It's defensible to have a voluntary separation program with clear terms. Microsoft, for example, announced on April 23 that a voluntary separation program would launch on May 7. On that day they announced the precise terms of separation, with affected employees given until June 8 to participate. Perfectly reasonable.

What Gitlab is announcing here is that employees need to apply for a separation, at a yet-to-be-determined time under still-unknown terms, without a guarantee of acceptance, in the next 7 calendar days. Much different and just so much worse.

the order here is backwards. publish the package first and let people apply without committing. right now GitLab gets the signal before employees even get the terms.