Layoffs are both painful and essential. Corporate reorganization has negative effects on organizations and their employees, from muddled emotions to decreased productivity. Victims of downsizing may experience troubles with their mental health as well as their finances. Additionally, it may have a negative impact on a survivor’s emotions and future work prospects.
But how severe are the impacts of employee layoffs on a business, the affected people, and the survivors? This was the driving question behind BizReport 2022 Layoff Aftermath Survey.
BizReport surveyed 2162 people in the United States to gain insights into this topic. 48% of the participants were layoff victims, 36% were layoff survivors, and 16% were layoff decision-makers. The participants were divided into groups and asked to answer approximately 30 questions about the effects of layoffs, attitudes toward future employment, and feelings after layoffs. To ensure that participants weren’t just answering questions mindlessly, attention-checker questions were included. Unqualified responses were not included in our analysis. In the survey, open-ended questions are employed, and the responses are afterwards standardized.
These impacts have been classified into five major groups in this survey, including:
- Changes in employee behaviors and emotions – Layoff survivors change their working attitude and opinion on their company.
- Financial impact of downsizing – How layoffs affect layoff victims and how businesses are helping them.
- Psychological impact of layoffs on victims and survivors – Negative feelings come after layoff for both the victims and survivors.
- The influence of terminations on attitudes and the future of employment – Negative changes in layoff victim’s attitudes and fewer chances for a new job.
- The state of layoffs in the U.S. over the next 12 months – Current situation of the US. economy and layoff decision-maker’s opinion on job cutting.
Layoffs are unavoidable, particularly in a struggling economy. Making the event as comfortable as possible for everyone involved is therefore the best course of action in this situation. When making cutback decisions, layoff decision-makers must keep their employees’ best interests in mind, and employees must make every effort to adapt to the new system as best they can.
Let’s dig deep into the results obtained from our survey to discover how layoffs affect businesses and their employees.
