Getting Laid Off Twice

from the ouch dept

Sick or reading all these dot commers who have been laid off? How about reading about those who have been laid off twice? What's that old saying? "Laid off once, shame on you. Laid off twice, shame on me." Okay, maybe that's a bit of a paraphrase. It's interesting that a number of those laid off are now "consulting" instead of hooking up with another full time job. Soon we'll have companies that are made up entirely of founders and contract workers.
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  1. identicon
    spongebrain, 3 Mar 2001 @ 2:06pm

    No Subject Given

    what do you mean by "consulting"?
    usually consultant make 50% more than the average employee doing the same job. You talk like its a bad thing

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. icon
    Mike (profile), 5 Mar 2001 @ 1:14am

    Re: No Subject Given

    Let me clarify... I'm sorry if you thought I implied it was a bad thing. I don't think it's a bad thing at all. In fact, I think it's a great thing for a lot of people. I just thought it was amusing to note that a lot of laid off people are suddenly becoming consultants.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Phillip, 5 Mar 2001 @ 6:37pm

    To clarify further

    Let me clarify... I'm sorry if you thought I implied it was a bad thing. I don't think it's a bad thing at all. In fact, I think it's a great thing for a lot of people. I just thought it was amusing to note that a lot of laid off people are suddenly becoming consultants.
    Or to clarify even further, I think Mike is amused that companies are laying off large numbers of people and blaming the current dot-com climate and then finding that the people they layed off are a little more key than they realised and are being forced to rehire them at exhorbitant contract rates (I've seen this happen a few times). Would this be fair to say Mike?
    Phillip.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. icon
    Mike (profile), 5 Mar 2001 @ 7:30pm

    Re: To clarify further

    Thanks for putting words in my mouth... :) That's part of what I meant. I've definitely seen that as well, which is especially amusing. I've also seen that such consultants work for a few months and then take some time off to relax since they've got the money for it.

    But, more to the point, what I meant originally was that it's amusing that in the past "contractors" or consultants tended to be experts in their field, whereas now it seems like every laid off employee is suddenly claiming they're an expert in their field and are starting up their own consulting business.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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