Are you suffering a downturn in business? Need to downsize? Well, lend me an ear, and I'll tell you a tale, a tale of what not to do ... with a hint on what you can do.
Redundancies are a fact of life. It's a pretty word used as a euphemism if will for sacking or firing, which is, by intent, impersonal. This has nothing to do with the staff member concerned, it's not related to their performance in any way shape or form, but money is short and hard decisions need to be made. Some jobs are declared "redundant". Which may, on occasion, be true, and yet it will also be used, as often as not, to simply describe the fact of necessary cost reduction – for which unaffordable is a better word than redundant (and arguably more flattering to the staff thus affected).
I've witnessed quite a few redundancies and been made redundant no less than thrice. The biggest farce I recall was a wave of what we called voluntary redundancies in the 1980s. It swept the steel industry at the time only to find that, well, the people who opted voluntarily to move on (a voluntary redundancy) were those that were confident of finding one jobs, the most employable people. The ones who stayed were those least confident that could find another job, the least employable. It was unilaterally considered a bad move after the fact and after the first wave, it became voluntary redundancy on approval!
But what I'm here for is to recount the tale of a redundancy that epitomises to my mind what not to do, to your colleagues and fellow human being, an experience so unnecessarily dehumanising and hostile it defies comprehension.
Whence it came
To be clear, I recount the tail of my own redundancy. But to understand it, we need to understand its context, and from whence it stems.
A small to medium business, that in the 22 years I worked there in its various names and guises, wavered between about 10 and 30 staff members at a guess. I was hired, on the back of a few years working in the field of training course design and delivery and management system installations across a global customer base, to design and deliver a training course for this business in a field of science new to me, that had been sold for delivery in 12 weeks but didn't actually exist yet. Always up for a challenge, I took home a text book from which I read cover to cover (the bible of this science) and for my first day, met my new boss at the airport, for a trip to Malaysia where he was presenting the product and felt this would be as good an intro as any.
Back at home base later, I took on front line customer support for their software product, and writing all the version 3 help file updates as part of the upskilling I had to do, while working on a three-day training course in the use of this software and the basic principles of the science that apply.
The course was a hit. Delivered in Seattle and Anchorage with warm and positive feedback. And I went on to deliver it in various other places before ... a child was born.
At that point, I wanted to reduce my travel (I'd been on the road for most of a decade by then and for two years prior to taking this job, in aeroplanes every weekend to deliver a training course, and install systems across the world and had enough and wanted to be there for my daughter. So I did a job swap in house, with a guy we'd hired into Quality Assurance, and so began my sojourn there.
In time, I dropped to a 4-day week wanting to be a present father in the life of my daughter, and we grew our business to purchase another, and then start a new blue sky division that would produce a new product into a new market to diversify our interests and protect the business against the vagaries on one product in one market. Along the way, I progressed to managing the Customer Support, Quality Assurance and Documentation needs across three business teams with teams of about a dozen individual support staff, testers and writers.
To fund this blue-sky product, we courted venture capitalists, and so had a glorious time of growth. Alas, internal conflicts and mismanagement also ensured we were running out of money and time and nowhere near an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) and I moved into project management tasked with delivery of a v1 MVP before we ran dry.
I worked on estimation and scheduling methods and after a false start, we got a v1 MVP out on the committed date with the committed feature set. Followed that with a v1.1 service release 3 months later on time, on budget.
But sales were slow, too slow, and we ran out of money. The team was folded down to minimal size, a programmer, a tester, a salesman, and I was snapped up into the sales team on our cash-cow product. My first redundancy. No paperwork, nothing formal, all verbal agreements and org chart alterations.
I started by working no necessary upgrades to an in-house license management system (C#, ASP .NET, and MS-SQL work) and direct sales in the Asia Pacific region. One surprise after another, not long after I was managing global sales and marketing for the product and a team of sales staff and resellers.
At which point more surprises, we lost our CEO and held internal interviews for someone to fill those shoes. I felt fully capable of the task, but nevertheless compelled to recommend a colleague who I thought would do a better job of it (besides, I wasn't really sure what a CEO does all day, and didn't much savour the idea). So my colleague took the job and I managed Sales under him.
