Click here for this episode’s show notes.

This transcript was created using an automated transcription service and may contain errors.

Susan White (00:02)
8.4 million Americans were laid off in the first five months of 2025, according to USAFacts.org. This is an increase of 2.4% for the same period in 2024.

Welcome to The JoyPowered® Workspace Podcast, where we help HR and business leaders embrace joy in the workplace. I’m Susan White, owner of Susan Tinder White Consulting, an HR consulting practice. Joining me is my dear friend and co-host, JoDee Curtis, owner of Purple Ink, a large-scale HR firm that I’m part of as an executive collaborator.

Today, we’re gonna riff on RIFs: reductions in force, or more commonly known as layoffs. We’re gonna take a look at layoffs from the perspective of organizations who feel compelled to downsize their staff count, from colleagues who survive the layoffs but face new realities, and from impacted staff who lose their jobs. So JoDee, we’re gonna try to look at it from three different angles.

JoDee Curtis (01:06)
Yeah, I like it.

Susan White (01:07)
8.4 million Americans were laid off in the first five months of 2025, according to USAFacts.org. This is an increase of 2.4% for the same period in 2024. We don’t know how the rest of 2025 will play out, but we do know it’s important for HR and business leaders to be prepared for the potential of reductions in force should the need surface anytime in the future.

I can remember my boss coming to me back in the mid 1980s asking me as an HR generalist to do some research as the bank I was working for, who had a history of no layoffs, realized it needed to develop a severance pay policy so we were ready for all the potential mergers and acquisitions of banks that were just beginning to happen all around us. I got to tell you, JoDee, it woke me up. I didn’t even know how to spell severance plan, let alone what to include in one. So it was a tall order, but great developmental opportunity for me.

For the next 30 plus years, I was involved in ramp ups and ramp downs in the US and eventually overseas. Early on, I realized it takes very intentional efforts for organizations to come out of a period of layoffs with a good culture intact, with the smaller workforce still committed and engaged. JoDee, have you had a lot of experience in the area of RIFs or layoffs?

JoDee Curtis (02:33)
You know, I have had a lot of, like, maybe small departments or a few people here and a few people there, but really only one time was I a part of kind of a pretty significant one, which was in the recession through 2008 and 2009. And it did not go well.

Susan White (02:58)
Yikes.

JoDee Curtis (02:59)
If I can say, I didn’t think it was going to go well at the beginning because I had some advice for them that our leadership team decided not to follow. Basically that was, we just kept letting people go or laying them off in onesies and twosies, but we knew we were going to have about 30 people, and I just felt so strongly we needed to rip the bandaid off one time and we didn’t do it and it was painful on all sides.

Susan White (03:30)
Yes. You have to go through that pain multiple times. It’s like, yeah, that’s rough. I’m sorry you went through that. Over the years with all the mergers and acquisitions and reorganizations and changes of leaderships and expense control initiatives that I watched in the organization that I had worked with, I was convinced every time I was gonna get laid off. I was absolutely convinced. eventually I was proven right. It just took 35 years and I was caught up in a RIF as well.

Well, what I’d like to do today is first explore best practices for organizations. We know that many of our listeners are HR professionals, they’re business heads, and I do think this is something that we need to be prepared for as business leaders or HR professionals. We know that organizations, they want to survive shrinking their workforces and come out on the other side of it, hopefully in a sustainable, positive, thriving way.

Employment Law Worldview posted an article on April 15th, 2025 that was written by Melissa Legault entitled, “Best Practices for Employers When Implementing a (U.S.) Reduction in Force.” Let’s go through these suggestions, JoDee. I think that they are good. Would you like to start us off?

JoDee Curtis (04:50)
Sure. So the first one is to clearly document the business reasons for the RIF. And I think there’s a few reasons to do this. Number one, being legally, you know, to be able to document and explain the reasons and understand who’s, you know, to make sure you’re being inclusive and all that. But I also think even just

internally so that there’s a clearly defined message of what is happening here. Is it cost control? Is it something coming up that we haven’t even announced yet? Is it a project gone wrong or a test or a pilot that didn’t go as planned? I think it just to get everyone on the same page of why are we doing this.

Susan White (05:46)
I totally agree, because internally you’re going to need to tell the people that are leaving the reason. You’re going to want to tell the people that are staying the reason why some people are going. You want to be able to tell your customers and on and on. So I think you’re exactly right. Let’s get on the same page from the get-go. Yeah, love that. Number two cited by Melissa Legault was you want to make sure that you conduct a thorough adverse impact analysis to avoid discrimination.

