It's impossible to escape it - in the news, on LinkedIn, friends, colleagues - it seems as though "re-org season" is once again upon us as businesses reset themselves to come out of COVID and into (the hideous phrase that is) "the new normal".
Whether you're "Impacted" (With a capital "I" - where your job is at risk) or just "impacted" (change to your role, where it reports or even seeing friends & colleagues affected nearby), it's the most unsettling thing you can face at work. It's also incredibly common. Long gone is the stigma of redundancy implying anything negative about you. In fact, the stark reality is the vast majority of us have been or will be impacted by redundancy at some stage in our careers.
I have had the dubious honour of being involved in 6 organisational re-designs in the last 4 years across various roles. I've designed structures, delivered the news on "announcement days", chaired group consultations, hosted 100s of individual consultation meetings and been personally impacted on more than one occasion.
Unfortunately, that makes me somewhat of an unwilling expert on the subject, so I thought why not share what I've learnt in the hope that it can help people better navigate it now or in the future.
Overall, I think there's three things that are key to getting through a redundancy process. First off, play the game to make the process work for you. In most cases, the process will be clear & there are some good ways, and bad ways you can operate within this. Secondly, don't be a passenger & proactively generate options. It's well known that "denial" is a key stage on the change curve & the quicker you can get through this and act on the things you can control, the better. Finally, going through change is hard & it can take a huge toll on your mental health, so be kind to yourself both in the way you frame the situation & the actions you take.
(1) Play the game to make the process work for you
Whether you're in a large company, medium company or anywhere making 20 or more redundancies (this is a legal requirement), the process & policy for redundancy should be pretty clear & readily available to you. Even in "less standard" redundancy processes (such as voluntary redundancy, or targeted severance) there will be information available & you should find it, digest it & understand what's coming.
A normal redundancy process will have two parts & colleagues will be consulted with in both stages. Firstly, this will happen in group consultation - where colleague reps are elected as the voice of colleagues through consultation on the proposed structure & the process by which consultation will be run (e.g. recruitment principles - will they be by assessment form or by interview?). Then, after group consultation, the new structure is confirmed & colleagues are consulted on a 121 basis around their individual impact.
Two things are really important in here - first, the separation of the structure in the first phase & the individual in the second. This is important (and it plays into tip 3) as it allows you to frame the proposed structure as just that - it's the organisation's best effort at meeting the objectives set (whether strategic, cost reduction or, in most cases, a combination of the two). It is not a judgement on you as an individual or the value you bring. That's an important headspace to be in to allow you to approach consultation in a way that gives you the best chance of success.
The second is that this is a process of consultation - this means that there is often an opportunity to seek a clearer understanding of the proposed changes and (sometimes) effect changes to the proposals before they are finalised.
I think group consultation is one of the most important points of the process, and one that I've most often seen approached in the wrong way. It's incredibly easy to take all of your (totally justifiable) feelings of frustration, anger, resentment and fear into this process and try to criticise, pick holes, argue that the structure is wrong, catch out the people chairing the process & generally "score points". I'm yet to see this be a successful approach.
What I have seen work well is to accept the strong position that you are in & use it to your advantage. You know the objectives of the review (this should be part of any announcement) and you know more about the day to day realities and challenges of your role than the person designing the structure. As such, you can add huge value in designing the best structure that is set for success. That's in everyone's interests.
So how do you do this? Two parts:
First - ask questions to understand the proposals. Get really clear on the strategic rationale for the overall change. Get really clear on any proposed impacts to your areas & the rationale behind it - how will it work in the future? What's different? If there's a reduction, what stops? Ask as objective & non-emotionally loaded questions as you can. You can either feed these questions through your consultation reps or be a rep yourself.
Second - counter-propose a better option. Based on the information gathered & what you know about the role, suggest a better alternative. Keep in mind that, more often than not, reducing cost is a factor in a new organisation proposal, so don't simply expect "please add back in [x] roles" to be accepted. Instead, if you can make the proposal "cost neutral" (e.g. save here to put a role back here) then great, if not, then be clear on the business case that comes with a counter-proposal (e.g. adding a role here will allow £xm sales growth / avoid the £xm risk that removing it brings). Again, objectivity is your friend - everyone in the process wants a structure that meets the strategic objectives and sets the new teams up for success in the future.