I pushed for significant reforms to sales and marketing (pricing reforms, reseller network growth, marketing and growth of passive sales - we had grown to this point on direct sales, rebranding with new brochures and conference and trade show bling and uniforms for our staff). I secured only some of that before my colleague decided he didn't really know what a CEO did all day either or, better said, and more honestly, decided that it wasn't for him, resigned and became a school teacher (which I dare say did not include a pay rise - which to my mind is a touching measure of what it means to be doing something you love - he's loving teaching to this day, and was a pretty good CEO too I should add).
A new CEO on deck (again with my recommendation and support) I did ultimately execute all those reforms and then turned to focus on the business relations as the global partner manager, growing our internation reseller network and empowering them to sell more rapidly, and courting the hardware suppliers we sold on the back of for OEM style deals.
In time though I pushed that as far as it would go readily, and I itched once more for creative work on the development cycle and negotiated with my CEO for an opportunity back in the development team. Out of the blue one-day I was called in to a meeting, and served a redundancy notice, with an offer to take a job in Quality Assurance on the development team.
My second redundancy with an offer in the development team as I'd sought. No-brainer really. Not my first and top preference, but as it happens Quality Assurance was one area in the team that felt could use some attention, some work on automation and rigour in particular and I had a lot to offer there. I had learned Python (and Matlab) on my tenure in Sales (as our customer base was using Matlab, Python and R and I hadn't got around to R yet) and could see great opportunities to apply that in this area. I fed back all the same to my CEO that I did not like this style one jot.
I would much rather be called into a meeting to discuss the plan of moving to quality assurance, and have the business needs and priorities on the table before the deal is finalised before it is a fait accompli and a formal redundancy with what can only be seen as a rather impersonal and concerning - decision made behind my back. At this point I was reporting directly to the CEO - a position I was almost offered at one point - and had been working closely with him for 5 or more years and had what I felt was a personable and friendly relationship. Such an unexpected, surprise delivery of dry formal decision made behind my back was most unwelcome in that context.
I did however, appreciate action on the front of my efforts to negotiate a return to the development team and creative expression and the offer of a place in that team and also credited them with solid efforts to keep the remunerative impacts modest and minimal. All the same I had two young sons now and found that on a 30 hour week that I was rushing everywhere all the time so I asked if as part of this transition I could drop to 25 hours a week, 5 x 5 hour workdays. That was granted.
On a personal front, 5 hour days are the thing! With two young sons in early primary school I was able to walk them to school and a good few afternoons collect them and take them to various sporting activities. I could be, what my father never was for me, present, there, in their lives and they in mine. And there is no greater gift.
I worked five odd years on the quality assurance team, cutting a niche there for the heavy mathematical work (wideband signal analyses among other things - I am still a telecoms engineer deep down I guess) and data science work (file formats and such) and I made huge strides in rigour and automation for the team.
Not without hiccups. On account of laudable diversity in our team and my re-entry as a peer after a decade of absence and some new staff and some old staff, my efforts to modernise were not immediately met with open arms. We'd adopted Teams over COVID and on a channel for sharing innovations I'd announced an early one I was excited about a massive time saver and rigour-boost in regression test analyses, and was publicly dissed by a colleague. That escalated quickly ... but a disciplinary meeting aside (on the subject of dissing colleagues in public, where a private communication would serve to resolve any misunderstanding or disagreements before going public) my tail between my legs and head tucked in, in-house public announcements were avoided and progress continued admirably in consultation with the QA lead and other development staff as needed.
I had just got this to the point of good enough, and a desire to present new tools and methods first to a select group of receptive folk and then with some luck to the whole team. Tools for increasing the rigour and efficiency of our QA efforts and first moves into full automation of our UI testing (big job to do well and would need full team buy-in).
December was approaching, and our half yearly reviews and I was going to table the possibility of a roll out and presentation, to sound that out, I felt the time was right, work sufficiently mature and the team culturally ready.
My goal was to present this and seek an exit from the business at some point. I had done my run on quality assurance here now and was keen for a change, a new adventure. I had been looking on and off for other opportunities for years and my poor wife had always to remind me that I had a job most people dream of. I had 5-hour work days on a good rate, could come and go mostly as I pleased and work fairly autonomously. What's not to love?