Let’s recognize it’s 2025 and the current political environment and governmental environment we’re in and their perspective on discrimination. It’s not necessarily that a protected class and race or gender or age being considered as a factor about who to keep and who to go. It’s the whole concept. Was the age of an individual, young or old a factor? Was race ever a factor that you looked at? Were you trying to make sure that you were not harming a particular protected class? That can get you as much hot water as if you were not doing that, just the opposite.

So do an adverse impact analysis. Personally, I think it’s smart to have somebody who’s very trained at it to do it. Often I see organizations, whoever’s in HR is doing it, trying to see, do we see a trend or a pattern here? Get an expert, get a labor law attorney who specializes in this. It’s worth the money. Should you get any allegations of discrimination or reverse discrimination or anything, you want to make sure that there’s a real sense of fairness that you all can look individuals in the eye and clearly attest to the fact it had nothing to do with any discriminatory factors. It was about the work being performed or about the performance of the individual performing the work.

JoDee Curtis (07:37)
The next one is about ensuring compliance with the WARN Act. That’s W-A-R-N, which is the federal law, but also any other local notice requirements. And that, those rules depend on the size of your organization, the number of people affected by it. And you may need to provide a specific number of days of advance notice both to those who will be impacted by it, but also to local government officials and agencies. We want to let them know of mass layoffs or plant closings. And this can help local communities have time to absorb the influx of job seekers and hopefully provide resources to get people employed again. So be sure and check the rules that might be in place in your region, state, cities, towns as well.

Susan White (08:41)
Yeah, very smart. I do see companies that trip over themselves and don’t do WARN acts when — notices when they should. Number four piece of advice is prepare legally compliant communications and documentation. Once again, maybe running things past a labor law attorney. Make sure you have your ducks in order, but I would go beyond that and I would add to this tip. Make sure that you have human-centered, transparent, and empathetic communications.

I’ve seen some really cold and dry and legally compliant communication notification letters and announcements. This is a chance for you to really demonstrate the values of your organization. You’re going to be certainly giving people notice letters, but you’re also going to be needing talking points to talk to the employees one-on-one and perhaps in groups, the surviving employees. You’re gonna wanna have good talking points that show as an organization, yes, we’re having to do some hard things. We care about these individuals, here’s what we’re gonna do to help them. So legally compliant, yes, but let’s make sure we’re also showing our empathy and our values.

JoDee Curtis (09:54)
Yeah, that’s it’s so important to follow the legal requirements, but sometimes we get caught up in the legal part of it that we forget these are people with families and, you know, it impacts their health insurance and, you know, some very important issues. So be kind throughout. Number five is to manage potential post-RIF morale dips. Thinking about, you know, the people who are staying, right? Sometimes we think like, they won’t care. They’ll just be so happy they weren’t a part of it. But there can be much more to it. And they wonder, you know, why they weren’t a part of that or why their friend or leader or manager was or their team members. And it can be very emotional process even for the people who are staying as well, too.

So double down on some of your employee engagement efforts and don’t forget, as you mentioned already, about communicating with those people as well. Our tendency again can be to think about the legal ramifications and the people affected directly, but not the people who will still be affected who are staying.

Susan White (11:21)
So right, we hear, we read about survivor’s guilt and many people do carry that. Why did my good friend lose their job and really suffering right now and I’m still employed? So it’s real. I, JoDee, I’d love to add one more tip here to Melissa Legault’s article, and that is, I think you should create a strong outplacement program for all impacted individuals that you can explain at the same time that you let people know that what’s happening to them. You wanna make sure that they know the support the company’s gonna wrap around them.

So we did an episode, you may recall, back in 2018 that I think is still very relevant, seven years later. The episode’s entitled, “Offering Outplacement? Outstanding!” We dropped it August 13th, 2018. Take a listen if you’ve not heard it and certainly consider what type of job coaching, resume help, having career fairs with other employers in town, what can we do as an employer to help our employees transition to that next role?

So let’s now talk about the second group here, which is those layoff survivors that JoDee just mentioned about potential dips in their morale. What can we do as HR professionals, business leaders to specifically help them? There was a Harvard Business Review article that was entitled “You Survived a Layoff. Here’s What to Do Next,” that was posted on April 25th, 2023 by Abby Davisson and Myra Strober. Let’s go through their recommendations for those survivors.

