AWOL wrote:Finally, I would like to highlight that for most people it is much easier on the emotions going at a time of your choosing than being forced to go. Being made redundant often feels like being dumped and I have known many people to have the start of their retirement poisoned by this even though it was in their financial best interests. Consequently I recommend choosing an exit if at all possible. Events may overtake one but otherwise this is a good way to retain a feeling of being in control of ones destiny rather than thinking "I gave them the best years of my life and this is the thanks I get".
The organisation I worked for announced it was undertaking a large reorganisation in 2014, and it seemed quite possible at that time it would result in my redundancy (and my wife’s as she worked in the same organisation, although in a different discipline), along with many thousands of other employees.
Roll on through 2015 and into 2016 and the redundancies across the organisation started, office by office across the country, a few hundred here, a few hundred over there. People you had worked closely with suddenly vanished. And so it continued through 2017, 2018, and 2019.
Although there were theoretically timescales, nothing was certain at all - not even the likelihood of redundancy itself. HR would not commit itself to anything.
Every time the organisation made an announcement so much time would be wasted on employees talking about what it meant for them.
Eventually in December 2019 there was some certainty on mine and my wife’s position, with confirmation at the start of January 2020 that we would both be made redundant.
But when?
HR were still being utterly elusive. Even after sending us letters that we would be made redundant, they refused to being pinned down to a definitive timescale as to when. The best they would offer was indicating it might be in the autumn of 2020, but that might change.
The delay to providing definitive information meant yet more time was wasted by employees debating what was going on.
And then of course as soon as we were told at the start of January 2020 the local management then started to plan how the work would be reallocated for those being made redundant.
The result being that not only were people immediately demotivated at how they were being ‘written out’ whilst they were still employees. I ceased doing any meaningful work by March as all my responsibilities had been moved to others, and most of those being made redundant had either effectively had their work removed by late spring / early summer or frankly given up caring about anything they did.
However by then the pandemic had happened, and by late summer the redundancy date moved back to 31st December 2020. And this was despite the fact that those being made redundant were ‘working from home’ with nothing to do.
As it turned out they paid me for about eleven months for doing nothing, including four months extra pay I didn’t think I was going to get.
The redundancy payment itself was exceedingly generous, but even that caused huge concern and turmoil within those being made redundant as no financial or legal advice was being provided about the various options open to people.
And then there was the (unsaid) discontent from those not being made redundant and not receiving the exceedingly generous redundancy payments.
For my wife and myself it meant we could retire a couple of years earlier than we had planned to and be in a very good financial position.
However I would have far far preferred being able to pick a retirement date, rather than having an HR department saying “dunno” (and ‘don’t care’) to what date we would be leaving, until right to the wire.
) but the joy of not working; no more managers, no more pointless appraisals, meetings, annoying colleagues, etc has been utter bliss!