Accepting Hard Truths and even harder decisions
In recent months, mass lay-offs in the tech sector have been commonplace.
From large multinational organizations to local tech shops, this seems to be almost everyone’s reality. It appears necessary and these are the sentiments often shared – ‘revenues aren’t where we need them to be’, ‘business requires restructuring and re-focus’ and ‘it is either let these people go, or let the whole company go bankrupt and everyone loses’.
As someone who believes strongly in cycles – the seasons, agriculture, markets and business - in a way this makes sense to me. Like the sometimes-necessary task of pruning a Juniper Bush so that it continues to grow healthy and strong.
But there was something indigestible to me about this trend that we now commonly accept.
I’m no stranger to mass lay-offs, and the one I just went through this month was not my first, or even my second.
Sometimes, I have been the one on the chopping block, other times I have ‘survived’, being labelled ‘safe’… for now.
In all cases, I have more than thrived, like the Juniper Bush.
Even so, I was not eased this time around.
I realize that the indigestion isn’t with the act of a mass lay-off; rather, what it tells us and what it shows us of ourselves.
Culture & Relations
There is so much emphasis on the culture at a place of employment – the vibe, the work-family and the work-life balance.
You see images on websites that flaunt smiling people collaborating over desks.
You see words like:
Trust | Caring Management | Innovation | Diversity & Inclusion | Fun | Collaborative
This was not always the case.
Up until the early 2000s, showcasing work culture was not an industry standard when hiring, like it is now.
You can be an accountant anywhere, so why not choose a place that has caring management, celebrates inclusion and diversity and fairness. Seems like a no-brainer!
So, we all started to ask what the work culture is like and that became important collectively. Work places started to flaunt their cool work culture, especially in tech-world.
We started to acknowledge that culture is the sum of every person’s relationship with others and with the work; a cumulative series of interactions mixed with passion, frustrations, wins and losses in which we all share; all that we love, that we despise, and that defines us, together.
That is actually what makes work interesting, dynamic and alive!
Everyone participates in this, even the office grump, who we learn to love and work with. We learn ourselves and learn each other and we dance towards our individual and collective goals.
Perhaps new client relationships are formed; while the legal agreements and contracts list the company names, the relationships are built and maintained by humans on both sides.
We become secure in our income and our lifestyle and before we know it our work is a part of us, a part of our identity. Often, when we are asked how we are and what we do, we answer about our work, rather than our whole Being.
I think this is why leaving a job is hard - because of the people, the network, the relationships built, almost as much as the job, impact and fulfillment itself.
Being forced to leave then, can feel a bit like being woken up in the middle of the night from the warm safety and comfort of your trusted home, and being kicked out in the cold, with a survival backpack (severance package).
It is sometimes even worse when the words spoken are ‘you didn’t do anything wrong’ or ‘it’s not you, it’s not personal’.
Because how can it not be personal?
We all contribute to the family, to the team, to the work culture. You cannot help but develop a sense of belonging and identity. Even when things are stressful or rough at work, generally, we are practiced in showing up, doing our tasks, thinking and collaborating, planning and executing, venting and going for coffee with our colleagues. It can become a little village, with colleagues taking care of each other during times of sickness or loss of a family members when care packages and flowers are sent.
This commonly used and accepted phrase: ‘it’s nothing personal, it’s just business’ dishonours and casts out the humanity and life-force for everyone who partook in the work culture.
Perhaps, this is the long-term damage of compartmentalizing aspects of life.
We see thing like revenue and business operations as sterile, emotional-less goals that all who are employed must endeavour to reach. This is talked about behind closed doors.
We see team building and retreats as the space and area in which “fun” and creative organic interaction is allowed. This is what we speak to when we talk about work culture on our websites.
We effort to keep these separate.
Perhaps we create business like this, because we are like this at an inner and individual level as well.
If you believe work is defined as what occurs from 9am – 5pm on weekdays, and life occurs outside that time, then are you alive on weekday morning?
Are we diverse because we have all the races and genders on our website? How do we handle diversity in leadership styles, diversity in quarterly revenue or diversity of thought and expression?
Who are we, as individuals and the collective when we are faced with fiscal, environmental, social adversity? Do we just have pretty words to mask difficult choices, or is there integrity and action underneath?
Do we compartmentalize things? Are they truly separate, mutually exclusive for us?
The benefit of compartmentalizing, of course, is that it is neater. We can dull, numb or be in denial of certain things at certain times of the day, so that we are more efficient in our tasks.
