I Was Laid Off Twice in 5 Years. The Warning Signs I Ignored.

Before they cut me, I had to cut someone else.

I helped management decide whose jobs would go. Somehow, I still believed my own performance and my relationship with the CEO would protect me.

Then my turn came.

I had already lost one job. I thought I knew better.

My first job loss came in 2017. After more than seven years at a financial services company, a leadership change ended my employment. They fired me on my daughter’s birthday. My wife was shopping for decorations when I called to tell her.

I have told the birthday story separately. Five years later, I was facing another exit, this time from an e-commerce company. By then, I thought I had rebuilt the career I had lost.

The new job looked like my comeback.

I was a director running the company’s B2B division. I had a large team, new partnerships, new revenue and the best salary I had earned in years. It felt like I had found my footing again.

The CEO liked me. He had an Ivy League education, an MBA and a plane. A real plane. I let those details reassure me about the business and my place inside it.

Looking back, I had confused his visible success with security for my family. I knew how he treated me. I paid too little attention to whether the company could sustain what it was spending.

Evenings and weekends went into the job. I was making another large investment of family time, confident that the results would justify it.

My top performer became a number on a spreadsheet.

When the first round of cuts arrived, management handed us the work of carrying them out. I had to choose between two strong people on my team.

The employee I let go and his wife were expecting a child. I sat across from him knowing what losing that paycheque would mean for his family.

He had been doing good work. Yet we were comparing salaries and the money the company could save. I was taking part in the very process I believed my own performance would protect me from.

That is the part of this story I find hardest to sit with. I was responsible for delivering a decision that hurt someone else, while still drawing comfort from my own position.

Our guide to how companies decide who gets laid off first explains the wider mix of costs, roles and management priorities.

They kept me. I let my guard down.

More directors and colleagues disappeared. From where I stood, the business had spent too freely, hired too much and allowed too much duplicated work.

Each time I was spared, relief made it easier to believe what I wanted to hear: they valued my work, the CEO wanted me there and I would be fine.

I had watched a strong employee lose his job. Still, I convinced myself that my results put me in a different category.

Surviving a round doesn’t mean you’re safe. I survived two.

At 7:25 a.m., the third round reached me.

I was sitting with coffee, logging in for the day, when an invitation from my boss appeared. I opened the call and saw HR on the screen. My stomach dropped.

For months, I had heard how much they loved my work and how important I was to the company’s future. The explanation for ending my job was cost cutting.

My title and paycheque disappeared again. My family faced another interruption to our income.

I was entering my 40s. How many times could I rebuild?

I worried about competing with younger people and having to start again. I had already proved I could work hard.

After my second job loss, I began building my own business. I wanted more control over my future and less dependence on a single employer’s decisions. Those experiences eventually led me to create The Grind Hotline.

The warning signs were there. I kept explaining them away.

Here is what I saw, how I explained it away and what I would ask now.

Today, I would follow shrinking budgets, sales trends and what the CFO says about costs alongside my own performance. Where public financial information exists, our guide to reading earnings reports for workforce pressure shows where to start. At a private company, ask which projects have funding and what resources your team has been promised.

Keep your options alive while the paycheque is coming.

In the episode, I call this “cheating on your employer professionally.” Stay in touch with people outside the business. Take a recruiter’s call. Interview while you are employed. You can do your current job well and still consider another opportunity.

I would start preparing before a dismissal meeting forces every decision into the same week. Update your résumé with achievements you can back up. Know who you would contact first. Our preparation guide walks through what to organize while you are still employed.

Building a business was my choice. Your next step might be another employer, training or a small project outside work. Start with what you can manage. You already have enough pressure without betting everything on an idea.

Do your core job well, but decide what the employer gets beyond it. My family had already paid for too much of the time I gave away. I wanted them to have more than whatever energy work left over.

I built the help I wish I had before that call.

I kept coming back to one question: where could someone turn while they were still employed, watching colleagues disappear and wondering whether their own job was next?

That question shaped The Grind Hotline. I wanted employees to have the information I wish I had taken seriously: what the company was saying, where the money was going and what repeated cuts could mean for the people left behind.

When we report on a company, we link to the documents and reporting behind the warning signs. Readers can follow those sources and ask better questions about their own workplace.

The Grind Hotline now reaches audiences in more than 100 countries. Alongside the reporting, I built three free products to help employees make sense of what they are seeing and prepare their next move.

Three free products to help you prepare.

The Job Threat Check asks seven questions about your company, team and role. In about two minutes, you get a workplace pressure score and suggested next steps. No email is required to see your result.

The Layoff Tracker + Corporate Stress Index follows public workforce pressure across 50 major employers in technology, banking and financial services. You can follow the sources and compare changes over time.

The Weekly Layoff Intelligence Report brings company developments, their possible effects on employees and questions to ask into a free weekly email.

The tools help you understand visible warning signs. They cannot see a company’s private staffing plans.

Your next move deserves a head start.

I wish I had kept my options open while I still had a salary. If you recognize yourself in this story, give yourself that chance now.

Keep your relationships alive. Pay attention to the business. Give your family time that work cannot automatically claim. If a better opportunity appears, allow yourself to consider it.

You don’t need to panic. You need to stay prepared.

About this account

Written from Harj Singh’s episode and his accompanying account, with editing for clarity and structure. The employment events are his recollections; the employers and former colleague are unnamed. Current product descriptions and award records were checked on October 11, 2026.

1. Original episode: I Got Laid Off Twice in 5 Years — The Host’s account of the second layoff, the earlier cuts and the lessons he describes.
2. Harj Singh: author profile — Background, editorial responsibility and the platform’s stated international audience.
3. The Grind Hotline: sourcing and corrections standards — How the publication distinguishes experience, reported facts and analysis.
4. Article source ledger — Personal recollections, current product facts and award records identified separately.