> this is happening just as news breaks about layoffs at CloudFlare.
Err, you have this backwards. The news broke that there weren't layoffs at CloudFlare (keep in mind, their spokesperson publicly stated this to the news, and there are legal consequences for lying about this). The CEO stated that <3% of the sales team was fired for not meeting standards, and that that's a normal rate for each quarter [1]. Sales in general is attrition-heavy, and rank-and-yank is a relatively common, if employee-unfriendly, strategy. So, yes, the former situation is much more likely when you strip out points 1 and 2, since points 3 and 4 correspond to each other and the latter situation is illegal in two different ways.
> it is common knowledge that layoffs are usually conducted as one massive group meeting with all parties at once
This is common knowledge? I've literally never heard of a layoff conducted like this, only the reverse. The major tech layoffs this week (Google, Twitch, Unity, Discord) were conducted in the reverse fashion.
> That's not me claiming that you're wrong, which would then require me to provide a reasonable argument. Instead, I leave you to wonder if I don't see the apparent contradiction, or if I do but I'm just not engaging with you for some reason, etc.
Occam's Razor: It's clearly a social problem, and it makes much more sense for it to be on one end than the other.
All HR has is a record saying that she was underperforming. HR doesn't know what went on in the meetings between the manager and their report. Even if they were to show her a piece of paper that says she was underperforming, you end up back at square one. There's obviously a paper trail (true or fabricated), and she doesn't believe what it says. The only person who could solve the problem is a person who isn't there.
> I don't see that as under-performing and then making an excuse for doing so
I was pulling in info from elsewhere in the thread where account executives were agreeing that that was under-performing. I'm not making that judgement call, as I've never worked in sales for B2B software.
> it would also be the height of cowardice for a boss to have someone else fire one of their reports for them.
This is my entire point. The difference between our opinions is that (to me) all the signs indicate that the manager fucked up. The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.
[1] https://twitter.com/eastdakota/status/1745697840180191501
Edit: TL;DR: Either it's a complex, multi-level conspiracy that's somewhat dysfunctional but not in a way that would lead to the conspiracy falling apart... or someone has a poor manager.