He worked for a shipping and logistics company you’ve probably never heard of, but have almost certainly relied on at some point. When you hear jokes about the handful of people who could bring modern infrastructure to a halt if they turned off their phone for a day? He was one of those guys.
The day before they told him, he was woken up at 5am by a guy who’d been trying to fix a server issue for over two hours. My dad had it fixed fifteen minutes later. This guy is supposed to replace him.
There were 15 other people laid off at the same time, and he says at least 5 of them had been working there for over 20 years. It seems like they all got decent severance packages, but he’s having a lawyer go over it to be certain. He says he has about a year to look for a new job before things start getting dire, but he was only a few years out from early-retirement and I’m terrified he’s going to be turned down due to his age.
The best part? They told him on what was to be his last day, and then were surprised when all he wanted to do was clear out his desk and go home. They expected him to keep working for the rest of the day