Getting Laid Off Once a Year Forum

[Anonymous User]

The title says it all. Has anyone experienced this? Repeated one year stints at firms, followed by dismissal (not for cause).

[Neff]

Getting laid once a year isn't the greatest but some people do worse.

In all seriousness, if the multiple dismissals were all truly not for cause (which I presume means due to poor firm financials), then one would have to have been extremely unlucky. However, consider that when the firm is doing poorly, it's a given that the worst-performing associate(s) are the first to be cut, so if this happens multiple times, it's a strong indication of poor performance regardless.

Hope this isn't you, but no judgment if it is. Succeeding at biglaw, in my view, is simply about minimizing hours/pain and maximizing dollars earned and saved. How often one changes firms/gets laid off is inconsequential. (1) Moving firms and taking a nice little sabbatical in between and (2) strategically cruising until one's welcome is worn out are essential tools of the game. In this good economy, lateral jobs are easy to get and it is rather difficult for employers to suss out problems at previous jobs.

[nealric]

I imagine there is a realistic limit to how many times this could happen. By the fourth or fifth year, you'd probably have a really hard time explaining all the moves to prospective firms.

[papermateflair]

When you say dismissed not for cause - I think in big law "cause" means something pretty specific, like actual misconduct (like violating a firm policy, harassment, those types of things). Getting laid off generally means that there's a financial reason behind the termination (and at companies [not law firms] you often have a small chance of being called back in if funding comes through, and sometimes you can try and find another job at the same company). Someone can be told to find another job and they aren't getting fired for cause, but they're not being laid off either. But if someone is just losing their job once a year, for multiple years, I find it unlikely that it's always a person being laid off (as someone else said, that's super unlucky), and I think most firms would be suspicious after it happens twice. If this has happened to you more than one or two times, you're probably better off coming up with an argument for a new employer that doesn't involve being laid off at all, unless you're at a firm that has a well-publicized meltdown or something. Think moving to another state for family reasons or something like that.

[notinbiglaw]

Once is no cause for concern.
Twice is maybe.
Thrice in a row is going to raise eyebrows anywhere.

It's nothing against you. It's just a basic Bayesian probability thing that someone that gets laid off two years in a row is more likely to have issues than someone who managed to stay at a firm for two years.

[FND]

Once is no cause for concern.
Twice is maybe.
Thrice in a row is going to raise eyebrows anywhere.

It's nothing against you. It's just a basic Bayesian probability thing that someone that gets laid off two years in a row is more likely to have issues than someone who managed to stay at a firm for two years.

This. If one person tells you to shut up, he's an a**hole. if five people tell you to shut up, you're an a**hole

There's also a big difference between being cut for lack of work and cut for being terrible at your job. Get fired once, you can get away with claiming it's the former, get fired a lot, and people assume it's the latter