Surviving Layoffs: How to Handle Getting Fired, or Let Go, with Dignity and Grace
In this powerful episode of the Make Work Not Suck podcast, co-hosts Daniel Steere and Ryan Hodges dive deep into one of the toughest aspects of professional life: layoffs and terminations. Whether you’re on the giving or receiving end, these conversations are never easy—but they don’t have to be devastating.
Ryan and Daniel share personal stories of difficult terminations and discuss the most common reasons people are let go, from strategic shifts and performance issues to economic downturns. They explore what executives, managers, and employees can do to handle these moments with empathy, dignity, and professionalism, minimizing the pain and maximizing future opportunities.
This episode covers:
• [00:00] Introduction to the Pain of Layoffs
• [04:15] Why Layoffs Happen: The Business Behind Tough Decisions
• [11:20] Managing Layoffs with Dignity: Practical Tips for Managers
• [16:42] What to Do When You Suspect You’re Next on the Layoff List
• [25:33] How to Support Laid-Off Employees and Remaining Team Members
• [32:08] Self-Reflection and Preparing Yourself for What’s Next
• [40:45] Why Getting Fired Isn’t the End of the World and How to Reframe It
Through real experiences and honest advice, Ryan and Daniel tackle how to make the layoff process less painful for everyone involved. If you’re facing a layoff, preparing to terminate someone, or just want to navigate difficult moments with grace, this episode is packed with valuable insights.
Key Takeaway: Getting fired or firing someone is tough—but it doesn’t have to destroy your confidence or your career. Learn how to approach these conversations with empathy and integrity, setting yourself and others up for success beyond the current role.
Transcript
[00:12] Ryan Hodges:Remember, both sides are human, not robots.
[:I'm sure there's some terrible human beings out there who actually enjoy that. But most of the people that I've worked with, when it comes time to have those types of conversations, they're miserable. So I think that'd be a good conversation for us to have is to think about what do layoffs look like, feel like? What are maybe some of the root causes? And then what would we advise for frontline employees, mid-level managers, and executives?
How can every one of them do that better? Be better at in the moment when it is obvious this employee and this company need to break up.
[:[01:35] Daniel Steere:I think it'd be good to talk about all of the above because I don't think every organization does this well. I have been in organizations that laid people off, and it was never really clear whether it was because of performance or because of business results or we are going in a different strategic direction. I have seen organization kinda hide and obfuscate that so that people don't really know why they're being let go. At least at some point, we gotta tackle all of those and say, okay, what are the reasons why an organization would let somebody go? What are a couple of reasons why you have seen go?
What are a couple of reasons why you have seen organizations or been part of an organization that has had to let somebody go?
[:Maybe they're a little culture I gotta put it in two categories. There's the culture component where there's just toxic culture, and then there's those that they're just amazing people, but they just don't get the job. And then the last category is, just downturn in business. Like, if the business loses some key clients, key accounts, and you're forced to lay some of the staff off as a reduction, you know, that's that's even harder because usually you're you're forced to let go of people that you wouldn't otherwise let go. So I've been in all those situations and they all suck.
[:[03:22] Ryan Hodges:Yes.
[:We wanna do this other kind of work. And so you can see these really strange situations where you hear thus and such companies having layoffs, and then they're hiring a bunch more people. And it's like, how can you have both layoffs and hiring blitz at the same time? Explain why that would happen because I've seen that and and I've had people be like, that's the dumbest thing ever. How can you both lay off people and hire people at the same time?
But I I think there's there could be, not always, but there could be circumstances or reasons why that pair of activities could actually make sense.
[:It's never about letting the people go. It's how the leadership team and the managers act in that moment and how they basically lie to themselves and everybody else of what's really happening because they feel guilty about it. And instead of just recognizing a spade is a spade. And I hope this doesn't sound heartless, but, you know, there are circumstances when the business is gonna shift, and there are just people that are not gonna fit anymore. And that's okay.
Right? Like, that's that's a business decision. What I hate is how companies handle it, where the manager tries to justify, well, they weren't a fit or, you know, it wasn't you know, it well, they really sucked at their job. Like, no. The business made a strategic change.
They no longer fit the role. And so just be honest with them. We're changing the business direction. This is the change in the role, and this is why you're no longer a fit. Hopefully, you know, you did the background of, you know, what is the box they're moving to?
