How to get laid off?

I did get the chance pop-up that layoffs were coming and my Sim should work hard to have a better chance of staying… but working hard led to a midlife crisis where she decided she wanted to quit her job anyway so that never really played out to the end to see what would happen.

I don't know about the buffs, but I do see a mod on mod the sims called "More Layoffs" by batsandbabydolls. The post says it's a 1% chance of a layoff event even starting. It seems that if you work hard during the event, you are not likely to be laid off while if you slack off, you are. That's probably what those buffs do. Working hard or slacking off does not make an event start, however, so they don't do anything unless you've already rolled lucky on the 1% roll. I don't see anything you can do to increase the odds the event happens except for download that mod. If you have professional slacker, you will never be laid off during an event. If you are ambitious, you are less likely and if you are lazy, you are more likely to be laid off. I'm wondering if I will need to do my vampire trick with this one like I did for the teen aspiration to sneak out to a college party. I basically had my vampire teen hibernate in a coffin for weeks until it happened. For this, She'll have to hibernate in a coffin while going to work. FUN!

I have looked into the lay off process (and detailed it... let me look for it... here).

If you want to do it quick, you can use this cheat:

traits.equip_trait trait_JobLoss_InLayoffPeriod

This won't give you a notification that the lay-off period has started, but it will apply the gameplay effects of it, eventually ending with your sim either keeping the job or getting laid off. So, this cheat starts the lay-off period.

All of these buffs are hidden. But as long as I understand these, these buffs do the following:

• Expired moodlet is applied when the lay-off period ends. This triggers the check if the sim keeps their job or loses it.
• Chance moodlet is what triggers the lay-off period. The game checks if it should be applied and when it is applied for 5 sim-minutes, a lay-off period is started
• Cooldown moodlet is applied when a lay-off period is over. It prevents the sim from being laid off for 7 days. It also reduces the chance of other sims from being laid off.
• WorkHarderBoost and SlackOffBoost come into play during a lay-off period. Sims that work harder are less likely to be laid off while sims who slack off are more likely to be laid off.

So, my advice on starting a lay-off is this:

• If your sim is an adult, they cannot get into a lay-off period if they have 2 days left until their birthday. Elders cannot get into a lay-off period.
• Get a Lazy trait. This raises the chance of getting into a lay-off period.
• Don't switch jobs as being new to the job eliminates the lay-off period chance.
• Avoid promotions as recently getting a promotions reduces the chance.
• Avoid Professional Slacker reward trait: this prevents a lay-off period.

So yeah, other than that, lay-off periods are rare events.