Well for me, there the challenge. I had more to do on this job but it was definitely exiting the innovation, and proof of concept phase, well into evolution and now needed commitment and hard yards and well it's not that I wouldn't be up for that, but it'd been 5 years on this and well, that's been more or less my limit to date.
My CV is littered with me getting antsy after 3-5 years and looking for something new to do, new stuff to learn and master. New problems to solve. Things fix, build create. And I didn't want another 5 years on this really, it was enough. But she (my wife) had a point, I had two young sons a mortgage, and well, financial security held great appeal as did this wonderful flexibility to be part of my boy's lives. So I never acted on it, just flirted with the idea and dropped the odd EOI (expression of interest - a term I use here for something far more modest than a job application).
Redundant again
(sung to the tune of Sick Again)
Unbeknownst to me, the perfect storm was brewing ...
It was late spring, the days were long and on Wednesday afternoon I was landscaping the front garden at home and had pulled a back muscle in the process, doh! Woke Thursday stiff and sore. Been here before, and not a fan, and know to be careful (I remmeber the time it took two morphine shots before they could pick me upoff the floor one time I tripped this back of mine, not good, not keen on a repeat).
Still, I also know that gentle movement is better than not, so I did ride my bike into the office (late, because I was working the afternoon shift anyhow on account an egagement in town that night) - I commute on a bicycle BTW. I put in a days work (at my standing desk). Leaving the office late-ish, and just putting my helmet on by the front door, still doubled over a little with stiff sore back and wonderig how wise it was to ride in, my CEO pases me on the way to his car and thrusts a letter into my hand (I bet you know where this going ...).
I started opening and he said "no need to open it now" and continued to the car. I did open it now. A redundancy notice. Hmmmm.
Really didn't take my feedback to heart last time it seems. But this time was going to be a new level of twisted ...
It announced a meeting on Monday Nov 11. A meeting, obligated by law, in which I was to have an opportunity to suggest re-deployment options to consider. The letter was dry and impersonal, pointed out clearly that this was a business decision to do with my role not performance related, or personal in any way.
A redacted copy of the letter I received
Redacted so as to protect all third parties from any implied criticism or otherwise. A mere matter of record so you can see what a formulaic redundancy letter reads like, bearing in mind this comes out of the blue with no forewarning and is thrust into your hand by a colleague (the CEO you've worked closely with for years).
Friday morning my back was worse so I on the floor with phone in hand. Went to write my team on teams that I'd be taking the day off with abad back and found I was locked out of Teams, and Outlook. Texted my CEO:
I notice that on my phone Teams and Outlook logged out and I can't log on. Related? Or poorly timed coincidence?
he replied:
Yes. Related. It's normal procedure to stop access in the period between initial notice and final determination. You are given the time off. We can discuss further on Monday.
I lost a lot of sleep that weekend. Here I was 22 years in the business a decade working with this CEO, in a busines of about 20 people, who all new each other well, mostly as friends, and socilised together. I had worn almost every hat one can wear in the business. And I'm treated suddenly like a threat. A danger. A risk.
Normal procedure? For ASIO? the CIA? a Military base? An Embassy? But us? Seriously? Or is this a case of tin-pot depotism gone wild, the little master of little kingdom? THis is not "normal" anywhere that I have worked ever and I've worked in some big places. I've worked in a national telcom, in a national steel producer, and nowhere have I ever been where my boss would not have bent the normal bureacratic procedure (which is far more rigid in national enterprises than a 20 strong family of IT workers) as far as they could to make the experience friendly and human. Not a single one, ever.
Heck, I kid ye not when I say, I would afford my enemies that luxury if I were in that position (in fact I have let folk go and I have been in that position and I know how to do it - oh and I do have enemies - in the words of Victor Hugo "You have enemies? Why, it is the story of every man who has done a great deed or created a new idea."). To wit, the sleep I lost that weekend was not to sorrow, nor pity, nor even anger, but to WTF (is there an emotion for that? ChatGTP thinks dumbfounded astonishment, baffled exasperation or stunned confusion, so no, no simple emotion and I think WTF has brevity benefits).
