What a day! Sigh...

上周上级领导给了本人一个 “hard quota” – 15%-20%，有的同事甚至于拿到了25%。

Maybe I jinxed it the other day, told Duke that nothing happened to us, and Duke probably reported to my boss. Now we get this. The whole morning, I have been talking to my people. I had to sit with the HR director in the conference room, and call 3 people in my group, one by one – 2 young men and 1 young Asian lady, to tell them we are downsizing. I had to assure them, it’s not their performance, but rather seniority.

Given the whole market, we couldn’t hold any longer without any change. It’s sad it happens to them, but that’s a tough decision to make. All I could do is to try to get them a better package (not much room either given the policy), and a good reference in the future. The girl, who was so nice, even gave me a box of chocolate during Xmas, just broke into tears when she saw the envelope. I just felt really bad about that, especially because I think they have been doing well and we do need them. However, the hard 15% dictates everything, and we decided to go by seniority this time. Who knows what’s next, if things don’t pick up? There are groups got canned entirely including their managers. We should consider ourselves lucky.

What a day! I hate to be the person to bring bad news to others, especially those ones who trusted me.