Right, a lay-off is a terrible experience for everyone and there’s no “right” way to do it… but there are less awful ways.

There’s 7,000 Klarna employees currently wondering if they’re losing their jobs! If they had simply informed everyone immediately, that would be just 10% of the people feeling those feelings.

Setting aside employees for a moment, from a company perspective, the harm you’re doing to your organisation by giving everyone a week to worry about being let go is ridiculous, it’s self immolation. Every single klarna employee is, in this moment, thinking about getting a new job.

Mass impersonal announcements are brutal, absolutely, but this is even worse.