crooked tale primitive reflects upon his working life

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x6844868

Oh my.

The crooked tale primitive, from Ohio, sometimes from California:

The Straight Story  (1000+ posts)        Fri Oct-23-09 09:33 PM
Original message
 
Age and experience - reflections on working (I am 44 this week, a review of my life at work)

Over the years I have heard the mantra "Companies in a free market will hire the best people for the job and work to retain them."

At one point in my youth I believed that.

I turned 44 this week and thought I would share some of my job experiences with you.

Over the years I have worked in security, been a deputy, worked in manufacturing, and the computer field.

Time and again I have seen people (myself included) screwed over.

I worked for a manufacturing company in my 20's. Spent 3 years with them. Won awards each year for attendance, most suggestions (that were implemented), I helped out with all the committees (Christmas parties, etc) and was one of their main contributors for their monthly newsletters. I was promoted up the chain quickly. After an injury and a worker's comp claim I was fired. I won a suit against them. The HR director had left a year earlier, totally disillusioned with them (he was a good guy whom I had become friends with).

After working for them went to work for a similar manufacturing company as a temp. Work 90 days and do well and get hired in they said. 90 days after that you can get benefits. Several people there told me that they often fired people who had families after the second 90 day period - saved them money on their insurance. I broke 3 company records for production. One week before my final 90 days (had been hired on) I was let go for some bogus reason (dealing with break lines that I had been working on. One of the team leads was a friend of ours and told me there had been no problems with them and smugly told me that he had warned me ahead of time about putting my wife and kids on my insurance policy).

I went into the computer field after all that - which is what I have been doing the last 15 years.

One company I worked for went bankrupt, and offered to pay retention bonuses to keep me and some others on (over a period of time). Promised to pay us the full amount if they were bought out. I got one check from all of that, and then we were bought out. I stood to collect a lot. New company said they did not have to honor that agreement. We were all laid off (although I was able to stay on to help with transitioning the data bases).

I have worked for Enron, JP Morgan, Bank One, Verizon (as a temp through another company), Nationwide, and several small companies. I excelled at each job. But in the end, they did not care about my skills in programming, running data centers, project management, etc.

At one point I had 4 offices when I worked for Chase, my director said I was the best manager (data center wise) they had.

But in the end it was the same.

They needed to save money. I worked well, worked my way up, and replacing me and others saved them money.

You and your skills? Valuable to them in the short term, but stay long term and you will cost them more.

Busting my ass, taking work home with me, studying and taking tests and getting certifications. Showing up, excelling at what I did - none of it mattered in the end.

Now I am 44. Seen as an old school guy.

Never mind I can program in several languages, know a lot more about data bases in an enterprise environment, keep up on new technology, etc.

Workers have become disposable because companies can count on money from government, investors, etc, and your worth to them is something they can toss out easily.

YOU mean nothing to them in the future. They have NO loyalty to you, only to themselves and share holders.

And if they lose money because a valuable person gets canned? So what - they will get more investment or bailouts anyway.

Brickbat (586 posts)      Fri Oct-23-09 09:41 PM
Response to Original message
 
1. The American Dream = The American Lie.

Showing up and doing a good job just doesn't cut it anymore. You have to be willing to do it for a pittance.

The above's the whole bonfire.

[Chump]

All I saw was, "blah blah blah I'd like to whine for a while."

[GOBUCKS]

The Straight Story  (1000+ posts)        Fri Oct-23-09 09:33 PM
Original message
 
Workers have become disposable because companies can count on money from government, investors, etc, and your worth to them is something they can toss out easily.

YOU mean nothing to them in the future. They have NO loyalty to you, only to themselves and share holders.

And if they lose money because a valuable person gets canned? So what - they will get more investment or bailouts anyway.

Suppose you are an employer, and you need to cut expenses due to a period of slow business, and you have a handful of employees with this typical DUmmy attitude. What do you do?

[Ralph Wiggum]

Brickbat (586 posts)      Fri Oct-23-09 09:41 PM
Response to Original message
 
1. The American Dream = The American Lie.

Showing up and doing a good job just doesn't cut it anymore. You have to be willing to do it for a pittance.

What a moron.

[The Village Idiot]

Suppose you were an employer and you had to cut the payroll to pay higher taxes...

[Carl]

Ever notice how they all are always fired for "bogus" reasons..they never seem to leave a job of their own accord to go to a better one.

This story sounds like it was made up by a 10 year old.

[Chris_]

It's about time for him to start setting up for his big Christmas donation drive.

He's laying the ground work.

