Hey Dubya, tell us again about the economic recovery. Maybe if we listen to you talk about the fastest rate of growth in twenty years and all, it'll lift the collective gloom that has fallen over me and my colleagues.
Yesterday three guys in my group got the axe. There were eight of us; now there are five. We were all offered a cheesy "buyout": a week's salary for every year of service, up to a maximum of 16 weeks, and six months of health insurance coverage. Three guys were told that if they didn't take the buyout, they were simply going to be fired.
None of the rest of us took the buyout. Nobody dared simply quit without having another job lined up. Four of the five of us who are still employed have kids and provide most or all of the family income.
The company I work for is going through a massive reorganization. The founder and CEO for the past thirty-five years was a guy with a Ph.D. in physics who wanted to do scientific research. He never lost his interest in science, but over the years the company shifted into IT and other services, until the group I work for was the last bastion of research. Late last year the founder retired and was replaced by someone brought in from the outside. Science? Bah. Fourteen groups were combined into five and the managers who have the most blood on their hands at the end of the month will get the most accolades. So my boss's boss's boss's boss doesn't think my group should be part of the company anymore. Scientific research just isn't very profitable.
One of the guys who got axed was past retirement age and isn't feeling too badly about it. One of the guys was already looking for another job. The five of us who survived the culling are trying to convince management to let us cut back on our own hours to save the job of the third guy, but we half expect management to refuse: they want to see a drop in the "head count".
The word "coldhearted" doesn't begin to describe what's going on here. It makes me wonder what these corporate guys believe in. Money rules. Money is everything. Nothing at all matters but money.
Look, the Dow is up!
look, not to be heartless or anything about your (plural) plight, but yeah, it IS all about nothing but money. That is the tyranny of the stockholder at work. When you're a public company, it's all about the next quarter. Some companies have the wisdom to know it's a marathon not a sprint and the balls to stand up to Wall Street and the analysts. Most don't.
Even if they keep you and your colleagues around, they obviously won't value what you are doing. Might be best to take their miserable offer and begin looking for a better place to go, where your work will be valued and appreciated.
I mostly agree with renato--but I'd also say that the era of the stockholder-being-in-charge is relatively new. It didn't used to be that way (anyone remember, uh, the customer?), and it doesn't have to be that way.
My sympathies, anyway. I don't know what I'd do in your situation; I really don't. Cry first, I think, for sure.
come to Finland with Mike http://careers.nokia.com/nokia/hr/recrsyst.nsf/WB2RR/4B015D747B10BBCDC2256E24003F5687?OpenDocument&Lang=Global and be a semi-millionare... why not?
http://careers.nokia.com/nokia/hr/recrsyst.nsf/WB2RR/D538FCE18B71F236C2256DE10045B025?OpenDocument&Lang=Global
Free Enterprise is much too hard on the old and the sick and the shy and the poor and the stupid, and on people nobody likes.'' - Kurt Vonnegut 1970
Mary, came over to read from Atrios. I've been in this type of position before myself. In fact I was laid off twice in one year, then couldn't find a job, any job (except maybe a McJob, which wouldn't help with child care, or the bills, not possible, unemployment paid more, but only about 1/4 my former salary, until it ran out), for a year. When I found a job it was about 1/3 my former salary and we just couldn't hang on any longer.
Yes, it's all about money and GREED. The people who laid me off, didn't even stop to think about how it would effect me and my family, not to mention the other 90% of the company in the second layoff (mainly due to corporate mismanagement). And I lost everything. It's time these people lost something too, and I think it's coming soon.
I hope that those who had to go can find a job soon.