As you move into individual consultation, this is the point where any selection processes, interviews or applications happen. Assuming a good working relationship, your line manager will want you to succeed & the process is set up to try and reduce the number of redundancies. On top of "generating options" which we'll talk about in a minute, there's 2 things to keep in mind:
If you're in one, know the selection process - if it's an assessment form, find out how these work, how they're scored & approach accordingly. If it's an interview (and this is equally true for applying for other roles) try to understand the form the interview is likely to take & how it's scored. Seek to understand what the selection criteria are and if you are "at risk" what implications this has (in many cases, it would mean you are offered a role over a higher scoring "safe" candidate, provided you meet a set of "minimum criteria" for a role)
Understand what support is available to you - many businesses will have colleague support or outplacement support available to you. Use it!
(2) Proactively generate options - don't be a passenger
Whilst you should absolutely play the game & make the process work for you, don't just do this. It's really important to understand your options and, if you're not satisfied with them, do what you can to generate new ones. I think about three things:
Do the maths - Unpleasant as it is, you need to know your required monthly outgoings, when income could stop & what any redundancy payment could look like. Look at things you could do to make it stretch further (keeping one of Netflix or Disney+, get an interest free credit card, move your mortgage to interest only if you have one - note, none of this is financial advice & I am not a financial advisor!). You can much better assess (and create) options if you're clear on your answers to questions such as - when do I need a new job by? Could I get by for a while by contracting / freelancing? Could I secure a smaller role that pays less whilst I continue searching?
Internal scenario planning - if you're in a selection process, all the things I spoke about in #1 to try and secure the role are key, but don't just do them. Look at the wider landscape in your business - where are there other opportunities? Where could they be? Who can I find out more from? The last part is the most important - do your detective work to understand what could be out there, and have the conversations to understand if they'd be interesting to you & how likely they are to materialise as options for you.
Use your network, and other people's - building on the point above, people & networks are critically important. No matter who you are and what role you do, you will either have a great network of people (in and outside the business you currently work in) that can help you spot opportunities. If you don't, don't worry, you will absolutely know at least one person that has a great network (that they'll share with you). Either way, people will want to help you as they have either been in the same position, will have been close to people in the same position or know they more than likely will be in the same position at some point in the future!
Remember - re-structure is a common, organisational decision, not a personal one. As mentioned earlier, the stigma that once came with redundancy is long gone & people will want to help. Reach out and ask for it, and accept it when it's offered.
(3) Be kind to yourself
You may have spotted a pattern in the tips above - they're all very logical, left brain things. Take emotion out of it and propose alternatives in consultation, rationally plan out your options & ask for help from your network.
However, there is not one person who's response to redundancy, restructure or change will be purely rational. You'll feel angry, upset, lose confidence, get stuck in mental doom loops & all kinds of other things through the process. This is totally natural, but knowing that doesn't make it any easier to deal with!
Given this, it's vitally important that you are totally and utterly selfish with looking after your mental and physical health. Not only is this the kind & emotionally smart thing to do, it's also the logical choice. When you're searching for a role & exploring your options, you're selling yourself as much as (if not more than!) your experience. So make sure that person is in as great physical & mental shape as possible!
There is loads written on this subject & plastered all over Google - but for me, I've found a few things work well that I'm happy to share:
Reset - Consciously eat better. Consciously go to bed earlier. Consciously make 60 minutes for a walk or exercise the first thing that goes in your calendar each day.
Relax - I remember the first time someone talked to be about meditation. I thought they were mad. I now use Headspace (lots of alternatives around) daily. It trains your brain to separate stimulus from response and this is vital when you're looking to make rational choices in an emotional situation.
Re-frame - "Because my role has been removed from an org chart, everything I have ever done is worthless & I am worthless". Without exaggeration, this exact thought has gone through my head in the past, as I know it has with many others. Your job is to catch these thoughts as they arise and re-frame them: "the business has changed & this is an opportunity to try something new". Asking a friend to help you catch these "doom loops" and reframe them can work wonders.
So that's it, if it helps one person (even slightly) then I'll be delighted. There's all kinds of material out there to help you (many of you know I love Amazing If and their excellent podcast includes great episodes on redundancy, interviews, confidence & more - https://www.amazingif.com/listen).
If you're currently working through this, just remember to make the process work for you, generate your options and, most importantly, look after yourself.
If I can help in anyway, please just ask.