If it's an entire division being shut down, you know, it kinda is what it is. But you're kinda shifting, hopefully, you would work with those people to see if they fit wherever the box is molding to. But this is the one that drives me insane the most is when they make the decision that this person is not gonna be a fit for the future box, it's the change in strategic direction, then they turn around and don't do anything for the employee. There's not a good severance package. They're not trying to help them find jobs.
That's the thing that pisses me off that goes when we go to these circumstances. And probably, I I'm gonna have to say, like, I think I would hope I'm 10 out of 10, but I gotta be at least 8 or 9 out of 10. Times that I've had to go in and do these, like, mass people shifts, I've typically set up generous compensation packages and or found those people jobs because it's not their fault the business strategy changed. They're a victim of it. Right?
Yep. And so as a leader, the best thing you can do is help them find work. And what pisses me off more than anything is when they start to justify that that was a bad employee because of the change in business direction. And then what's left with those people is that they have no clear understanding what's going on. Everybody talks inside the organization.
So as soon as the guy, you know, starts telling, well, we got rid of Bob because, you know, Bob just wasn't performing well. And then all of a sudden, this guy is, like, what? Why was I let go? Because I was told I was doing well, and then the business shifted. That's, I think, the one that's it's, it's not so much handling it or doing it.
That's the problem. It's it's doing it in a, you know, red line manner where we try to justify or we try to scapegoat or you know what? Hey. You've been here for 3 years. We're changing direction of the business.
Here's your 2 weeks.
[:[07:09] Ryan Hodges:2 weeks severance. Not only 2 week notice. Here's your 2 weeks severance. Like, it is not the employee's fault you had a change in business direction.
[:And for a variety of reasons, most of which I think I agree with, they said, we're killing the project. They handled that well. They said, you've got 6 weeks. There's any job you know of in the company that you're interested in. We will help you, you know, make introductions to the hiring manager.
We will help you land on your feet because this isn't your fault. We've just we've had a change of heart and a change of direction. So it it can be done even in publicly traded very, very large companies, but that isn't always the case.
[:It's really that SMB space, 50, 100, 2, 300 people that I think it gets dismissed, especially a big strategic one. Now the other one I would say is when you are terminating somebody for maybe not so much of maybe a good culture fit, but they weren't a right fit for the box. And, of course, we all know this one. Right? There's the The performance.
Yeah. Performance issue. We're doing it for performance, but it's it's you know, we'll use the EOS method. Right? Like, they get it, want it, have the capacity.
[:[08:57] Ryan Hodges:You know, they're core value fit, culture fit. And what we wanna do is we wanna move them from box to box to box to box to box because, man, you know, Bob's a great guy. Right. The problem is at the end of the day, all we're doing is making a box for the person as opposed to being strategic for the business. And then what happens is we let them go because we're frustrated that we couldn't be a leader and and do the right thing.
Nobody likes being fired. But
[:[09:18] Ryan Hodges:the day, sometime, that is the best thing that can be done. Because if you hold on to that person for too long, you're depriving them of opportunities that exist out in the in the world marketplace where they can be better. If you're on the other side of that, if you're the one that's been bounced from box to box to box to box. I would encourage you to go look elsewhere because you're probably being bounced around because they don't understand the seat. Obviously, there's some sort of, like, get it one at capacity connection to what the job expectations is and your ability, and I would go find a better job.
[:We all started looking at each other and realizing they really needed an architect, and I'm not an architect. And I was like, guys, I wasn't good at writing code 20 years ago. Like, I'm if I'm writing if you need me to write code, we are both in a very bad place. And they're like, yeah, but we're a bootstrap startup. We we love you.
You're a great culture fit. Like, we wish there was another seat on the bus, but we can't afford you and the guy that we really need. And I'm like, yeah. That sucks. And so we shook hands and walked away.
They did a good job of taking care of me and helping me network into my next role that worked out really well for me. But it it it does kinda suck when you're when you're just not a good fit for the job that needs to be done.
[:[10:57] Daniel Steere:I've also been on the receiving end of that one.
[:Whereas if you're gonna let people go, do it on a Monday morning. That way, they've done the rest of the week to go prospect for their next job.
[:[11:26] Ryan Hodges:It's a sucky situation, but you don't have to be an asshole about it. There the person on the other side has a family or a livelihood or a thing. Now if they're blatantly stealing or it's a criminal offense, like, you know, I'm taking all that stuff off the table and that should be the rarity. Right? Like, that should only statistically, that should only be, like, what, 6% of the workforce fits into that.
You know, 94% is just not a culture fit or not a, job fit.
[:[12:00] Ryan Hodges:So I'll give you one. If you remember back in our days at a particular medical software company, I actually fired somebody.
