Ever since I joined my first job at a big corporation many years ago, I started an emotional relationship with the layoff of older workers who were "not needed" anymore and always have thought it is one of the worst managed issues big companies do. It always impacted me to see someone who had been working many years at the same company being told they had to leave in their late 50s when it was clear they would have a very hard time trying to find a new job. Companies and those responsible for making the decision just evaluate financial aspects, forgetting about personal, and many times knowledge aspects the workers have and can use wisely somewhere else.
We see HHRR departments spending lots of money on off-site events to create a team culture. Training programs to keep workers up to date, evaluation programs to make sure every issue is scaled for managers and workers to do better their jobs, but when dealing with someone "not-needed" anymore, they are unable to evaluate all the assets that worker has, find other roles they could create and work with that worker to get the most out of the situation in benefit of the company and of course the employee.
I understand there may be situations where this is very difficult and even impossible, but when I think about big corps with lots of resources, dealing with a small group of employees, it has no sense at all to throw away all that expertise and send a person to an emotional and sometimes economical critical situation.
I agree. This isn't that at this place though - it isn't age or even skill, it is more that the direction of the company has changed. I was looking at the support for those who will leave and it is very good!
This is a big problem in many organizations, especially those which don't build career paths. Again, this place has been better with this (I have seen some horror companies), as they tend to encourage internal transfers where possible and job growth. People shift from team to team often here, building out their knowledge of the industry and organization. The average tenure is very long, especially for an IT company. This isn't a big corp though, most people know most people.