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What not to say to someone who has just been laid off

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Re: What not to say to someone who has just been laid off

#161

Post by embeng4096 »

ska wrote: post #97
robbyking wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing I learned when my son was born is eating well is really tough to do when your mind is somewhere else. Mealtrains -- friend sourced meal prep -- are popular for people with newborns, but I've taken to dropping off meals (or sending GrubHub gift cards for friends who live out of town) to friends when I know they're going through a tough time.

This - providing meals - is a time honored tradition in many many cultures and communities, for exactly the reasons you mention. I think the somewhat recent focus on nuclear families and breaking of social cohesion that came with it makes this harder. If you don't even know your neighbors, you probably don't know when they need the help, or if it would be appreciated/accepted if you offer.

Interesting to see this perspective. I've always associated the focus on nuclear families with a tight-knit neighborhood, almost small-town vibe where everyone knows each other and, yes, are up in each other's business. The breaking of social cohesion I've associated with the more recent phenomenon of it becoming more common to leave one's community to go to school or for a new job.

Re: What not to say to someone who has just been laid off

#162

Post by Joel_Mckay »

notUrsMine wrote: post #40
Joel_Mckay wrote: post #26

"The Five Stages of Grief" from the Kubler-Ross Model seems to apply. 1. Denial 2. Anger 3. Bargaining 4. Depression 5. Acceptance The detail most get confused with is these stages occur in no particular order. Personally, I would likely jump from 2 to 3, then found a competing nonprofit firm with 9k people in the same situation, The real danger with talent layoffs is people wrongly assume every employee is replaceab…

I read that book and came away feeling underwhelmed. She went into many patient interviews with her model in mind; did she instigate patient behavior through questions? The book was often vague when it came to her interview methodology, and favored development of patient story, IMO to latch onto reader’s sympathy, while offering little detail of the authors methods. From the authors reference frame the patients appea…

Verifiable facts and accountability are often more important than individual interpretations of a singular theory of "truth".

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Blind_Men_and_the_Elephan...

If one is cooking their data, it is only slightly worse than creating entire fake journals to publish self-serving content for political arguments (true story). I hold particular disdain for the chaos faction after taking 20 minutes to read nonsense:

https://mchankins.wordpress.com/2013/04/21/still-not-signifi...

The internet simply allowed amateurs to participate in these scams. =)

Re: What not to say to someone who has just been laid off

#163

Post by ska »

embeng4096 wrote: post #161
ska wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This - providing meals - is a time honored tradition in many many cultures and communities, for exactly the reasons you mention. I think the somewhat recent focus on nuclear families and breaking of social cohesion that came with it makes this harder. If you don't even know your neighbors, you probably don't know when they need the help, or if it would be appreciated/accepted if you offer.

Interesting to see this perspective. I've always associated the focus on nuclear families with a tight-knit neighborhood, almost small-town vibe where everyone knows each other and, yes, are up in each other's business. The breaking of social cohesion I've associated with the more recent phenomenon of it becoming more common to leave one's community to go to school or for a new job.

I agree it's a combination of travel an nuclear families but those things are highly interrelated. For what it's worth most of the small-town vibe I'm familiar with from actual small towns is behind the trend to nuclear families; more likely you have multiple generations of multiple families near by who know/grow up with each other. Not uniformly, but very common. Not that I'm highly familiar or anything.

But another important impact I think is that the idea of a nuclear family is pretty much predicated on independence of your little family unit. This not needing anyone else makes it practical to move across the country on short notice, but also makes it possible to break/ignore ties locally. This is of course also affected by the creation of state level supports.

In other scenarios, part of the reason that people got more involved in local community is because they literally risked disaster if they didn't.

Re: What not to say to someone who has just been laid off

#165

Post by idiotsecant »

SoftTalker wrote: post #152
idiotsecant wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I am just the sort of person who does not want pity or charity. If I want help, I'll ask for it or do the hiring, thanks. As someone who fights this same urge, you should know that this makes you appear as closed off and cold to people that you have no intention of being closed off and cold to. You do this (I suspect) out of a deep seated fear of vulnerability. People pick up on the lack of vulnerability and will no…

You're probably not wrong, but it's who I am.

I think most people would be surprised by how often 'it's who I am' really boils down to 'I am currently comfortable with this'. Changing the deep feedback loops that we call a personality is usually very difficult because so much of the human firmware runs on autopilot and resists conscious control but we are not static patterns - we can and do change constantly. Some changes are hard and some changes are easy but it's remarkable how much a small change can sometimes make a big impact in our lives.

Re: What not to say to someone who has just been laid off

#166

Post by blagie »

GrinningFool wrote: post #105
ransom1538 wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My friend: "I can't pay my rent." Me: "Whats your venmo". 4 minutes later.... My friend: "wtf I can't pay this back" Me: "Good i don't do loans" Put in the cash or effort. When you help someone down, they never forget.

> When you help someone down, they never forget. Does that matter?

Oddly enough, decades later, I can say: yes it does.

People I came through for before seem to pop up in my times of need now. And people who helped others when we were younger now have amazing support networks, which makes a huge difference.

Re: What not to say to someone who has just been laid off

#167

Post by GrinningFool »

blagie wrote: post #166
GrinningFool wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When you help someone down, they never forget. Does that matter?

Oddly enough, decades later, I can say: yes it does. People I came through for before seem to pop up in my times of need now. And people who helped others when we were younger now have amazing support networks, which makes a huge difference.

But hindsight being 20/20, does the future potential of someone to repay in kind influence your decision to help a friend now?
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