployed Americans looking for work. 

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