Bobby Powers, 39, a leadership coach in Seattle, once helped plan a layoff at a remote media startup, then lost his own job weeks later. Working in HR, he and his boss were told to run the cuts and coordinate the list with the executive team.
Many of those affected were people he knew well and who were doing great work. As revenue projections fell, the cuts deepened. He called the work soul-crushing, saying it felt like “putting humans in a spreadsheet.”
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The pair tried to preserve humanity by asking how they would want it done to them. They scripted the process almost to the minute: who calls, when the company email goes out and when access is switched off.
If there was no major security concern, they wanted to give people a little time to say goodbye. Most layoffs happened over video calls to keep a human touch. They even debated what to name the call.
About a month and a half later, after a promotion and his highest pay yet, Powers was at a conference in Las Vegas when his boss called to say they were on the chopping block this time. The next morning, he was locked out of his email.
He says he once assumed layoffs hit low performers. Now he has more empathy and no longer jumps to those conclusions.
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