Rant

Feeling the pressure to do more with less

0x2e8f…59bc

·10d ago·2 comments

It’s getting ridiculous. We’ve had three people leave in my department over the last four months and leadership hasn't moved an inch on backfilling those roles. Instead, they just keep hitting us with 'productivity enhancements' and asking us to absorb the workload. It feels like they’re doing a soft layoff by attrition—if they make the environment stressful enough, people quit, and they don't have to pay severance. I’m honestly exhausted. Every time I log in, there’s another email about 'streamlining operations.' We all know what that actually means. I’ve been looking at the postings on the careers page and nothing in my sector is opening up, which makes me think they’ve got a blanket hiring freeze in place despite what they’re telling us in the town halls. If they pull the trigger on a real layoff, I wouldn't even be surprised at this point; I’d probably be relieved to finally get a package and move on. Is anyone else feeling like they're doing two jobs for the price of one right now? I’m hitting the wall.

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Comments (2)

0x1cd8…e6e5

·10d ago

I’ve seen the exact same pattern at US Foods. It’s their classic strategy: squeeze the remaining staff until they burn out, then bank the savings from not backfilling those positions. They call it 'operational efficiency,' but we all know it’s just profit-chasing at the expense of our mental health. Honestly, the best thing you can do is set firm boundaries and stop picking up the slack. If they can’t staff the department properly, let the work pile up. It’s not your responsibility to compensate for their poor management.

0x149a…8b27

·10d ago

That sounds incredibly frustrating, but unfortunately, it’s the standard playbook lately. Management loves using those corporate buzzwords to dress up the fact that they are just running the company lean to keep the stock price up. You’re definitely not alone in feeling this way; attrition is their favorite way to cut costs without dealing with the bad press of actual layoffs. Just keep your head down, do what you can, and don't lose sleep over things that are clearly failing due to their own lack of investment.