JoDee Curtis (13:00)
Yeah. So first off, take time to process your own emotions. You may literally go through the five stages of grief, right? Because you might be losing friends, coworkers, your team is going to feel different. You might have a new boss and your workload might be going up or changing because of the people who are no longer there. So it can be exciting and yet you might have that survivor’s guilt to think about being exciting. It can be depressing and it certainly can be scary.

Susan White (13:40)
Absolutely. The second piece of advice from this Harvard Business Review article is reach out to those colleagues that were impacted. I got to tell you, I have been in HR for a long time and a part of my HR consulting practice more recently has been career coaching. A part of it’s been career coaching. It surprised me how many people who have been laid off of their jobs are absolutely hurt and they feel abandoned by their former colleagues.

They really thought that their friends at work would absolutely be checking in on them. And I’m gonna tell you, I’ve talked to lot of survivors and they say, “I don’t know what to say. I feel like my contacting my friend who was laid off would be like rubbing it in that I still have a job.” I’m gonna tell you based on my unscientific surveying of the people I’ve dealt with, go ahead and reach out. Go ahead and just check in and say, “Hey, I’m so sorry it happened. I wanna let you know that I’m not quitting you. The organization may not still

be something we have in common anymore, but I care about you.” It’s really important to do.

JoDee Curtis (14:43)
I love that, that is such a good reminder. The next one is about clarifying your own responsibilities, right? What are your responsibilities today and what are they going to be when these people, coworkers, team members, bosses even, or people who work for you, what of their jobs might you be taking on or might you be changing your job description and you might not be getting a raise to do it either, which can be difficult to be given additional responsibilities without a promotion, a change in job title too. So make sure you understand what exactly are you responsible for right now.

Susan White (15:37)
We’ve seen that happen many times where a company is going through some type of a financial issue or some type of a struggle. They’re laying people off. Other people are asked to do more and there is no more money to pay people. It can be, you know, understand that. And it’s a surprise sometimes to those survivors. They’re doing two people’s job now for their old salary. Which leads me to really the fourth piece of advice in this HBR article is it’s time for you to do some self-reflection. This organization is going through trauma of some kind because they’re letting people go.

Is this a place you want to stay? You know, do you want to recommit to it? Or should you start thinking about an escape route? Certainly JoDee’s example early on, she worked at a company that they were doing dribs and drabs of layoffs. They just kept coming. Maybe it’s time for you to freshen up your own resume. They’ve certainly told you that your job is okay today, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to be tomorrow. Do your values and interests still align with this company? Maybe so. Maybe you double down and this is a pivot point and that you’re gonna continue having more opportunity, but maybe not. So do some self-reflection.

JoDee Curtis (16:41)
Yeah. And you might not want to make a decision right away. So do that self-reflection and then take some time to understand how you want to move forward. Davisson and Strober recommended you wait at least three, maybe six months post layoff before you meet with your boss to talk through what additional skills and experiences you’ve gotten under your belt by taking on more, different work or how is it impacting your long-term goals, which might include asking for a salary review as well, too. Yeah.

Susan White (17:20)
I think that’s good advice, letting this dust settle and get as many new skills as you can and then have that conversation when kind of the trauma is behind the organization, we hope.

Well good, well last but not least, let’s get to the third stakeholder group that I wanted to get to today, which is the person who’s actually laid off. Let’s discuss how you survive a layoff personally when you’re the one who has gotten notice.

I have worked with hundreds and maybe thousands of people over many years who have lost their job by no fault of their own when their employers laid them off. They were in the wrong place, the wrong job at the wrong time. So I’m gonna share some of my best advice. JoDee, I know you will jump in with points that you wanna make because the Purple Ink team, I know, has had a lot of experience helping companies in this space.

So number one, you may be happy to leave this job or pleased to head into retirement earlier than you planned. Or you could be devastated to be put out to pasture before you feel like you have, especially after you’ve given a lot to a company. And maybe you are living paycheck to paycheck and you cannot have this interruption. Maybe severance is not gonna be enough to sustain you until you find that next job. No matter where you are on the mood elevator, I’m gonna say to you, you’ve gotta give yourself time to decompress.

You need to remind yourself this is not about you. It’s a business decision that you’re caught up in. I want you to take time to kind of absorb all that and then craft your own message that how you’re gonna communicate this major life change to the people in your life, because they’re gonna look to you and how you talk about it can really have profound impact.

