A few days ago, a friend of many years chatted with me and said that he was laid off by the company. I was very surprised.
This friend of mine has worked in a well-known foreign company for more than 10 years before, and his level is not bad.
When entrepreneurship was the most popular in the past few years, I and others wanted to pull this friend out to work together. No matter how tempted or how to draw big cakes, he would not be tempted. He said that he would probably work in this company until he retired.
Unexpectedly, the unpredictable epidemic this year has a great impact on the business of my friend's company. The company has laid off staff, and then it has been laid off on my friend's head.
After being laid off, my friend was angry and helpless, and his words revealed:
"I have worked in the company for so many years, I have been so loyal to the company, and dedicated my best youth to the company. Now I don't expect the company to be so heartless."
"In the future . It will not be so easy to find a job with a similar salary to the current position.”
After chatting with my friend, to be honest, my heart is heavy. I think about him and myself... I can't help but think of a problem. In fact, many people will face this problem:
Did the company feed me, or did I feed the company?
1. It’s hard to work at a company until retirement
In my parents' generation, a working employee could often work in one unit until retirement, a veritable "iron rice bowl". Even in earlier eras, the children of workers could take over their parents' shifts, and in a factory, they worked from generation to generation.
Times have changed now, and there are fewer and fewer companies with this type of lifetime employment.
Not to mention that in China, the average life expectancy of many small and medium-sized companies is only 2 or 3 years, so no matter how loyal you are, it is difficult to work in a company until retirement.
2. The company and its employees are not the relationship between home and family
When you join a new company, how often do you hear welcome words like "Welcome to the family"?
Excuse me, if it is a family, which parent have you ever seen said this to a child: "I am dissatisfied with you, our family doesn't want you anymore, you can go to another family to see."
It's like the two big lies that exist in the workplace:
- The boss said, if you work hard, I will definitely not treat you badly in the future. However, after most bosses make money, they don't think about giving money to their employees first.
- The employees said, I must work hard and take the company as my home. However, when there is a higher-paying job, most people will choose to change jobs.
"Company and employees are the relationship between home and family." If someone fills you with this kind of chicken soup in the future, you have to be careful and distinguish whether it is poisonous chicken soup.
Most companies and employees on the market are just employment relationships, and companies buy employees’ time and labor by paying wages.
3. Who is feeding whom?
After laying the groundwork for the first two points, let’s talk about who is supporting the company and the employees.
As mentioned in the previous article, I worked in a mobile game company. At that time, there were multiple game teams in the company. These teams can be divided into two categories:
- A-type team: The game can generate income, and the income is greater than the cost. Simply put, it is a game team that makes money.
- Category B team: The game revenue is less than the cost, or even zero, it is obviously a team that does not make money.
At that time, the days of the A and B teams were really one in the sky and one on the ground.
The A-type team has more bonuses, more team building, and more salary increases. It is a big red in the eyes of the boss. Who let people be cash cows, and the income of several million or tens of millions a month is there.
The B-type team is much worse. If the income does not improve for a long time, when the boss loses patience, the game project may be suspended, the team members are assigned to other teams, or even the team is disbanded and laid off.
For the A-type team, it is the team that feeds the company; for the B-type team, the company supports the team, and it can even be said that the A-type team supports the B-type team.
Here is a sentence. I told readers before, don’t blindly go to big factories, and strive to become a core business and make money team. The same company, different teams, sometimes really big gaps.
As a team, as an individual.
If the value you create is not worth your wages and other costs, the company is feeding you.
If someone else can create the same value as you, but at a lower cost than you, the company is supporting you.
In layman's terms, if you can't find a higher-paying position after you leave, or if young people with low wages are about to take your job, it means that the company is supporting you, the company is active, and you are passive.
Conversely, if it is difficult for you to be replaced, or the value you create is far greater than the salary the company pays you, you support the company.
4. Win-win is the best
Many bosses think in their minds that they support their employees. Employees should cherish this job, work hard, and contribute more to the company. Don’t always think about raising wages, 996 is a blessing.
As mentioned earlier, the boss pays the employees wages, and the wages buy the employees' time, physical strength, and wisdom. The two parties are an employment relationship and a transaction. Moreover, there is no absolute who feeds who.
A company is supposed to be a platform, a platform where everyone can come together and create more value through collaboration.
Take Internet Apps as an example, assuming you are a skilled full-stack programmer, you can develop an app with 10,000 daily active users. If you can find an excellent product manager and an excellent operation at this time, and the three of you work together, the daily activity of this app may reach 100,000.
Professional things are left to professional people to do, and everyone should get together to produce the effect of 1+1>2.