[:[12:08] Ryan Hodges:were doing a little bit of restructuring and fired the guy and come to find out, like, that was the wrong move. There was just a lot of misinformation. He was a very loved team member. He was great with the team. He was great individually, and there was just a gap in the in the knowledge.
It was a week later, we pulled him back in, and I would say this, and this is I'm gonna go for another one, is if that's the case, and we pulled him back in because it was the right move, we were just wrong in the way we did it. I I wouldn't say, like, we did it erroneously. It was just there was a lot of gaps in the knowledge, and so we didn't have enough time to do due diligence, and we needed to to scale part of the business down. And so he kinda got cross caught the crossfires, unfortunately. But what I hate is when either a, people double back or double down on their decision, or, b, they bring them back and they try to go, yeah.
It was my idea to bring this person back and, you know, no. You know, like, they they skirt the situation. In that particular instance, I stood in front of the tire company and said I made a mistake.
[:[13:07] Ryan Hodges:Go. That was a mistake. Here's what we did. Here's what we found, and here's how we won't do that again. And I apologize for the disruption this has created in the business, and we will learn from this and not do it again.
So, you know, it's it's we make mistakes, right, as leaders. We're not always gonna get it right, but it's how you handle it that matters. I've walked into too many businesses where they pull people back in, and they try to make it feel like it's an honor for them to come back when really all you did is create chaos in the business. Right.
[:[13:35] Ryan Hodges:wrongfully terminate somebody, I say wrongfully. That's that's gotta be very dangerous words there. Right? Like, we gotta be Yeah. Flip
[:Own it. Yeah. Like
[:And you know what? You'll get more respect out of your team, more respect out of the individual. And you know what? That gentleman was a hard worker, and he's still at the business today, and he's still kicking ass. That's, that's what 6 years later?
[:Was working for a tech startup, really high growth, pretty stressful situation. My home life was, like, 5 times more stressful than my job. The guy that I was working for just saw me miserable, and he was like, you're clearly not happy here. Here's a severance package. Like, go find something you really wanna do.
And I was like, no. This is what I want to be doing. It's just I come here to get away from the mess that is my my family. My my wife was we were she was pregnant with my with our second kid. She was bedridden, and our first kid had been diagnosed with special needs.
So I had a special needs kid and a bedridden wife at home. I was working an hour away at a tech startup, but I was like, honestly, tech startup is so much less stressful than being at home. And so he fired me on a Friday, and then I started asking him questions like, okay, so what's your plan with this? What's your plan with this? What's your plan with this?
How are you gonna do this? How are you gonna do this? And I don't think he realized all that I was doing, which is probably my fault for not telling him more. And so he's like, well, let's talk tomorrow. And so we talked on Saturday, he hired me back, and then I showed up Monday as if nothing had happened, Except I had texted one or 2 of my friends, like, hey.
I just got fired. Can you get my stuff? And then I show up Monday morning, and everyone's just like, what? What's what like, what happened? Probably not best practice there.
Yeah. So so maybe let's go to some lessons learned from your mistake and this past mistake I just referred to. Could you say that it's it's a best practice to make sure you really understand the full story? What's going on with this person? You said there were gaps in your knowledge when you let this guy go and didn't realize you didn't know what you didn't know.
Same thing happened with my boss. He didn't realize that my misery had nothing to do with my job. It had to do with my personal life. So I would say maybe step one is make sure you've got the full story before you pull the trigger. Yep.
Make sure you really know what's going on professionally, first of all. And then to some extent, try to figure out what's going on personally because I think oftentimes there's reasons why performance can dip that has nothing to do with work. And oftentimes we're too scared to ask or just don't have the relationship there to really know what's going on. So that'd be my recommendation number one. Make sure you really know what's going on before you pull the trigger.
Yeah.
[:[16:49] Daniel Steere:seek to
[:[16:51] Daniel Steere:Don't assume
[:[17:03] Daniel Steere:Other one I would recommend is you mentioned EOS and the get it, want it, has the capacity. I think so few organizations that I've worked with really construct their values in a way that are I'm gonna use the word discriminatory. And and I know that's an inflammatory word, but I'm using on purpose. It's because there should be great people that you do not want to hire because they don't fit your culture. And if your values aren't, again, the the best word I can come up with is discriminatory.
Like, if your if your values aren't clear enough to weed out good people, I don't think your values are are good enough. And I've seen a lot of companies that have just have just have poor values, integrity. That's the worst value I've ever heard because nobody's looking for the guy with a lack of integrity.