Personally, I do think it’s important that you regain your sense of control and move through this victim thinking. When it’s done to you, there’s no other way to feel. You weren’t responsible for what’s been done to you, but you gotta move through that as quickly as feels right for you. And you’ve gotta get into, okay, what am I gonna do about it? What am I gonna do next?

It may help you if you could come up with a 30-second elevator speech to use so that you can say something like, as you run into people at the grocery store, as you sit down with your family, when your mother-in-law calls to find out why you’re so available in the daytime, you wanna have that 30-second speech ready that could sound something like, I recently wrapped up six years at ABC Company where I was responsible for — fill in the blank. It was a great run and I enjoyed it a lot, but they, ABC Company, you know, whatever the reason is they gave you. ABC Company is, is offshoring. ABC Company’s, the profitability was down. The ABC company is going to move this function to another city, whatever it is, whatever is true. So now I’m exploring my next chapter. What I’m good at is, and you all there should be three things that you are good at. And trust me, I could find three good things about any human, what are the three things that you are good at in the world of work?

And you can ask that person, say, hey, do you have any suggestions of people I should be talking to or companies I should target? And you never know. These don’t have to be businesspeople. This can be your mother-in-law. This can be somebody in your bowling team. Do you have any suggestions of companies I ought to be targeting or people I should speak with? You never know where that will lead. Everybody knows somebody. So most in that moment are going to look you blank in the eye and say, well, gosh, no. But don’t be surprised if somebody who you tell the story to, your 30-second commercial, doesn’t come back to you a week later, two weeks later and say, hey, I just heard they’re hiring over at XYZ. You told me you were good at accounts payable, you were good at whatever. I think you need to apply for that job. Here’s somebody I know there. You’ve got to get through that being done to you and get it back in control. A 30-second commercial will help you.

JoDee Curtis (21:21)
Yeah, I love that advice. I know there’s — something I always tell people who have lost a job for whatever reason is to tell everyone they know that they’re looking for a new one. And some people really struggle with that. They, you know, they may be embarrassed or feel badly about themselves or, or maybe just angry because they feel like a victim as well, too. But you just truly never know. And so think of a thoughtful 30-second answer to that and be prepared for it. It might keep you, too, from going through all those emotions every time someone asks. And be prepared to ask for help in the ways you suggested. Yeah.

Susan White (22:14)
Absolutely.

JoDee Curtis (22:16)
Number two is apply for unemployment. This is the insurance your employer has paid into during your tenure, and now it’s time to collect it. Again, sometimes people feel awkward or embarrassed about it, but you know, no longer the days where you have to go stand in line outside the unemployment office. You can do this online and you’re due this money.

Do recognize that depending on your state laws, that if you get severance, that money could impact when you’re eligible and how much you can get. So it might not be starting immediately, but apply for it, start learning about it, and follow the rules on what you need to do to keep getting it.

Susan White (23:04)
I worked with people that had pride about doing this. It was something — they felt like it was going on the dole, they shouldn’t do it. I’m telling you, this is insurance that your company paid into and it’s your time to collect. So thank you for that, JoDee. Number three, approach getting your new job in a balanced, positive way. Assuming you want to get a new job, and most people will. Let me give you some tips around that. First of all, don’t go at this 24 by seven. It will drain you and you will hit the wall quickly.

Look at your calendar and block time Monday through Friday. Do not work weekends. Do not work evenings unless you’re a night owl and that’s really when you shine. But if you’re like me, Monday through Friday, I’m going to make sure that that is my job search time. Be sure that you block different things on that calendar as you’re looking for a job. Since you want to do this in a balanced way, I’m going to suggest block time every day for some kind of exercise. If you like pickleball, make a pickleball. If you like water walking, make it water walking, whatever it is, but you need every day now to make sure that you are exercising your body. That’s gonna help with your stress, it’s gonna help you feel better, it’s gonna energize you.

Block time every day to network. You know, JoDee says, everybody you know needs to know you’re looking for a job. I’d suggest amping up your LinkedIn connections. Commit to reaching out every day to three or four different people. Make sure you keep a spreadsheet of who you’re fall, who you reached out to so you don’t follow up with you — that you can follow up with them. And certainly when you do land, you want to go back to everyone you reached out to, to let them know where you landed. Use that 30-second elevator pitch as you’re reaching out to three to four people a day.

Block time every day to research organizations who you want to target. You know, take a look at their openings. Maybe there’s five or six different companies in your immediate area that you hear good things about. Well, research them. Find, make sure you’re looking at their talent community. If you can join it, join it. Reach out to any first connections that you have who work at those companies and see if you can’t have time to do kind of a informational interview, but definitely you’re going to be researching companies that you want to target.

