Layoff Thinking

08 April 2026

LinkedIn has been awash in layoff stories for, God, it feels like forever now. But a recent post got me thinking about layoffs, and how some of our reactions are deeply visceral when others get laid off around us, and why it's such a deeply personal thing to be suddenly unemployed.

First, the post

The video does some interesting analysis around what the real cause of the layoff is (and I think she's right about that), but the text above the video reads, in part:

We are so conditioned to believe that we have no inherent worth in capitalism unless we are EARNING. So we outsource our own worth to the very privileged few who are seemingly doing capitalism "right."

You're worthy, I promise you. Struggle isn't necessary, poverty doesn't happen because you're lazy and entitled.

... which got me thinking. Why is it we take it so hard when we are separated from a company?

In Western (American) society, we often place a great deal of our identity into what we do.

Consider, for a moment, how we greet each other when strangers first meet: "Hi, what's your name? What do you do?" (In the Deep South, I'm told the question is often, "What church do you go to?" while New Yorkers, I'm told, ask "Where ya from?" meaning "Which of the boroughs do you live?" and answers of anything other than a New York borough is essentially discounted and heavily judged.) These questions, right out of the gate, are how we look to understand other people, meaning we are using them to understand that other person.

In essence, these questions are what we use to establish our identity, our sense of selves, and how we represent that self both to others and to ourselves. It's ingrained into us as kids--in fact, it's a natural outgrowth of how, when we are children, we self-identify based on our school/grade/teacher which then leads naturally to college which then leads naturally to employer.

Notice how "What do you do" is right up there, right after the name, even? We use that as a definition of who we are, to ourselves every bit as much as we do to others.

Is it any surprise, then, that people take a layoff hard? Employers are literally striking a hole at somebody's sense of self when laying them off. It's as deep of a blow as taking away their national identity or displacing them out of their culture.

While I've always enjoyed programming and making money as a programmer, I don't think I've had that sense of "self" wrapped entirely in that concept of being a programmer. When everybody around me was a "Java developer" or a ".NET developer", I was just "a developer". Possibly because I've spent a ton of time thinking about all the other things I could (and wanted) to do: fiction author, sommelier, dungeon master, game developer, and a few more to boot. Don't get me wrong, I love coding and I love learning about all this new tech stuff, but if I couldn't make money at it, I'd do it on the side while making money doing whatever else. It's a weird thing to explain sometimes.

My reason for bringing all this up? In the spirit of trying to console people by counseling actions to take: If you're experiencing a layoff, I think it critical to lean into all of the non-work parts of your self. Re-center your sense of identity away from work. Hobbies. Family. Voracious consumer of urban fantasy romance slam poetry. Whatever. Take the chance to rebuild your sense of self around things that aren't work, so that when you get back into work, you're never quite as vulnerable as you were before.

In other words: You are way more than what you do. You have skills, insights, views, and probably a whole lotta love that you can offer. Your company said you have no worth to them? Fuck 'em. You have worth, just because. It sucks, yes, and it's important to grieve. Then get up and go wander the coffee aisle at the local grocery store, enjoying all the smells. Go watch kids in the park for a while. Swing on a swing like you did when you were five. Whatever. Be you. Reconnect with yourself, and realize that nowhere inside you is a company logo. You are waaaaay more than just what you do, and that in of itself is waaaaay bigger than where you do it.

I don't know if that helps anyone else. But it kept me sane (and even a degree hopeful) during my three-year "involuntary sabbatical" a few years back.