How to deal with toxic leadership during company layoffs
Constant whiplash between promises of growth and sudden rounds of cost-cutting leaves teams trapped in deep insecurity and confusion. When leadership responds to questions with dismissive ultimatums, it shatters trust and locks anxious workers into a cycle of fear where leaving feels impossible due to tied benefits.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
- 1Treating the leadership comments as a formal grievance through HR
- 2Contacting labor law experts or advisory services like ACAS
- 3Keeping heads down, pretending to trust leadership, and waiting to be made redundant or find a new job
- 4resigning before layoffs happen
- 5leaving for another company for a better raise
- 6venting frustration on online forums
- 7Applying for jobs in other fields like hospitality, office management, or project management
- 8Attending real estate networking events and handing out business cards
- 9Taking time off to recover before looking for a new workplace that values management staff
- 10Staying at the job temporarily just to gain experience for a master's degree
- 11Considering applying to fundraising projects to get noticed
- 12looking for another job while quietly enduring the current workplace
- 13setting strict boundaries and separating personal worth from the job
- 14documenting everything and waiting for upper management to intervene
- 15focusing on fulfillment outside of work
- 16pushing through to gain experience and pay bills
- 17relying on a supportive team
- 18writing a screenplay as a comedy out of self preservation
- 19waiting out bad leadership until getting a stable admin or retiring
In their words
Unedited, most upvoted first, each linked to the thread it came from.
“I've been at my property for 5 years. As the assistant manager, I did very well. I won awards, I was asked to travel to other properties to help out, and I was loved by the residents.”source ↗
“Everything immediately became incredibly difficult. Huge problems that were previously ignored by management now became my responsibility. I did the absolute best I could. I genuinely cared about the community, the residents and my staff. But I had no assistance from my corporate office.”source ↗
“I was juggling 400 units and one disaster after another. Four months ago my maintenance supervisor quit. Since then I have been doing that job as well. I wasn't allowed to order anything above $200. I wasn't allowed to make any quick decisions without permission. It was like I had been set up to fail.”source ↗
“This morning I was fired as soon as I unlocked my office. I'm so hurt and lost. There's no similar job openings where I live so I'm applying for everything. I've never been fired before and I still don't really understand why it happened.”source ↗
“That layoff speech, as a former employee (resigned before the layoffs), made me absolutely sick to my stomach.”source ↗
“Feeling like things are getting pretty precarious… New CIO, new Ops Manager, freshly promoted Quality Control and Architecture Managers, all of them fully aboard the AI hype train, and things are breaking left, right, and centre.”source ↗
“The pay is too good to walk away from, but the trajectory feels bad. Anyone been through something similar? Would appreciate any advice.”source ↗
“Last straw was 2.5x my quota for no apparent reason.”source ↗
“It's created a lot of insecurity and confusion across the business.”source ↗
“The pattern at the moment is promises of growth and opportunity one week, followed by talks of cost-cutting and redundancies being announced the next.”source ↗
“During an all-company meeting this week, I asked (anonymously) how leadership planned to address the breakdown of trust between them and employees.”source ↗
“I'm afraid if … there is a breakdown of trust, there is no way I can rebuild it and I would ask you openly to please volunteer yourself to leave the business”source ↗
“Less than 90 days into my new job, I am questioning whether I am allowed to text a volunteer, “Great job.””source ↗
“My manager is a first-time people manager. She calls me the “numbers girl,” and she is right.”source ↗
“Then I was told to step away from the numbers and focus on relationships.”source ↗
“Now I want to quit tomorrow. Full stop. I don’t deserve this misery.”source ↗
“We US workers are trapped by our need for health insurance. Nervous, shitty times.”source ↗
“I had enough of them in my career that I started writing a screen play for a show called Peter’s Principal about a student who goes to a school lead by incompetent adults.”source ↗
“they are so, so wretched, and they spout inane statements in the same way my students do.”source ↗
“I've been working as IT support for under 5 years - and I'm burnt out.”source ↗
“I'm the one getting the beating and push back with people on this”source ↗
“these annoying folks are just making shit up for vengeance”source ↗
“I don't even want to do this anymore, i think I just want the bills paid and do something else.”source ↗
“After all of the incompetent principals that I had, writing a horror story would have re-traumatized me and undone years of therapy.”source ↗
“There were so many bad ones. The one who was effectively illiterate and tried to fight a staff member, the one who was an alcoholic and coke addict, the one who slept with multiple staff members, and more.”source ↗
“Ya van 3 semanas y de verdad me arrepiento de estar ahí. Todo está súper desorganizado y siento que cada vez que intento contactar a mi jefa o a otros coordinadores es como hablar con mi ex (nunca responden).”source ↗
“Pero mientras tanto no tengo ni idea de qué hacer. No sé cómo llamar su atención.”source ↗
“How do you ‘pretend’ to be in a job at less than 90 days, meeting new donors, supporting the team. And look for a job elsewhere? I have done absolutely incredible things in my life, but I don’t know how to do this.”source ↗
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
- 7How to deal with a manager who is confidently wrong
- 7How to survive a completely mismanaged project with terrible leadership
- 4Why are executives so out of touch with employees?
- 2How to manage an older employee with more experience who undermines you
- 3Fired after trying to fix a dysfunctional workplace
- 12Why are clients suddenly ghosting contracts and sales slowing down?