And then block out time to review job postings on LinkedIn and one other job board that’s relevant to your area of expertise. Do not look for a job that you’re 100% match for because that person does not exist. I always say if you’re 80% qualified for a job, you auto apply. Employers are delighted when they get somebody who’s 80% matching the job qualifications. Don’t be waiting for that dream job to appear. I also would not do more than LinkedIn and one other job board because you will be inundated with insurance sales and other types of job openings hitting your feed. Keep it, LinkedIn, absolutely think it’s an important one to do, but you pick on another job board that fits for your skill level and your interest level.

And then block time, finally, to do something for someone else every week. I’m telling you, when you are feeling low, and I’m gonna tell you, look, in the job search, you can feel low, you’re gonna feel highs and lows every single day, and it’s gonna be a roller coaster. If you block time to do some service work, some charity work, pro bono work for somebody else, you’re gonna accomplish something each week and you’re gonna help the world. So I truly believe it’s gonna make you feel much better about yourself.

JoDee Curtis (26:28)
I love that. That is great advice.

Susan White (26:33)
I might also add, be serious about your financial planning. If you’re not been a person who ever budgeted before, now may be the time. Also think about, you know, how much do I have to live on? What can I do differently to make sure I stretch the dollars I have? And then one last tip I might suggest is work with a respected friend, a mentor, or hire a career coach. If you need a sounding board during your journey, we find that it’s…losing a job can be really tough on an individual with their partner, their loved ones, because that partner or loved one, they hear it all the time. Or you start to think, I can’t talk about it to them, they’re sick of hearing about it. Or I’m gonna worry them if I’m worried. Sometimes it’s helpful to have somebody outside of your home that can be a partner with you on this journey. And that’s where career coaches can come in handy. You may not be able to afford it at that time. Find a mentor, a friend, somebody who can be an arm length’s away and can be your thought partner. So those are all the tips I think I’ve got on that front.

JoDee Curtis (27:35)
After you get started in your new role or launch your own business or whatever you decide to do next, take time to capture your learnings from your layoff experience and circle back to thank all the individuals you networked with and let them know where you landed. It’s always good to share good news and people want to hear it from you.

Susan White (28:01)
Absolutely. If you are an HR or business leader and looking for a practical resource to create or refresh your downsizing resources, I want to mention that SHRM has a How to Conduct a Layoff or Reduction in Force guide for members at shrm.org. We will put a link to that in our show notes if you’re looking for something specific that you can follow. Otherwise, we’d love to hear your layoff lessons. I think we can all always get better at it as HR professionals as business leaders. And for those of us that would experience it, any tips that you might have, please do share.

JoDee Curtis (28:36)
Yeah, good advice. So Susan, question for you. You mentioned that you got laid off towards the end of your career. What was JoyPowered® about your being laid off?

Susan White (28:50)
Well, you know I was expecting it for 35 years, so when I finally, it happened to me, I was sad. I was sad for about three days. Just, you, you think, why me? Or I thought I was doing a really good job, or why now? But I gotta tell you that I was also kinda relieved and excited.

JoDee, I know that I was incapable of saying the words “I” and “quit” in the same sentence. I did not know how to quit anything. Haven’t, I haven’t quit my man, my marriage. I lived in the same house for 38 years. I worked in the same place 30. I don’t know how to quit. So fortunately, they gave me the gift of layoff that has enabled me to go off and do fun and interesting things the last 11 years. I’m very grateful for it. But I know that not everybody feels that way. And certainly it’s scary. It is scary and it’s sad too.

JoDee Curtis (29:40)
Yeah, yeah. Well, I’m glad you found some joy in that moment. So it’s time for our listener question. This question came from a listener who heard our games and play episode that dropped on June 17th, 2024. “What recommendations do you have for teams that may be in various locations or they are not typically working together?”

Susan White (29:45)
I think this is so common now that people are remote from each other, at least a good chunk of the time. So I would view building social capital within your staff as an investment that will yield dividends. And I would talk to my senior leaders about it, that our teams are spread throughout different locations and they don’t really have the opportunity to regularly be physically together and they’re gonna need extra HR and business leader intervention to build that esprit de corps.

