Come Thursday it won't be alright

It is uncomfortable (weak word but I don't have a ton of time for updates this week) when layoffs are going on at the company you are working for...

Executives go missing, managers go into closed door mode, employees spend a lot, A LOT of time wondering, conjecturing, worrying about what is going on, certain people avoid other people (i.e. people in the know don't want to make eye contact with the masses, for fear their eyes will scream "Yes you are about to be booted out on your ass!" or "No, you are safe, but buckle up as things are going to get even shittier around here") and finally, a strange mixture of no work and a ridiculous amount of output gets done.

People panic - maybe if I work really really hard right now for the next 5 days and cross my fingers they won't axe me. Good workers, the thoughtful and high performing sensitive ones, seem to freeze with anxiety - the very people who might not necessarily need to worry find themselves awash in panic and desperation that shuts them down from performing at the level on which they usually operate.

You are somewhat in the know when you have been told, "You are okay for now. No long term promises, but for this round, we'd like you to continue to slave away for lower than market average wages." You are also somewhat in the know if you are smart enough to catch wind of what other teams are going through - who has a headcount target, who has already been told. But not knowing everything, every walk to the bathroom, every jaunt down to the cafeteria is precarious.

I'm here to say that being in the know is not fun. See someone you know is going but hasn't been told yet and your heart beats faster, you feel a little sick, and then you feel relief that its them and not you, and then you feel like a total ass for thinking of yourself. There is some survior guilt going on here. See someone else, someone you haven't seen in awhile, and you begin to wonder their fate - are they going? do they know? what exactly does she do around here? It takes over every moment of the day.

I worry that they will change their minds about me in the next two days and that, come Thursday, I'll be asked to go away like the other workers, managers, and executives they tagged this time.