What sort of sick and twisted individual decided to professionally deploy an analogy to a childhood game of musical chairs as a process of eliminating mass jobs and family livelihoods?
Someone actually thought long and hard about this and then proposed this Left Standing nonsense, and various levels of their supervisors thought, yes, that sounds like a pretty good idea.
Problem is, this isn't really a game for those playing.
Company should get sued due to posing layoffs on the basis of a game alone.
What other inappropriate analogies could they have chosen instead?
20 replies (most recent on top)
its just a saying; grow up; same as you're fired
oh yeah; f punctuation and grammar
this is a layoff board not uranus
From the center, it’s like falling off the merry go around or getting thrown out of the spin cycle. Nonetheless, always better of in the end.
Out here in the in the field it's called "Getting a Window Seat". So you can take a last look at the place when the plane or helicopter takes off.
years ago when downstream went through layoffs and co worker from there (I was upstream) said "Joe was left standing", I chuckled thinking odd term, but didn't know it was company lingo. But, I remember going back 10 years or so "brown bag informational lunches" with different groups; only to have term 'brown bag' removed since some thought it was racially insensitive. Hmmm....
I have heard it described as musical chairs before. Perhaps a good description and analog but very insensitive for the seriousness of loosing a job. When you loose a job the company is basically saying “I don’t want you here anymore” and “ you cannot be part of our team ”. It feels like total rejection even if they pay you good severance. But once you are through the grieving process you are so much stronger than before and can have much more self confidence than before. It is a rite of passage in this industry.
No @zpd, it’s more that “got you over a barrel” and now get ready to be “Triple Crowned”. Two tough spots to be in.
The typical musical chairs game has all the players fighting for spots. The Chevron transformation event has some chairs reserved in the name of business continuity. The criteria used for the reservation is the question for many.
In that sense, a musical chairs game where everyone gets to play, where chairs are not reserved or assigned based on criteria that have nothing to do with merit isn't as cruel. It's what occurs in most competitive fields.
The right analogy is calling it a rigged musical chairs game.
ou do know they have let go over 25,000 people in SLB to meet your boredom complaints? HAL the same and BHI similiar.
The world will keep going with Chevron, ExxonMobil or Hess etc fail, Russia or Saudi would turn on a few taps however if SLB, HAL and BHI all went under every O&G company could not function.
Figure out ways to leverage service companies, stop squeezing them.
Remember they have entire well engineering, production engineering all for 1/2 price of internal departments. Shapren your pencils— in fact forget they already have Data, Automation and AI to replace you. Good luck!
It's the other way around :
In Kindergarten, we are "taught" not to get up and give our chair to the other child, the Teacher will scold any child who tries to be nice and create harmonious space. (That's Communism to them) It is not natural to act in that way and that is why the education system which is by definition an extension of corporate America is intent on making sure that the worker bees are always in competition and struggling to out do one another. (And btw the reason salaries are kept secret) The idea that we are here in the workplace to cooperate is a complete fallacy. Don't you see the contradiction? we are taught that is not the way the game is to be played, fast forward to "adult" life and they remove positions and when the music stops..... you get the picture, everyone for themselves which is the exactly the way the owners want it. And then you retire and die- And we pretend this is civilization. Nothing civil about it really. Like the Dalai Lama said when asked what he thought of Western Civilization "oh that would be a good idea" lol
Call it musical chairs or being Triple Crowned, it makes no difference. A little levity is good for the soul and no one is immune to being laid off. Remember, sh!t always rolls downhill.
Took a stroll down Chevron Way
Hey John, have you seen Bob?
Oh, he took a stroll down Chevron Way.
It's both pleasant and to the point. Doesn't involve a childhood game analogy.
I prefer 'Turn in the barrel' though it's not a childhood game.
The Chevron Way.
@ghy = offended by the previous post which described him perfectly and called him out. Check.
Hunger games
Left standing, laid off, out the door, got shafted, not enough seats in the car, ran out of gas, on the street, shown the door, ride is up, new chapter, vs saying some individuals that are currently employed will no longer be employed due to a lower oil price environment resulting from low demand for crude oil. Friend, the words all mean the same thing. I will take one of the shorter phrases.
Thanks popcorn. You are alway sooo insightful... not.
This year long musical chairs game has been fun, where Sr. management continuously holds town halls bragging about their great insights and openness without sharing any actual any employee actionable details. Totally uninformative, but it did keep everyone on edge enough so that no one got much actual work done. Next reorg, which will probably start up next year, we should do the survivor island game, where we all meet once a week to vote one person in the unit to be fired. This should make management feel far more powerful and should really insure that we spend all our time focused on key PowerPoint development in simple bullets for management rather than gaining any real (and often confusing to management) development plans or risk assessments. Let the games begin. May the odds be ever in your favor!
Its not so bad when you consider the other choices were fd in the a$$ and $hit out of luck.
Chill out! We all are stressed. Does not matter what they call it. There are bigger problems out there.