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Better CEO 'Taking Time Off Effective Immediately': Email

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36 pointsekovarski13 comments

Layoffs will happen when companies aren't doing well. IMHO, the problem is the CEO getting a freaking _BONUS_ while simultaneously claiming the company isn't doing well and as a result they're laying off people. The board probably approved his bonus as well, so all this is nothing but a PR stunt. They don't care, they never cared.

If the company isn't doing well everyone in senior management should also get a haircut. Bonus cancelled, pay reduced, etc. As per the CEO - "Not meeting deadlines will not be acceptable". Well, dude, what about your own deadlines and milestones? He drove the company into the ground, and so should also shoulder some of the responsibility.

They hoped to do better after firing them, thus the bonus. One day you're "part of the family," the next...

Anyway, I hope the CEO feels Better

Not just a bonus, but $25 million. An amazingly high bonus even for CEO standards.

Incredible! I didn't see that in the article — do you have a link?

I don't remember when this happened exactly during my career, but someday something clicked in my mind and I learned that, after youre promoted above middle management, you can get away with most legal but immoral things, and with many straight up illegal stuff as well. One can concentrate so much power without accountability that it's easy to blame someone else, the market, the client, the employees, and keep changing the rules to never get screwed. And if something happens... There's always a "sabbatical period" to relax a bit before going on to the next company.

I suppose that's tied to people believing that you have some kind of midas touch for turning capital into profit. As long as the people with the capital believe that about you, they will back you with their capital and then have your back.

What's the "normal" way to lay off a group of people of that size? Do companies normally schedule one on one meetings in this case?

Nowhere near that scale, but we had one office closed, the CEO met with each team personally, then made a wider announcement to the company once all the severance and other things were fully hashed out, and new roles could be found for folks that could relocate.

Probably the right thing would have been smaller lay offs a while ago, they must have seen this coming.

The bottom line is the getting fired is, almost always, bad news. Sure delivery matters but if he was announcing a raise, no one would have questioned the manner. So unless he had some major financial aid for the laid off...

Not sure if it’s fair to compare a raise announcement to layoffs. Raise is good news and doesn’t need to be handled as carefully as a 10% workforce layoff

Big meeting with HR or CEO is completely normal.

Preferably followed up with various smaller meetings, but those aren't legally required everywhere.

Usually fed down the chain of command. Execs tell managers who tell their people, HR is usually involved too. If the managers are also involved, it's a bigger affair

It's rarely a surprise in my experience (eg: new owners/investors are sniffing around for months). Announcement of the acquisition/investment is often made, mentioning that certain business units will need to be 'optimized' or some other vague term.

Yes, in my company their aim was to complete the redundancies as fast as possible, and it took about one week. One on one meetings are held with HR - I don't believe line management was even involved in the meetings. The employee leaves the office immediately.

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