"A few years ago, my company sold about 25 of our locations. The employees at those locations were transferred to the new company that had bought them, but as a result of having fewer employees overall, there were layoffs at our corporate office. This meant my workload increased significantly as our team worked to close out those properties and transfer all of the employees' records to the new company. It also meant I had angry, scared, or depressed employees coming by my desk daily to ask how their termination was going to work. I had to find a way to juggle the high volume of work on my desk with being available and empathetic to the people who were looking to me for help and often just someone to listen to them. As I found myself struggling to manage both, I realized my other teammates were likely in the same position. I pitched an idea to my manager where we would have 'office hours' all day with one team member in a private office ready and waiting to talk to anyone who needed us. We rotated shifts, allowing each of us to spend a couple of hours a day being there for the people being laid off and the remainder of the day focused on our processing work at our desks."
