Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for July 02, 2021

Is he going to write off the Maui trip as a business expense?

Like a boss ……. unfortunately.

And Mike when your finished, fire yourself.

Mike will be laid off later after the dust settles, but he will be the one blamed.

How “noble”…and opportunistic.

At least Bernie’s self-aware enough to realize how shabby this is.

This is where Mike should say, “You can’t make me fire everyone. I quit!”

I remember around this time the AT&T CEO issued layoffs in a gathering – via videotape. I suppose in the future they may have a robot do this dirty work.

My first duty as the new manager at my work was firing the previous manager and banning him from the premises.

Dump would be proud.

I think Bernie should fall back on his old werewolf formula.

But give them all a million dollar severance package first.

Now we know where Ted Cruz got the idea.

Early Jeff Bezos

So Mike the Axe? Not really the moniker to aspire to, but better than Mike the axed, I suppose.

I had the disagreeable position of being a corporate hatchet man for a time. I hated it! The company I worked for would take over distressed properties ( hotels/resorts ) fire all the employees, sometimes completely close the property for much-needed repairs and refurbishments, re-open, put the books back in the black, then flip it.

My job was to bring a team in undercover prior to the takeover, evaluate the employees working in various departments, and then … after firing everyone, invite the good workers to reapply for their old jobs. On the plus side, for the workers rehired, they were brought in at a higher wage than what they’d had before. On the minus side, they’d lost all seniority, vacation time, and benefits they might have had with the previous owner.

I never liked having to be the bad guy and affect people’s lives in such a negative way. It always haunted me.

Years ago, I gave notice to my boss because I was moving to another state. He started to tell me how valuable I was and hoped I would change my mind but had to leave for a big meeting. When he came out of the meeting he thanked me. Told me he’d just been ordered to downsize and my leaving meant he didn’t have to.

Sometimes, a real coward company hires an outside “hatchet man” as part of a consultancy package. It’s supposed to give management deniability.

I actually had this happen to me. At a small company, where I was just a project manager, the owner called me into his office and told me that because profits were down he was going to reduce everybody’s pay by 10%. (This after calling a company meeting so he could show off two new BMWs he’d just bought.) And even though I had nobody reporting to me, he wanted me to tell everybody about the pay cut. (The actual bosses were strangely absent…)

I sent out a mass e-mail, as I was told, and of course there was immediate fervor. The owner turned around and claimed I was lying, and retracted his decision. At least he didn’t penalize me for carrying out his orders, but it convinced me that it was time to leave.

Yep. Happens all the time.

Why not use George Clooney from “Up in the Air”? (Great movie if you haven’t seen it)

Reminds me of a trip to Cancun during winter storm.

Trump was great in theses comics.

And I am curious where Trudeau is going with this. Business related layoffs are very common in the tech industry. Every manager should be familiar with it and have the tools for handling it as fairly as possible. Every employee should be aware that it is always a possibility. It seems like Bernie is being set up as a bad guy for trying to keep his company alive and functioning.

It is always unfortunate when a person loses a job that fits their skills well and has been lucrative for them. But anyone in a high tech firm knows the risks and should have a savings account (from their high pay) and a current resume handy. And a few recent outside contacts don’t hurt either.

Is Kim on the list?

Wait. He’s got to tell the new Love of his life that she is fired.

Well, hopefully, she will remember that she was looking for a Job when she found this one.

I would say that you owe Mike a big fat bonus, Bernie.

I know a guy who was promoted to manager of his department, and then told his first management job would be to lay off everyone in his department.

So many horror stories. I’m grateful I was never in that spot.

This is getting a little tedious. If Bernie doesn’t have an HR department, this might be a good time to get one. As a marketing guy, Mike doesn’t know jack about how to lay people off, and he’s going to get Bernie’s ass sued right out from under him. Other than as a plot device with Mike and Kim, this makes no sense. And the conversation keeps getting lamer.

We know MIke and Kim are still around. Could someone please post a spoiler and let me know if they are still at Bernies?