[ScubaGuy]

If his IT skills are as good as he says they are he should go out on his own.

In 2001 I got tired of the instability of IT positions and went out with a few others on our own.  I've been doing that for almost 10 years and have never regretted it.

[AllosaursRus]

Ever notice how they all are always fired for "bogus" reasons..they never seem to leave a job of their own accord to go to a better one.

This story sounds like it was made up by a 10 year old.

I also notice they never work for the same company more than 3 years! WTF is up with that? Hell, I don't think I've ever worked for the same company less than 5, excluding my current position at Home Depot. As far as that goes, it complains it's emplyers don't care about it's expertise. Amazing, since the Depot pays me better than half again what they do for the majority because of...........my EXPERTISE and KNOWLEDGE in construction!

[Carl]

I also notice they never work for the same company more than 3 years! WTF is up with that? Hell, I don't think I've ever worked for the same company less than 5, excluding my current position at Home Depot. As far as that goes, it complains it's emplyers don't care about it's expertise. Amazing, since the Depot pays me better than half again what they do for the majority because of...........my EXPERTISE and KNOWLEDGE in construction!

I never really noticed that part about the time of service but you are right.
Have been at the current job since April 2000 and the one before that from May 1988 until April 2000.

It seems they all seem to sway from being the best most succesfull person on the planet to just eeking by in life too.

Franks first rule of DUmmies about that they lie everytime they open their mouths or write things is spot on.

[diesel driver]

Ever notice how they all are always fired for "bogus" reasons..they never seem to leave a job of their own accord to go to a better one.

This story sounds like it was made up by a 10 year old.

They probably do alright with and for the company, until the results of the company's mandatory drug testing policy comes back on them....

Hence, "fired for 'bogus' reasons"....

[RobJohnson]

Suppose you were an employer and you had to cut the payroll to pay higher taxes...

Good point.

[sofa king]

every thread, every post...  a tale of woe.

no wonder dummies are depressed all of the time.  most have shut off all other access to the world.  they love to live within the confines of du where any opinion that questions theirs is only an "alert" click away from being removed permanently.

poor dummies.  tales of gloom and doom all day long.  post after post.  and then their own -D leadership, the one's they ate ramin noodles for and donated all of their earthly possessions to for the election, turn out to not to hold the same moonbat ideas as they do.

ummm...  that's gotta sting. 

no wonder dummies need all of them drugs. 

[LC EFA]

DUmmies need to harden the **** up - stop bitching and take responsibility for their life.

Not everyone is going to like you all the time - deal with it.

Sometimes you're gonna get sacked for no direct fault of your own - Suck it up and move on.

Life is not fair and never will be. There is no Free Ponyâ„¢.

Sooner they can understand this - the better.

Course if DUmmies could understand and accept the above - they wouldn't be DUmmies.

[FlaGator]

From the viewpoint of his  post and my knowledge of the computer field I can draw some conclusions on why he can't keep a job. He thinks more highly of his abilities than than the people who employee him do. Working on the assumption that this is true then I can conclude he does not take any personal responsiblity for his inability to maintain a job. In short, he lies to himself, believes the lies and then views his whole life filtering everything through those lies.

[NHSparky]

Newsflash to DUmmies.  Since commerce was invented way back in the caveman day (i.e., you have something I want and am willing to give you something for it) all businesses, regardless of time, place, product, or method, have had only two basic rules:

--Make as much as you can (money, trinkets, chickens, whatever).

--Spend as little effort/material/resources as possible.

This is true in ANY business today, not just the "greedy" capitalist ones, but the socialist/dictatorial ones.  Labor is one of those costs, and if the market won't bear paying a layabout whiner $50/hr just because he simply thinks he "deserves" it, guess what?  You ain't seeing that kind of jack!  Conversely, a business which doesn't compensate employees commensurate with their efforts and talents won't stay in business long either.

If ya'll think you can just surf pron all day and collect a huge paycheck at the end of the week without your employer getting upset about it, newsflash!

[DumbAss Tanker]

I also notice they never work for the same company more than 3 years! WTF is up with that? Hell, I don't think I've ever worked for the same company less than 5, excluding my current position at Home Depot. As far as that goes, it complains it's emplyers don't care about it's expertise. Amazing, since the Depot pays me better than half again what they do for the majority because of...........my EXPERTISE and KNOWLEDGE in construction!

Three hours in the case of StellaBlue!

 

[delilahmused]

One does have to wonder if they're the best of the workforce why they can never keep a job. It's a miracle Microsoft managed to grow to such heights without the Straight Story.

Cindie