If this works, it is at best, in the short-term.
All you have to do is feel into how you sleep, how you rest, how stressed and exhausted you are, the collection of bags under your eyes and how often you get stress headaches, how your relationships are at work and at home, how authentic, open, allowed, loved and honest you are within yourself and in your relationships.
Numbness, escapism, apathy, sterility, sickness, frustration, resentment and bitterness either at home or at work tell us a lot about our overall handling of our emotions – both at work and at home.
Sometimes we do not intentionally compartmentalize. It is a self-preservation mechanism. We cannot handle the vastness of our emotions and so we have no choice, but to divide and conquer our tasks.
‘Divide & Conquer’ – words made famous during the periods of colonialism in our world. Whether we mean to our not, sometimes we keep colonial concepts more alive in our present moments than we would care to acknowledge.
And so, our inner division and separation attracts us to places or work and relationships that carry the same vibration.
Blame & Shame
Tempting as it is, it is easy to blame to current heads of the departments or company for mass-layoffs.
Perhaps they did not do their job properly.
Perhaps someone made a mistake and those laid-off have to pay for it.
Perhaps they didn’t like us anyway, and this was an easy reason to get rid of us.
We may tell ourselves all sorts of things when we are at the receiving end.
I know that being on the giving end of a severance package is equally terrible.
When I had to do it a long time ago, I was given a script and warned not to deviate too much for risk of liability.
It’s not you; it’s me/us
Whether we hear this in the dating circles, or across the table from the person telling us we no longer have a job, it is an absolutely terrible feeling.
But, there is a grain of truth to it.
If I tell you to come work for me and I will treat you like family and we will have this amazing culture and do awesome work that will better our world; and when things get hard, I kick you out. That shows you beyond words, who I am.
It shows you that I am someone who has learned to use others when it suits me.
It tells you that I cannot be trusted as my words and my actions are out of integrity, and likely, I don’t even know it.
Perhaps I am still tethered into the old-world matrix of business, work and economy; as such I’m limited to making choices from survival, which I measure with money. When things are hard or tight, I often have to choose between what is bad and what is terrible and this weighs on me.
To believe work and business is ‘not personal’ is to separate our full expression of aliveness from our actions – we are no better than animated corpses doing the actions we did yesterday, running mechanical default programs.
If this is you, or your leaders, or even your partner, that is something to consider as the world turns. Because there is a big energy exchange we do with our work-places where we spend hours (physically, virtually, mentally and emotionally) and we need to have a care of where we place our trust, our energy and our effort.
I do not know what an alternative solution is to mass lay-offs.
I know they are awful for every person involved.
The ones who are cut away, have to wonder on their self-worth and may have to desperately seek other opportunities while reeling from a sense of betrayal.
The ones who have to execute, have to live with themselves.
The ones who stay, have to pick up the pieces of work and walk on, masking mistrust and insecurity with positive thoughts.
What I do know is that all of us though, in the face of this, have an opportunity here.
Now more than ever, each of us has to come into truth with who we are, what our offer to the world in service and work is. This effort is needed to pull us towards the people, the networks and workplaces that are aligned with who we are (becoming).
This coming to truth isn’t just about doing our heart’s desire; it is also practical and needs to incorporate sources of livelihood, knowing where are values and integrity lie, our skills and capabilities (technical and soft) and taking one step at a time to create new lives for ourselves.
Maybe your choice of work affords you a salary which enables you a life you love.
Maybe the work you do is what you love and it doesn’t feel like work.
Maybe work is what pays the bills and it doesn’t matter how you feel while you are there.
Maybe you work because it is your only escape and your path to freedom from a rough situation.
It doesn’t matter. Why?
Because whatever this new world is that we are coming to, it seems to me that is amplifies what is within us.
If we are divisive and compartmentalized within, then that is what we will see and know in our world.
If we are poor and limited within even if we have a lot of money, we will only know hard choices, insecurity and mistrust.
Our inner culture brings forth an outer cultural mirror.
And if that mirror is ugly, then maybe those who are laid-off are the lucky ones, in the long-term.
For now, my friends, as we close up this year, may you rest, reflect and restore.
May you touch, taste, feel and know your brilliance and your power.
May you understand the power you bring when you join with others in any and all manner of relationship.
May you have your own permission to discern yourself and align with your love and your truths, and find work and colleagues that are elevated by you, and that in return elevates you.