So some specific suggestions that I have. First of all, establish a rotating buddy system where people are partnered up for a month, a quarter, a year to get to know each other on a deeper level and then create some buddy-based fun competitions, pay them to huddle weekly for 20 minutes to catch up with each other, share ideas, and then change up everyone’s official buddies at regular intervals so that it’s not just you have one buddy in the company, over time, you’re gonna have more and more buddies. So that’s my first suggestion.

The second is schedule and facilitate virtual lunches, happy hours, work-related book club meetings, social engagements. Certainly you can do all that via Zoom, Teams, whatever platform that you have. A third idea, host online game show events with cross-functional teams who don’t know each other very well. Have the team meet in advance to get to know each other, talk about their skillset, and then have them meet post-game to celebrate their wins, their lessons, even if they lost, to laugh about it. You can really build camaraderie when people compete together.

And then finally, I would add a get to know me portion of each team huddle where a different remote person has a chance to showcase their photos, their slides, have a discussion about their life, their town, the company, location. their hopes, their dreams, their joys, their worries. So devote time to it and let people present. JoDee, you are a master at this given that your business has really been remotely based for the last — what? — 13, 14 years. Anything else you might suggest?

JoDee Curtis (32:10)
Yeah. Yeah, we’ve done most everything you have suggested and something else that I’ve talked about before on the podcast, but honestly was not really very good at doing it, and that is I’m trying just recently to be much more intentional at building in a bit of social time in our meetings. So I’m one who can be pretty heads down work or to have a meeting and I want to start on time and get it moving. But thinking now I’ve been more intentional at the beginning of the meeting or the end or it can even be somewhere in the middle to just say, let’s share some good news, right? Or let’s, you know, what’s the best thing that’s happened to you recently type of conversations so that people, when you are in a remote environment, those conversations are more important than ever. When you’re live, you’re naturally having more of those. You might not always be intentional about including everyone or, you know, talking to everyone specifically, but just allowing that time, even putting it on the agenda so that it doesn’t feel like we’re wasting time or we’re not being productive, but we’re committed to learning about each other.

Susan White (33:55)
I love it, yep.

So JoDee, it’s time for In the News. A February 6th, 2025, hbr.org online article entitled, “How to Recognize and Avoid Toxic Positivity,” caught our interest. We are seeing a lot written about the concept of toxic positivity. Being The JoyPowered® Workspace, that just feels wrong. Feels real wrong.

Medical News Today defines toxic positivity as an obsession with positive thinking. It is the belief that people should put a positive spin on all experiences, even those that are profoundly tragic. As The JoyPowered® Workspace Podcast, we are all about positivity, but not when it’s toxic. Signs that positivity may be turning toxic in the workplace that HBR cites include… why don’t you start us off, Jodee?

JoDee Curtis (34:45)
When colleagues or bosses are consistently responding to individuals’ concerns with, “it’ll be fine,” or “don’t overthink it,” or in other words, downplaying legitimate worries.

Susan White (35:00)
Yeah. Number two, labeling skeptics as difficult. You are in effect marginalizing people and may be quieting legitimate issues that need to be raised.

JoDee Curtis (35:12)
Yeah. Number three, always looking for the silver lining. When you hear a colleague’s, boss’s mantra of “everything happens for a reason,” maybe stay alert. It can come across as insincere, naive, or dismissive.

Susan White (35:30)
Whenever that expression comes up, my husband, Bill, it just drives him nuts. It’s like, not everything happens for a reason. He hates that. So I don’t ever say it. Yeah. Number four, jumping to the fix it mode. Trying to kill a problem before you really understand the problem. Sometimes colleagues, bosses just need to vent and you’re jumping to fix what you think you heard can be frustrating to the person sharing their concerns with you.

JoDee Curtis (35:37)
Yeah, yeah. Number five, performing positivity on social media. Most people are weary of people posting only idealized upbeat images online, especially in the work setting, which can come across as unauthentic. Why not share mistakes made, lessons learned, or growth that has occurred?

Susan White (36:19)
Please tune in next time and make it a JoyPowered® Day.

If you’re SHRM certified, you can get credit for listening to this episode. To get the code, go to getjoypowered.com/shrm and fill out a short evaluation. When you finish the evaluation, you’ll get th code and a link to a proof of participation certificate. The code will expire on October 6th, 2026. Again, that’s getjoypowered.com/shrm to get the code and it’s going to expire on October 6th, 2026.

Thank you for listening and thank you for your dedication to the HR profession.

JoDee Curtis (37:00)
Thanks for tuning in and make it a JoyPowered® day.

Susan White (37:05)
Thank you.