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Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

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Re: Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

#41

Post by rmbyrro »

subsubzero wrote: post #26

Terrible communication in that letter, I love brutally honest and to the point communication. Everyone's time is precious don't beat around the bush just say: we are laying off 10% of the companies staff due to macro-economic conditions beyond our control, this coupled with decreased customer spending and hiring like this day would never happen lead us to this decision. Sorry :(

Not everyone would appreciate your style of communication. I, for example, certainly wouldn't. Unfortunately, it would be unfeasible to customize such a letter for each employee...

Re: Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

#42

Post by cortesoft »

rvnx wrote: post #31
atty wrote: post #21

Honestly, what a terrible letter. Did not once say the words layoff or let go. Using phrases like “continue to be part of klarna’s journey”. Good lord, is this a business or a cult? And not a single line about concrete steps they will take to support the layoffs (multi-month severance packages, etc). Hopefully that is what they intend, but as of right now, this is pretty disappointing.

I feel it's better to use "fired" or "have to leave your job" or "layoff" or "terminate the employment contract" than "let go". Because "let go" is to "allow someone or something to escape or go free" so it implies that you are the owner of the employee and you allow him to leave, just like as an ultimate humiliation he has to have your permission to go.

"Let go" and "layoff" seem to be similar euphemisms. Why does it matter which one is used?

Re: Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

#43

Post by tejohnso »

> However, unfortunately, some of you will be informed that we cannot offer you a role in the new organization

What new organization? They're laying off ~10%, not restructuring the whole business, or creating a wholly owned subsidiary, or even repositioning their product. Is there some kind of legal advantage being exploited here?

Re: Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

#44

Post by phphphphp »

rmbyrro wrote: post #34
atty wrote: post #21

Honestly, what a terrible letter. Did not once say the words layoff or let go. Using phrases like “continue to be part of klarna’s journey”. Good lord, is this a business or a cult? And not a single line about concrete steps they will take to support the layoffs (multi-month severance packages, etc). Hopefully that is what they intend, but as of right now, this is pretty disappointing.

I actually found it a humane way of dealing with the situation. They let everyone know in advance. Have the decency of individual communication. Anticipated what type of invite to expect. Promised to roll out quickly, in a matter of days. I mean, probably not the "perfect" layoff, but certainly not close to worse, or even "terrible".

I very much disagree. For people with anxious tendencies, this type of email is absolutely awful to receive, and consider that most of those let go will be at lower rungs of the company, so job security in the current market is going to be a big source of anxiety.

“You are at risk of losing your job, but you’ll have to wait all week to find out”

Re: Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

#45

Post by madamelic »

phphphphp wrote: post #36

The worst possible way to handle it: 1. Tells everyone that they’ll get an email in the next few days about whether or not they’re to be fired — days of anxiety ahead for everyone, and even those who aren’t being let go will be looking for new roles 2. Asking everyone to work from home, so those who are let go are isolated from their peers who they very probably want to commiserate with and say goodbye to What a terr…

Yeah, #2 definitely feels the worst imo.

Not knowing who will be there when you get back, having to go into the office with the anxiety of having to be the survivors even if it is only 10%.

With that said, it's a lose-lose. Layoffs suck. It sucks to know what is happening and see people led off, just like it sucks to be the one led off with the psychologically long walk to the meeting room.

Re: Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

#46

Post by zucked »

subsubzero wrote: post #26

Terrible communication in that letter, I love brutally honest and to the point communication. Everyone's time is precious don't beat around the bush just say: we are laying off 10% of the companies staff due to macro-economic conditions beyond our control, this coupled with decreased customer spending and hiring like this day would never happen lead us to this decision. Sorry :(

I don't think you need to be brutal about it, but being more direct would have been better here. Someone else already captured the essence, but this was all over the place and still didn't really convey that 700 people were losing their jobs.

Re: Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

#47

Post by nvrspyx »

nowherebeen wrote: post #35
rvnx wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel it's better to use "fired" or "have to leave your job" or "layoff" or "terminate the employment contract" than "let go". Because "let go" is to "allow someone or something to escape or go free" so it implies that you are the owner of the employee and you allow him to leave, just like as an ultimate humiliation he has to have your permission to go.

Fired means you did something wrong. Let go means you were let go of your job through no fault of your own.

Wouldn't the latter be layoff? I feel like let go can be used for either; a more polite way of saying "fired" or an alternative to "laid off".

Re: Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

#48

Post by nisse2000 »

atty wrote: post #21

Honestly, what a terrible letter. Did not once say the words layoff or let go. Using phrases like “continue to be part of klarna’s journey”. Good lord, is this a business or a cult? And not a single line about concrete steps they will take to support the layoffs (multi-month severance packages, etc). Hopefully that is what they intend, but as of right now, this is pretty disappointing.

From a Swedish perspective this is probably a "varsel" which is prior notice that they intend to do layoffs. You can't just fire people in Sweden so this is a first step. They have to give notice that they intent to layoff people to the different unions and then start the process. In other countries where they operate it's probably very different?

My guess is it will vary a lot how they do this because of first-in-first-out rules in Sweden they will have to get around to be able to layoff the people they want. I agree with the general sentiment though that the language is a bit vague, but this is a partial reason I think.

Re: Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

#49

Post by BurningFrog »

aabhay wrote: post #4

What does it look like to fire someone in Europe? As an outsider, all I’ve heard is that it looks very different from the US. What does the author mean by ‘associated compensation’?

Pet Peeve:

There is no unified "Europe" where things are done the same way.

There are ~50 very diverse countries in Europe, and things will vary widely.

This is even true, though a bit less so, for the 27 EU member states.

Re: Klarna – Company announcement from CEO regarding layoffs

#50

Post by dvt »

phphphphp wrote: post #44
rmbyrro wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually found it a humane way of dealing with the situation. They let everyone know in advance. Have the decency of individual communication. Anticipated what type of invite to expect. Promised to roll out quickly, in a matter of days. I mean, probably not the "perfect" layoff, but certainly not close to worse, or even "terrible".

I very much disagree. For people with anxious tendencies, this type of email is absolutely awful to receive, and consider that most of those let go will be at lower rungs of the company, so job security in the current market is going to be a big source of anxiety. “You are at risk of losing your job, but you’ll have to wait all week to find out”

> “You are at risk of losing your job, but you’ll have to wait all week to find out”

I think this is actually pretty nice because it gives you a bit of time to start polishing your resume. Even if you don't get laid off, that's always a good idea.

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