Beyond the Ivory Tower

What It's Like to Be Laid Off

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By Susan Basalla May

Anyone looking for a job during this recession should understand a few basic facts about layoffs. This advice goes double for Ph.D.'s who may not be familiar with how the business world works. While a professor who is denied tenure usually has a year to find a new position, someone who works outside the academy may be asked to clear out their desk within hours.

As one of the 2.4-million Americans who filed for unemployment in 2001, I've had firsthand experience with layoffs. My job as a content producer with an Internet company ended in November. I miss seeing my former colleagues every day, but being laid off has been a surprisingly positive experience.

Unlike academic careers, postacademic careers (my term for jobs outside the ivory tower) rarely give you time to reflect. There are no sabbaticals, no summers off, no spring breaks. In the nonacademic world, job changes usually involve a flying leap from one moving train to another. Having been in constant motion for the last few years, I am grateful for this unscheduled stop. I'm making good use of my four months of unemployment benefits and will choose my next step carefully.

For me, being laid off was a relief. After two rounds of layoffs at my office, nine months of company reorganizing, and a dozen false starts, I was ready to depart. The rumor being frantically circulated around the office by Instant Messenger said that two-thirds of the company's staff would be cut in late September. It turned out to be true. On the day of the layoffs, we each had individual meetings to hear whether we'd be staying or going. My supervisor smiled ruefully at me and said, "Guess what?" I said, "It's OK, I'm relieved. This'll be the easiest meeting you have all day."

I had already heard the details through the grapevine ‚- 60 days' notice instead of severance pay. Knowing that I had two months to leave made the transition much easier. I had plenty of time to collect samples of my work and apply for other jobs. The company was generous in asking little of those who were leaving; most of us were able to stop coming to work after we had wrapped up our final projects.

The most instructive part of my experience was observing how differently this third round of layoffs was handled compared with the two previous ones. People who had been let go earlier were given severance pay (the exact amount was confidential) instead of notice, had to clean out their desks within hours, and were escorted from the building by security guards.

After two uneventful rounds of layoffs, management decided -‚ to its credit ‚- that the "let's avoid an incident" approach was unnecessary with this mild-mannered group of employees. In the third set of layoffs, no security guards were used. And we received 60 days' notice, instead of severance pay -- a decision influenced by the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (known as the WARN Act), a law every employee should understand.

The WARN Act was designed to prevent companies with more than 100 employees from shutting down without warning. For example, if a factory located in a small town laid off all of its employees simultaneously, the economic burden on the town would be enormous. By requiring staggered layoffs and a minimal amount of severance pay, the WARN Act provides basic financial protections for employees.

While the factory scenario may not sound relevant to your working life, you have probably seen the effects of this law without realizing it. Did you ever wonder why headlines so often say that exactly a third of a company's staff has been let go? Under the WARN Act, one third is the maximum percentage of employees that can be terminated at one time without triggering additional protections, such as mandatory 60 days' notice or two months' severance pay for all employees. These provisions are expensive, and companies strive to avoid them -- hence the tendency to lay off exactly a third of the staff at a time.

The WARN Act is also the reason that layoffs frequently happen in successive rounds. The law requires companies that discharge more than a third of their employees within 90 days to pay for the additional protections listed above. In order to avoid these extra expenses, companies will stagger their layoffs by 90 days, cutting no more than a third of the staff in any round.

At my company, the first two rounds of layoffs involved a third of the staff or less so the WARN Act did not apply. For the third round, management was required to offer us either 60 days' notice or two months of severance pay, since two-thirds of the staff was being cut. I assume the management decided to offer us notice because the financial burden can be spread over a longer period. Whatever the reason, I appreciated having the extra time to say goodbye and make plans.

Applying this basic knowledge about layoffs to your career can help you become a smarter job seeker and employee. If you're interviewing for jobs outside of academe, you should research each company on financial news Web sites. During your interviews, ask specific questions about the stability of the company: Which parts of the company would be eliminated first in the event of downsizing? Is another round of layoffs likely? Which economic factors most directly affect the company's business? You may not get a straight answer, but you will learn about the company and demonstrate that you've done your homework.

Unfortunately, the fact that a company is hiring new people doesn't mean that it is stable. I spent my last weeks at the Internet company interviewing candidates for a high-level job that was eliminated before anyone was hired.

If you're already working in the business world, watch for these signs of impending layoffs:

• You are asked to write out your job responsibilities and tally how much time you spend on each activity during the week.

• You are no longer included in decisions that used to involve you.

• You have too little work to do, and no new projects in the pipeline.

• Your boss is having closed-door meetings with upper management, and can't or won't explain why.

If you notice several of these changes happening simultaneously, it may be time to start working on your résumé. But be discreet. If your supervisor knows that you are job hunting, he or she may find it easier to let you go. Your instincts may be wrong, but it never hurts to have a head start on the job hunt. It's also a good time to build up your emergency savings fund ‚- having three months of living expenses in reserve is a good goal.

Although I've written an entire book for graduate students changing careers, being laid off reminded me just how hard the search for employment can be. Knowing how to write a résumé and how to handle an interview doesn't make it that much easier. In fact, I've found that the advice I take most often from myself is to call on friends for ideas and support. In job-hunting, as in writing, an extra set of eyes helps you regain perspective on your subject. Although I haven't made any final decisions about my future, maybe a few thoughtful readers can help me plot the next chapter of my life.