• Companies use "stealth firing" to quietly reduce staff without public layoffs.
• It involves dismissing employees for minor offenses to avoid public backlash.
• This tactic can harm company culture, leading to low morale and potential legal issues.

Some companies are opting for a new tactic in slimming down employee numbers — "stealth firing."

Meta let go around two dozen staff in October for using their $25 meal credits to buy other items, including laundry detergent and acne pads, while EY fired many more for "cheating" and taking multiple training courses at once.

The Financial Times, which first reported the EY firings, referred to these instances of being dismissed for minor offenses as "stealth firing."

Joe Galvin, the chief research officer at the executive coaching platform Vistage, told Business Insider that this sneaky sacking is "a "covert behind-the-scenes activity" that "violates the principle of respect for the individual."

A corporation might think: "I'm trying to downsize a little bit without saying I'm downsizing a little bit," Galvin said.

"So you go through this process that does nothing but break trust."

Short-term gain for long-term problems

Stealth firing leads from an era of "quiet firing," where companies methodically made employees' roles increasingly uncomfortable and less appealing, such as implementing strict return-to-office mandates.

This trend, along with the quietly agreed-upon severance packages of "silent layoffs," is a tactic to avoid the optics of publicly cutting dozens of staff.

Cynthia Patterson, the founder of the HR consultancy firm PeopleOps.how, who has 20 years of experience in HR across tech, AI, healthcare, and retail industries, told BI that while quietly trimming headcounts in these ways may work in the short term, they can cause serious issues for a workplace.

"Any short-term outcome is offset by the negative cultural impact," Patterson said. "Employees are left second-guessing their own value and stability, creating an environment of anxiety and mistrust."

A lack of trust and stability can lead to low morale, reduced productivity, and a stressed-out workforce.

"This dynamic mirrors the patterns of toxic and/or abusive work cultures, where fear and uncertainty are used — intentionally or not — as tools for behavioral control," Patterson said.

A shift in power

People are also perceptive, and employees who see their colleagues be shown the door for minor indiscretions will only make them wary and dissatisfied.

Patterson told BI companies who push people out in arbitrary ways are mistakenly viewing avoidance as kindness.

"Employee performance management is part of running a business," she said. "And it can't be skipped because it feels uncomfortable or inconvenient to the employer."

Stealth firing, Patterson said, simply exposes a company's inability or unwillingness to have honest, necessary conversations about performance — and "signals to employees that the organization doesn't have integrity."

Galvin told BI that companies willfully harming their reputations in this way may find they are the ones suffering and bleeding talent if an era of revenge quitting hits in 2025.

"The signs are pointing up toward a really strong 2025 — our community is energized, hiring's going back up again, investments are going up, expectations for profits and revenues are up," he said. "The power shifting."

Weigh up your options

It's always a smaller world than you think when it comes to work and looking for your next job, Ciara Harrington, the chief people officer of the leadership training platform Skillsoft, told BI.

"It's in the interest of everybody to keep good relationships," she said. "I don't think anybody really wants to leave a company on bad terms."

Sometimes, companies have to let their staff go, and the best thing for everyone is to do so with respect and honesty. That way, while the news isn't what the employees hope for, they still maintain a level of respect for the company.

The alternative is that employees post on public platforms such as LinkedIn, TikTok, Reddit, and job review sites about their negative experiences, such as how they felt undervalued and lied to.

Patterson said these stories could reach future employees, customers, investors, and even employment lawyers, opening up companies to potential legal disputes.

"Strong companies know their employees are human beings and deserve to be treated as such," Patterson said.

Galvin told BI that if there are signs that your company is looking to stealth fire you, it's time to start weighing your options.

Even if your employer isn't planning on firing you, if their communication is poor, and you feel unsafe, it's best to get out anyway.

"In the absence of a story, we create one," Galvin said. "If you sense that's happening to you, you either have the direct conversation with your manager or start looking for your next job."

• Russia's labor shortage has businesses turning to teens and retirees to fill positions.
• Openings for workers as young as 14 or older than 55 have jumped.
• The nation was short around 5 million workers last year, Russia's Academy of Sciences estimated.

Russia's wartime economy is dealing with a difficult labor shortage, and the problem is pushing companies to broaden the age range of new hires as they look to fill their ranks.

An analysis cited by the Russian news site Nakanune showed that job openings tailored to "young applicants" — as young as 14 — soared 119% year-over-year in the first quarter. That adds to last year's 289% increase, with openings for young workers rising from 14,500 to 42,000, the analysis found.

In catering and retail, the demand for workers between the ages of 16 and 18 has doubled, Bloomberg reported, citing an analysis from the Russian ad agency Avito.

Demand is also growing for older workers. Openings for specialists over the age of 55 climbed 65% in the culture and education sectors in the third quarter, while openings for specialists in the services sector rose 12%, according to a study viewed by the Russian state-owned news agency TASS.

The average age of specialists has also climbed by three to six years since 2022, per Bloomberg, citing an analysis from the Russian recruiting agency SuperJob.

Russia has also dialed back rules to allow younger people to work, or to allow retirement-age people to continue working.

Last year, Putin approved the employment of workers as young as 14 in some circumstances, though Russia's legal working age is still technically set at 16 years old.

In 2018, Russia raised the retirement age from 60 to 65 for men and from 55 to 63 for women. The nation also plans on raising pension payments for working retirees early next year, with retirement-age people who choose to work potentially receiving an average minimum increase of 1.3 million rubles a year, or $12,264, according to estimates from Russia's Deputy Prime Minister.

Russia's working-age population took a hit in 2022, when millions of Russians fled the nation after the start of the war in Ukraine. The nation is short around 2 million workers, Bloomberg reported, citing an analysis from FinExpertiza, one of the nation's largest auditors. Last year, the Russian Academy of Sciences estimated the nation was short around 5 million workers.

Meanwhile, around 73% of businesses are experiencing a staffing shortage, according to polls conducted by Russia's central bank.