The days of cradle-to-grave jobs are as long gone as fully employer-funded pensions, medical insurance, and annual company picnics for staff and their families. But while most employees have accepted a hefty dose of employment precarity as a fact of today’s labor market, new data shows many longer-tenured workers are blindsided—and suffer debilitating setbacks—in getting layoff notices they thought their seniority had made impossible.
That continued belief in the traditional unwritten employment rule of “first in, last out” costs more tenured workers who wind up being dismissed an emotional and professional “loyalty tax.” That’s the term workforce staffing company Careerminds used to describe the penalizing effects on laid-off workers who thought their five, 10, 15 years of service for the same employer had made them virtually invulnerable to head-count cuts. In addition to the disbelief, shattered trust, and deep loss that longer-term employees struggle with when they’ve been cut, those staffers also end up being vastly less prepared to find new opportunities than more cynical colleagues who’ve come to view employment as increasingly at risk.
The result is often a distressing real-life mash-up of Death of a Salesman and Up in the Air for longer-term workers caught in the middle of it.
“One of the biggest misconceptions employees still have is that loyalty will protect them from layoffs,” said Careerminds career expert Amanda Augustine. “Unfortunately, many longtime employees discover all too late that their years of dedication don’t necessarily equate to job security.”
To gain a better understanding of what happens when longer-term workers are hit by those layoff bolts from the blue, Careerminds recently surveyed 900 people who’d lost jobs they’d had for a minimum of five years.
The first major finding was that a large majority of respondents (76%) had considered their employment to be secure or very safe prior to getting a pink slip. Nearly the same portion also said they’d felt sure “their terms of service would protect them from being laid off.” Not surprisingly, 66.3% of respondents said they’d been thunderstruck by their dismissal, with nearly a quarter having previously considered it unthinkable.
That misplaced conviction that their relatively long tenure with the same employer offered a higher degree of job protection was penalized by the loyalty tax in a few ways.
The first form of that came even before layoffs were announced, with 58% of respondents reporting they’d rejected one or more outside work offers before being cut free—opportunities they’d considered unnecessary and unwanted.
That same contentment with and confidence in their employment situation also led 46.5% of survey participants to let their résumés become sorely out of date. Similarly, a bit more than 53% of respondents said they’d let their professional networks fall into partial or complete disuse.
That benign neglect produced the second jolt of loyalty tax. The sudden loss of a job most respondents had considered safe made bouncing far more difficult and time-consuming than for people who had viewed the risk of renewed unemployment as a constant possibility. In fact, just 13.8% of participants said they could have applied for new roles using the résumés, work hunting skills, and contacts they possessed when they were dismissed.
It goes without saying that employers don’t lay staff off eagerly, or without carefully selecting job eliminations that serve the company’s best interests. That’s especially true when it comes to longer-term workers.
But managers can be aware of the acute shock and subsequent struggles more tenured employees with experience face, and try to help minimize those. A few other findings in the survey offer ideas on how managers can do that.
The first way is financial. Fully 45% of the more tenured respondents to the poll said they got no severance pay or other monetary assistance from their employers. Meanwhile, nearly a quarter said they received far less severance than expected for their time served. Financially acknowledging the loyalty and effort of longer-term staffers on the way out will blunt some of the difficulties in longer-term workers being let go.
The second way is professional. Most laid-off workers said they went from being a valued, integral part of the team to becoming an outsider left to fend for themselves almost overnight. Most felt abandoned at the worst moment of their career—a sentiment that can be easily avoided.
“Nearly two-thirds of long-tenured workers (63.3%) were offered no outplacement support upon their exit, no career coaching, no résumé help, no job search guidance,” the survey results noted. “These employees arrive at a time of transition with dormant networks, out-of-date résumés, and no experience in job hunting. Outplacement is one area where organizations can make a genuine difference in how a long-tenured employee lands.”
—Bruce Crumley
This article originally appeared on Fast Company’s sister website, Inc.com.
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