I get an invite to Monday's meeting on Teams. Ironic, given I have no access to Teams. Described with "This meeting scheduled as per my letter. Please let me know if you’d prefer in-person.". I replied "I'd rather come in thanks." and did. Whatever goes down here can be done looking me in the eye, not over a camera or worse a voice link. Just how many steps can we take to dehumanise this I wondered?
As per the letter this meeting was for them to provide the full context of the redundancy and to afford me the opportunity to propose a redeployment.
The reason was amusing. And no surprise. I might even have predicted it. But still the tight adherence to minimal legal obligations here and the language twists that demands amuse me, I admit.
To put that into context there is no way that a QA role is redundant in this business. There are 4 other staff employed on QA. As it happens though because that blue-sky product failed and our venture capitalists basically lost their money, they wanted to grab the money and run - time to sell the business while the cash cow was earning.
We started this process at the time that I moved into Sales and in fact I was on the team driving it and gave the project its name, Bacchus (a pun on "back us" and the Roman god of revelry and wine). But in all the years since, we had come close once or twice but never clinched a sale.
Since I managed sales we'd been on a rising sales trajectory but it was levelling out (also predicted) but because expenditures tracked the very questionable year on year 20% growth targets in what is a very niche market sector, 2023 was apparently the first year we ran at a loss, cash negative. We could afford it, had cash in the bank, but nevertheless we ran at a loss. We did have a record quarter following that too, but then these are the vagaries of a small-niche global market (we're quite sensitive to exhange rates too trading globally often in local currencies).
Anyhow, a sale was looking good when we were growing and after last year we need a) to cut costs and b) to look at how we can be more "saleable". And in the back room, the decision was made that a part time QA role did not align with that need. Another part-timer was made renundant too (in the admin area). So the irony is, I'm redundant because of project Bacchus that I was part of from the outset (albeit no more, since I moved out of upper management into QA I was no longer involved).
The opportunity to propose redeployment made me laugh. And I shared as much in the meeting. I mean they know, and I know, that I know how the business runs. I know the nature of the business. And I know as well as they know that I'm not genuinely redundant, I'm just not afforable (they can probably hire a graduate full time into a full time QA role for what they pay me).
And they know too, that without the books on the table, recent years financial reports, and the coming years credible projections (with a view on the sales pipeline - our cash cow has a 6-18 month sales pipeline is a budgeted-for product not a discretionary expense) and above all, minutes from recent board meetings.
All of which I'd want, nay need, to make a credible and serious propsal for a redeployment. I reckon I'd find one, no guarantee they'd take it but to pitch one I'd need to do the business analysis which after 5 years in QA I was a little blind to (mushrooms as they say, kept in the dark and fed ...). So no, I had no capability to pitch a credible redeployment opportunity, thanks for invite though.
The redundancy includes a mandated 5 weeks of notice. But they are happy to pay that out, I don't have to work it if I don't want to. But if I want to have some time for a handover it's available. Again, I look at these guys (two of them in the meeting I waived my right and invite for a support person) with a cocked eyebrow. You're saying you'll pay me regardless and I can come in and work here or spend my time looking for another job? Um is that a real question? I told them I could use a day maybe two to document all I'd done and have some hand over meetings and/or presentations and I would like to do that.
I told them again, that it would have been trivial to have a meeting before this letter, as colleagues and friends. We could have come to an agreement we could have timed it better, I'm fine with moving on, I have no need for redeployment, but here we are on my birthday discussing my dismissal, a mere week after a positive RSVP to the staff Christmas party. Merry Christmas Scrooge.
They recoiled a little "It's you're Birthday!?". "Nah, it's tomorrow". They relax visible. I retort "That's all right then I guess". I let them know, here I am 22 years in, much of it in senior management, a sharehlder of the business, and you shove a letter into my hand and lock me out of all the systems, like I'm a spy, thief or vandal or emotionally unstable. "It's not personal, just the 'process'".
