That’s neat. High probability of employee taking your offer and not just shopping around because they are layed off and good for the employee who needs to make ends meet quick. I like that they try to exclude companies that had mass layoffs within the last 3 years as well.
Though if I were the employee, I’d take that severance and try to stretch it for a couple of months and depending on the engineering field, do a bunch of interview questions and apply at FAANG or other high paying ones. I feel like a large portion of layed off employees aren’t the ones who jump companies and get promoted regularly. Those ones can smell the end is near and jump ship probabaly beforehand. If finances are stable, getting laid off might be a great opportunity if one can maintain focus and is willing to put in the time.
I was laid off from my first job. It can be really soul crushing at first but luckily in technology its not that hard to find openings in a short time span.
Apart from the constant fear of not getting another job, it was actually a very very pleasant experience. I ended up doing a lot of reading by the pool at my gym, working out a lot and traveling. All the while reading up on algorithms, learning new technologies.
Of course I was pretty stable financially and that really helped. The severance made the first month seem like a paid vacation. The next 2 months were pretty wonderful as well, except that it hurt to see my savings get eroded.
I don't think you're accurate about the kind of employees that get laid off though. If I was a little more experienced, I would have seen it coming and started interviewing long before I was laid off. There were a couple of other folks who got laid off with me and they're not doing all that well now.
Those ones can smell the end is near and jump ship probabaly beforehand
If you sense it coming and you work for a company that treats people decently (dunno if eBay does or not) then why wouldn’t you hang around for the payoff? A good company will give a months pay per year of service.
If you took a job as a developer because you love creating useful things that people like; and you know after the layoff the product is going in the trash; that's going to cut into your job satisfaction a lot.
Plus there's the risk you'll be among those who aren't laid off, but your working conditions will worsen.
Though if I were the employee, I’d take that severance and try to stretch it for a couple of months and depending on the engineering field, do a bunch of interview questions and apply at FAANG or other high paying ones. I feel like a large portion of layed off employees aren’t the ones who jump companies and get promoted regularly. Those ones can smell the end is near and jump ship probabaly beforehand. If finances are stable, getting laid off might be a great opportunity if one can maintain focus and is willing to put in the time.