Getting your stuff back after you've been laid off

In mid-March, millions of workers started working from home, as businesses started to shut down in light of the pandemic spreading across the country. And over the last eight weeks, 36.5 million people found out that they’d not be returning to their offices.

For me, that was Wednesday, March 11. That was the last time I was in Manhattan, and, as it turns out, the last time I’d ever step foot into Adweek’s office. I was laid off on April 17.

In the before times, when folks would get the pink slip, they’d be summoned to the boss’s or HR office, where, depending on the level of communication expertise and compassion, bad news is delivered. The staffer would sit uncomfortably as they are being let go. Then, they’d be given the chance to go say goodbye to their colleagues, return to their desk and pick up their personal belongings. 

In the after times, employees are laid off via phone, video conference, or in some cases, not even told until after they’re kicked off their email systems and Slack. 

Getting laid off is not enjoyable! According to a 2015 University of Manchester study, there are more than just negative financial and psychological effects. Reporting on the study, the Washington Post writes:

Many years after being laid off, individuals show higher levels of distrust of other people than they did before they were shown the door.

"The effect appears to not really diminish over time," said James Laurence, the study's author. "We found at least 10 years after the event had occurred — and even getting back into work — doesn't make you any more trusting. People carry that scar around even after they get a job again."

As someone who has been laid off a couple of times (hello media!), this certainly rings true.

One of the first things that raced through my mind after getting told I was parting ways with my former company was my notebooks: I take lots of notes; I talk to lots of sources; I write down everything. How am I going to get them? Which then led to a cascade of thoughts about all the items I have on my desk that are relevant to a) my life; and b) my future work. 

I have pictures of my wife and kids; I have one of the greatest birthday cards. A (now former) colleague drew my name in the Phish-logo style and it’s something I treasure. There are issues of the magazines splayed across my desk, where I had a published story. There are business cards of sources and folks I’ve met along the way that may be helpful when I land my next gig.

There are sweatshirts and fleeces and sneakers! And of course all the detritus I’ve picked up over the last three years: pens and thumbdrives and other trinkets and doodads from conferences. 

These are important to me, but not my employer. Today, four weeks later, I still don’t have my stuff. (Side bar: please watch George Carlin’s bit on “stuff”.) 

I get it. No one wants to go into an office building, putting themselves at risk of the coronavirus, and have to pack up someone else’s shit. The flip side: no one wants to be laid off during a global pandemic! 

And for the record, I am confident I will get my belongings at some point, as I have to trust the organization to do the right thing and send me everything (see how those trust issues can rear their ugly heads?).

But it got me thinking about millions of others stuck in this weird purgatory, too. How should they handle getting their stuff back? What responsibility does a company have? And what does this mean for the future of work: if people can't trust companies to send their belongings back to them, what will happen when this is over and folks slowly start to enter the workforce?

So I reached out to a few labor attorneys to understand what’s at play.

“There are no statutes governing the return of property, like there are for wage and hour claims, but the employer still owes a duty to return the personal property of an employee, once the employee makes it known that it wants the items returned,” Scott Rome, a principal at Veritas Law, told me in Twitter DM. 

Mike Amster, an employment lawyer and a founding partner at Zipin, Amster & Greenberg, said in the grand scheme of things, getting your stuff back isn’t that big of a deal. 

“The employer doesn't want to keep the employee’s stuff,” he said in an interview. “In almost all circumstances, they don’t want to deal with those things. It’s not their problem.”

Though he did add that it’s the employer's responsibility to give belongings back and that the employee can sue if they don't get it back. In almost no circumstance, he said, will it be worth the employee’s time to retain an attorney to get items back.

In the end, legal experts tell me, if you’ve been laid off and want your items back, it’s a logistical issue, not a legal one. But Amster did raise an interesting point: it could also be a reputational issue.

“This pandemic will shine a light on an employer’s culture in regards to how they treat their employees,” he said. “We’re going through a period where everyone is making sacrifices, if the employer requires employees to make sacrifices and the employer makes none, it makes the employer not look great.”

J.J. Cale, “Unemployment”

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Some interesting links:

• NYT set to phase out 3rd party ad-targeting data (Axios)

• Diversity still matters (McKinsey)

• Never go back to the office (The Atlantic)

• Bot or not? The facts about platform manipulation on Twitter (Twitter)

• CBS hired conspiracy reporter from Fox News, now she's pushing "Obamagate" (Press Run)

• $4.7 Million Grant From Eric & Wendy Schmidt to NPR Collaborative Journalism Network (NPR Press Release)