In an Internet company, to make a good product, various professionals such as development, testing, UI, DBA, operation and maintenance, product managers, operations, and marketing are often required to work together.
Therefore, the most ideal state is a win-win situation for the company and employees:
On the platform of the company, through the cooperation of many people, everyone can earn more income than they do alone; naturally, the company also obtains higher profits.
5. Don’t be a company-supported employee
Mafengwo cut salaries by 50% in February;
Harrow travel without compensation for layoffs;
Suizhuo all staff cut salaries by 30% and layoffs by 20%;
Eggshell layoffs, free layoffs;
CreditEase layoffs and salary cuts; iQiyi
layoffs;
Ali Fliggy layoffs ;
SF layoffs;
Cheetah Mobile layoffs;
Meicai layoffs;
Tongdun layoffs;
The above is the list of Internet companies that I saw on the Internet two days ago that laid off employees and reduced wages. Do you lament why there are so many companies? The truth is, to save space, I've only pasted a quarter.
To be honest, in the more than ten years I have worked in Siyuanwai, I have never encountered such a large-scale and long-lasting wave of layoffs. The most frustrating thing is that it is impossible to tell when this layoff wind will blow.
Our company has also laid off staff in the last year (compensated layoffs). According to my observation, the laid-off employees have two manifestations:
- It doesn't matter - suddenly get a compensation, just go on a trip, come back to find a job, and get a salary increase by the way. Some people are even more exaggerated. Knowing that they have been fired, it seems that they are happy from the sky, and they can't wait for gongs and drums and firecrackers.
- The end of the world - after knowing that I was fired, I was really silent. After being laid off for several months, he has not found a new job.
Needless to say, obviously the second category is the employees the company feeds.
It is estimated that many people, like me, used to think that layoffs were very far away from them. We were still young before, and it used to be the Internet bonus period, with more opportunities, more companies, and more jobs.
It's different now. No matter whether you are young or not, I hope everyone will not become an employee supported by the company. Here are a few points:
- Give yourself some time . Suppose I am 965 now, work 40 hours a week, and earn 20k a month. If you have a new job with 996 and work 60 hours a week, you can raise your salary to 25k. I will definitely not accept this offer. It seems that the salary is high, but after careful calculation, the working hours have increased by 50%, the salary has increased by 25%, and the hourly salary has been reduced, which is a loss! And most of my personal time is given to work.
- Do a side hustle in your spare time . This one is related to the previous one. Time is so precious. I can use my time outside of work to do a side job. What if the side job becomes the main job one day? You see, I write the official account from my spare time. Of course, many people's spare time is wasted on Douyin and the king. This is a topic of determination, self-discipline and time management.
- Don't let wages be all your income . Financial ability is very important, not much to say, I am a novice and still learning.
- Don't lay dead on the credit book . Don't let your previous grades become an obstacle to your continued progress, and have a mentality of always returning to zero. There are many people who claim to be "the former director of xxx company and the former CTO of xxx company", what is the title now? Don't ask, it's embarrassing to ask. The hero does not mention the courage of those years, but thinks that the second senior brother was still a marshal of Tianpeng.
- Don't be a workplace old fritter . Those with high wages, slow work, and disobedience, let others do the work and take credit for themselves. Such employees are the key targets for layoffs.
- Don't take your own weaknesses and face up to young people . If you can only compare your physical strength, energy, and time with young people, isn't it a little sad?
6. Former employees are also company resources
In this wave of layoffs, many companies are very impersonal, especially in terms of compensation.
It is understandable that the company wants to save money, but isn’t it more important to get together and get away? Former employees are also a resource for the company.
The termination of the employment relationship does not mean that the company has no relationship with the former employee.
Now that the Internet is so developed and social media has such a great influence, former employees can praise the company online, and they can also hack the company online. Why can't we maintain this relationship and let former employees help the company spread more positive energy.
Even better, since we can set up new recruiting incentives for current employees, why can't we set up similar incentives for former employees?
The above is definitely not yy. I used to have a company that had a group of former employees. There were former company bosses in the group. The atmosphere in the group is usually very active. Not to mention recommending talents for the boss, and there are even several people who "re-enter the palace" and go back to work.
Just write it here , I hope that after reading this article, you can think about whether the company feeds you or you feed the company.
Last joke:
None of the above is true, the company makes money from customers.
It is the customers who feed the company and its employees
You can't see this clearly when you look at Haidilao, but dare to raise prices to customers! Don't you know that everyone is poor now?
A few days later, Haidilao obediently restored the original price. It is estimated that it is time to hit the staff.