[:[18:07] Daniel Steere:Mhmm. And so I think for many people, they end up making this decision harder for themselves because they've not done the hard work. They know they're not a culture fit, but they can't say why. They've just got a bad gut feeling, and then you're firing somebody for a gut feeling, but that's a downstream consequence of the fact that you've not done your homework on your core values.
[:Right? There's there's the culture component, but if you don't have a clear set of behaviors that you expect or if you don't have the role defined for get it, want it, have the capacity. But that means, like, what are the three to five accountabilities that that person's gonna be held to? So let's go both ways. Like, if you're an employee and you don't know the three to five behaviors you're you're expected to to live by, you should ask for those.
And if you have core values on the wall that say integrity, honesty, and, you know, awesomeness Team teamwork. Teamwork. There you go. Then then you should ask, like, what behaviors do you expect of me to live those? And then secondarily, if you don't have the, you know, the accountabilities, if you will, like the measurables, then you should ask what are the three to five things, you know, of job outputs you should expect from me that is going to say if I'm doing a good job or not?
What's the scorecard? What are you gonna measure me by? And if you get kind of a a nebulous answer, well, you you you you your fate is your fate is is flipping a coin.
[:I don't have a job description. I want to do a good job, and I don't know what that looks like in your head. I know what it looks like in my head, but there's a big risk that what the picture in your head is not the picture in my head, and we're gonna get sideways at some point in the future. So let's spend some time defining what it would really look like for me to do this job well. While not easy, I think it actually makes the hiring and firing conversation when that has if and when that has to happen, it's so much easier.
[:I've I've not done that. Yep. It makes sense to me. It sucks. Right?
Firing people, terminating whatever reason, it it sucks because you're changing somebody's livelihood. But at the end of the day, if they were under if if if the expectations were clear and they were underperforming, they probably will be fine seeking a new job before you terminate them, or they're going to be in line with why it's happening as opposed to a blind side. Yeah. I think that's that's it can it can smooth out the layoff process because there's clear on what's happening. It makes the situation less sucky because we're very clear on what we're what the expectations are.
[:But but most people want to do a good job. The challenge is is that they many times don't know what it looks like to do a good job. And that's, you know, that's the fault of the leader of the executive who needs to define the job description, define the values, define the behaviors so that employees can do a good job. And or they can self-select out. They could say, okay.
That's what you really want. I don't wanna do that. You should go find somebody else. Yep. And that's actually, you know, some of the the best separation conversations is is when it ends up being almost mutual of, like, you want this.
I want that. These things are not the same. Let's find a way to part ways, but you're only gonna get that when you've done the hard work to create the clarity upfront.
[:What are the things that you can do in the immediate, you know, as you're doing? Somebody's gotta lay somebody off tomorrow. What can they do between now and that phone call meeting, etcetera?
[:Everybody has a family. Everybody has a life. They've got a livelihood. They've got people depending on them. And so letting people go with as much dignity as possible is important.
I think part of that dignity is how do you care for them, either helping them get another job, offering a referral if you can, giving them a generous severance package where available. I think those are all part
[:If they if the the person being let go goes negative, don't bring that back in the workplace because it's not gonna end well for everybody else. You know, try to separate. If it's in a very positive manner, then I think it's okay to maintain those relationships. But either way, if you try to help the person, either, a, connect them on somebody on LinkedIn. Hey.
I found this job and thought of you, or I'll give you a perfect example. There is an executive I had to let go, a week ago, I believe, and we're meeting tomorrow, for career advice. He wants some career advice on what his next move is, and so, you know, it's helping him be successful in his next move. So if the circumstances is outside of your control of why you're having to terminate them, do what you can to help them be successful in their next path.
[:[25:09] Ryan Hodges:If you're the manager, I think get get your facts. If you wanna make it suck less, don't bullshit them. Just tell them the truth. Like, let them know what's going on because you know you they may not know they were doing something wrong or they may not like, they can take that into consideration and and be more successful in every opportunity is an opportunity for growth even in a sucky situation. So if you wanna make it suck less, be a good steward.
[:But then there also should be some regular ongoing performance conversations that say, hey. Here's what we said we needed you to do. Here's how you're doing. And if that's going great, high 5. If it's not, here's what we need to do for this to continue working out for both of us.
Right? And how are we gonna fix this? Because I find so many employees get blindsided because they didn't know they weren't meeting expectations.
[:[26:43] Daniel Steere:It's too late. Yeah.