It's not personal? Catch-22 my friend. The fact that in a workplace of under two dozen colleagues, with a guy you've worked with for a decade, who recommended you to the CEO position, who's been here 22 years and calls this place family, your precious "process" can't flex a little to make it personal. That is personal. That you couldn't be bothered making this process more personal for me.In refusing to make it personaly, you have made it personal.
The CEO made it clear that he takes his legal obligations very seriously. I thanked him for that. It is appreciated. All the same it seems minimal observance and not one jot more is what he's keen on here.
A redacted copy of the letter I received to summarise the followup meeting
Redacted so as to protect all third parties from any implied criticism or otherwise. A mere matter of record so you can see how the story closed from the business side.
I had to take a week off for this bad back anyhow, but then come in and clear my desk. I asked if I could come in on the Monday after and my CEO wrote:
Under the circumstances, and given your views about the redundancy process and our workplace (dehumanising, hostile, treated like a statistic), I do not believe that it’s appropriate for you to attend the premises during normal work hours.
Agan, WTF? He read the feedback on his "process" right, but it has actually nothing to do with the workplace or anyone in it, including him. Let's be clear, this is a lovely man, and a great colleague, a wonderful salesman and CEO. We simply differ on the relative priorties of "process" and "humanity" in a small business where everyone knows one another, we're all family. But shrug. Evidence in hand, dehumanising and hostile. So I had to come in out of hours.
I also asked about coming in for a day to document my assets and present some materials as a handover - given I'm technically employed for 5 weeks (the notice period). His reply:
To re-confirm, your last day of employment here was Monday 11 November and you have been fully paid in lieu of notice period. You are not “technically employed” ...
How to execute a redundancy
As per my CEO's express intent, abide by the law. But the law, as a rule is there to protect employees from abuse (in Australia it is and we're governed under the Professional Employees Award 2020 for example), and don't use it as a guide to limit what you do to make this process human. The law tables the minimal requirements it is not a guidebook.
Remember you are dealing with people. And you are not a monster. Don't let anyone convince you of it and don't let them tell you the "process" must be followed.
Rule 1: Meet first. Never deliver a letter first. Talk first. Let them know what's up in person. Not like some legal notice. We're not in court. We work together.
Rule 2: Because you followed Rule 1 and met first, never treat them like a threat, or a danger, like someone who's going to steal from you or vandalise you, unless you assess a genuine risk of just that. Which is one more reason to follow Rule 1, to assess the risk of and emotionally unstable repsonse. Never suppose someone is a risk, never mind someone you know very well isn't, someone who is a member of the family, a colleague, friend, shareholder, invested in the business.
Really it's not that hard, two basic rules to keep the process human.
Yes, if you're kicking someone out of the CIA maybe make it clean and fast. But if you're a private business no matter how large, try, for the love of all you respect, to keep it human, two simple rules (consult them first, and don't treat them like a threat unless they are) to keep it human. In a huge business you may need to stand for that. As the CEO you have zero excuse and only a lack of caring and desire or, of course, that saving dodge: "this hurts me more than it hurts you, but unfortunately my hands are tied, this is the 'process' and I wish it were better" ... doesn't (dodge the responsibility that is). You take the wrap.
Disclaimer
I have opted to use a very personal experience to illustrate two simple rules to follow that can make redundancy a human experience and not a hostile one. In so doing it needs to be stated there are no ill feelings and now judgements surrounding the matter. In sharing a personal story there is the risk of inadvertently embarrassing someone and to avoid that I have carefully removed all identifying materials and references as best I can. All the people in this story are wonderful people, doing the best vthey can with the skills, knowledge, tools and pressures they have and face. The story attempts to capture the sense of surprise and wow, surrounding the dehumanisation of a close colleague and attempts only to pinpoint the key difference in style or opinion that exists between key characters in that story. Both are presented:
- The view that "process" exists to be followed, and thet laws should be adhered to minimally.
- The view that "people" matter more than process and that laws do no limit how nice and human you can be, they only set minimal standards.
Attribution
This a people story, and not a particularly short one, so I wanted some nice people pictures to break up the prose a bit. I found those on Freepik which has a good selection of free images that can be used with attribution (a limit of 3 downloads a day anonymously, and 10 per day for an account).
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