Kaila Lopez
Appearances
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
Yeah, I think it's all connected, right? So we've been talking about sneaky layoffs, backdoor layoffs. If these knowledge workers, tech workers are getting laid off and don't necessarily see any prospects in the job market, it makes sense that they're looking for ways to strengthen their resume.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
And typically, I guess I don't have exactly the data on this, but typically the idea is when you see expected declines in the economy, these graduate degrees or additional degrees, additional credentialing will increase, right? So I'm not surprised that you're seeing that at the same time.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
What I'm surprised by is the fact that I'm also seeing, anecdotally, an increase in distaste for hiring people with MBAs. And just a few months ago, we did an episode on if you should get an MBA. And one of the stats that we saw was actually that people who graduated from the Harvard Business School, which is one of those tippy-top business schools that you mentioned—
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
We're having a vast increase in unemployment six months after graduating. I believe it went from like 7% unemployment to like 23% unemployment, something like that. So I'm curious what's going to happen when this next batch of increased students graduate.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
But you're not working in data science.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
That's a-hole. That's a-hole behavior. Yeah. Women swear. Okay. That's crazy. I'm so sorry, Brooke. They are the a-hole.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
I don't know.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
Well, I think once they've reneged on the offer, and it seems like everyone is upset, I think it's time to say, okay, clearly this is not a fit for some reason. It's time to start looking. I don't think you even have to message the president.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
What I will say is because it's internal, I agree with that. If it was external, I don't think you should believe anything until you see it in writing because they have – you're not already employed with them. It's the internal part that's like, all right, you gave us your word.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
Yeah, sounds like nobody's the a-hole here, so we love that. My advice here is that it's going to be really challenging, especially if you're a group full of your peers and then all of a sudden you're managing them. I can completely understand why that's going to be tough, and so my recommendation is to completely over-communicate.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
Explain the awkwardness, name it, call it out, allow your new direct reports to express any discomfort to you directly so that they don't harbor resentments. And that basically will open up a clear channel of communication for the future and hopefully will make your bonds and relationships stronger moving forward.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
Yes, and I think that it might be helpful to say like, I'm putting on my manager hat now and I have to give you hard conversation and that could or hard, hard advice that could give you a little bit of like alter ego mindset where I'm now the manager and therefore I can give you this difficult feedback.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
Yeah, I think my hottest take here is that this is just laziness. It's laziness from the management team that basically is pining for these like older, the olden days when they could tell how hard people were working by standing behind their desk.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
And I think that instead of doing the actual work of determining who are high performers, who maybe should be downsized or right-sized or whatever the hell they want to talk about, they're just saying, if you work from home and you want to stay there, just leave. And I think that that's a very lazy practice and it's not going to It's not going to turn into improved performance.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
It's maybe going to cut costs for a little bit, but I don't think it's going to do that much in the long run.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
I think it depends on the general environment. Like I think if every single company starts to enact mandatory return to office policies, then employees may not have a choice.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
But I think if companies like Allstate, which we talked about in a previous episode, decide to make co-working and flexible working and hybrid working more of an option, they're going to have the leg up and you will see in the long run better talent going and driving to those companies.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
Yes, and also I would like to say that those last two I actually think might have been a little bit justified. And we went back and forth.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
It's not necessarily that, but there are rules for a reason. And I'm not saying that Meta should have fired these people for misusing these perks or that EY should have fired these people for whatever they're doing. I think it's more like it's a slippery slope. If they're fudging the rules on these small things, could that be an indication of a larger issue with those employees?
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
So that being said, I do think it's very silly to fire somebody for being part of Fantasy Football League, but I kind of understand where they're coming from. They are rules that they've set. They're allowed to like enforce those rules.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
I think also one of the things that we actually don't know about these sneaky layoffs is how abrupt they were. Were people warned about this and then they were fired? If that's the case, then you have, you know, you're probably fine. If you get warned about misuse of the $30 credits, maybe just don't misuse them again. And now you'll be okay.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
But I think for the most part, maybe revisit that employee handbook if you're a little nervous and try to reduce your rule breaking.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
I am also a worker and I am not. I really don't care about AI. So it's tough for me to have a big opinion on this. I think when you're using AI tools to get unstuck, to help brainstorm, to reduce task fatigue, to be more productive, great. Where I run into issues is when it's used to communicate things. to other people, and then it's very obvious that AI has been used.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
To me, and I think to other maybe potentially hiring managers, that's a signal that you're not thinking very deeply to at least try to mask the fact that you used AI in the first place. So that's one of the things I think we might see a backlash of in 2025.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
Yeah. Sometimes I kind of feel like somebody before the Internet being like, why would I use the Internet when I have books? So I could be wrong. And I will. Let's revisit this in December of 2025. Sure.
Morning Brew Daily
2024 Work Trends: Return to Office, Sneaky Layoffs and are MBAs Worth it?
Thank you. I appreciate it.