[:They were phenomenal human beings, but their MO, their behavior was not in line with the company's culture.
[:[27:08] Ryan Hodges:There's nothing wrong with that. It sucks. Just be clear on the difference and why it is. Now, again, if they're belligerent and they don't want to listen, you know, that's on them. On either side of the fence, don't stoop to their level.
And, I mean, you can use all the cliches and phrases and whatnot, but the thing is if you can say you did as much as you possibly could correctly, then you've done your part. If you've half-assed it, then, well, shame on you. But let's go to the executive. So if you're an executive who's made the decision, I've been in this role. If you're an executive that has said we're gonna lay some people off and it's a manager's job to then, you know, do the execution, I think you've gotta have some grace for the managers because terminating people is tough. It's nerve-wracking. Managers don't sleep well the night before. They're stressed and worried, thinking about what the rest of the team is going to think. I think you've got to be there for support, and you've also gotta be understanding that when that manager terminates the individual or individuals, they're going to need support—not just telling them to fire Bob and get back to work.
[:[28:25] Ryan Hodges:The worst thing you can do is not allow that manager some breathing room and flexibility. Maybe you need to mentor them on better execution or ensure they're prepared to have the conversation. There are a lot of executives who have managers terminate people because they don't want to do it themselves. Right.
[:[28:43] Ryan Hodges:Passing the buck. Shame on them. Good leaders don't do that. If a manager is terminating an employee and you're the executive, support your managers. Support your direct reports.
[:[29:41] Ryan Hodges:Oh, I've been on the other side of that too many times where everybody is a special snowflake, and they can't be touched because of some unique thing. And it's like, no. No. We can get rid of these 10 people
[:[29:55] Ryan Hodges:And three people can do the work because it's a more streamlined system and tools or for whatever reason. But not everybody is irreplaceable.
[:[30:07] Ryan Hodges:Right. Right. And that's where I think executives need to work well with their managers to understand what are the real skills that are necessary here, which of those are replaceable, and which of them are not.
[:[31:28] Ryan Hodges:On the flip side of that is sometimes if you're the executive or the manager once removed, if you come into the situation and say, look. This is the directive the business is moving in. We've asked X manager to do this. You know, the people that remain, you know, this is what happened. And sometimes coming in and supporting the manager indirectly helps keep the team that is remaining at bay or more engaged because you can create fear and chaos.
[:[32:17] Ryan Hodges:You know, ABCs. Was it always be closing? Always be Always
[:[32:22] Ryan Hodges:No. I mean, if you think you've got a concern that you're on the chopping block, the real question I would ask is, like, self-reflection is why do you think you're on the chopping block? You know, what do you think is there? If there's layoffs going on, like you hear Microsoft and Facebook, you know, 10,000 layoffs happening, you're gonna be a victim of the machine. III think everybody that's in corporate America knows the corporate game enough that they kinda just bounce around.
I think in the small business space, if you've got that feeling it's coming, I would say two things. One, just be prepared, maybe be prospecting. The other side of it would be just walk away. Like, when it happens, don't get vindictive. Don't I mean, unless the business isn't doing something illegal. Right? Go take legal action if that's the case. But don't threaten legal action because you're upset.
[:[33:14] Ryan Hodges:You know, get vindictive and go on Facebook and don't, like, don't be a jerk. Their lack of moral value in business does not define yours.
[:[33:53] Ryan Hodges:Yeah. Yeah. I think that's true. I'd wanna echo your advice: don't let a bad situation bring out the worst of you. If you're gonna get laid off and you know it's coming, that's not the time to throw a fit, cry, flip tables, flip birds at everybody because that's how you're going to be remembered. Acting with class and dignity, even if your manager and those above you are not, is going to be what people remember. Also, start to make sure that those relationships that are really important to you in your current job are strong. You know how to stay in touch with them.
[:[35:10] Daniel Steere:Yeah. You're not just losing that job. You're losing every job that every person in that office thought you would be good at.
[:[35:21] Daniel Steere:Getting fired sucks. Firing people sucks. No matter what side of the table you're on, be as clear as possible. Handle yourself with as much dignity as possible, and believe that there are better days ahead for both sides.
[:[35:38] Daniel Steere:Good.
[:[35:42] Daniel Steere:Make work not suck. Our podcast talks about exactly that, our process, vision, journey, culture, and results. We present real world business solutions that make the difference. Our goal is to make work not suck. Hosted by Ryan Hodges, co-host Daniel Steere.
Join us each episode and make work not suck.
