OT: Joining the ranks . . .

Whistle
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. . . of the unemployed.

My position at the company I work(ed) for was determined to be “no longer necessary”. Some corporate restructuring going on. So on Tuesday, my boss and our HR manager came to the office, asked me to pack up my personal belongings, and told me I’d be paid through Wednesday, and be provided benefits through the end of the month.

Since CA is an at-will employment state, and I had an at-will contract, the employer isn’t required to give notice, or provide severance packages (except in certain cases, such as large-scale layoffs, etc.). So I don’t really have a safety net to ease the transition. At least my boss and the HR rep had the good grace to be angry at that particular corporate policy. . . Not that it helps much.

I’m trying to look at this as a blessing in disguise (I hope it’s not a wolf in sheep’s clothing, though!). I’d been looking for a career in a different field anyway, so now I have even more reason to look even harder. The frightening thing is that I have been looking, and not having success, in the fields that most interest me. Not a great job market right now, and non-profits are especially suffering.

And all this as my wife has gone part-time to take some prereq classes in preparation for veterinary school, and the attendant thousands of dollars I just sent to pay for those classes (about three grand per class, at the local four-year college). Oy!

Anyway, if anyone has good leads, especially for a management level position in a non-profit arena (environmental policy, for instance), I’m all ears. If you need a freelancer to do some writing for you, too, I’ve got plenty of time all of a sudden . . . (In fact, a friend who’s an editor at Wired may have something for me, but it’d be small and not very remunerative. Which is, of course, better than nothing.)

At least I know I’m in good company (right, Weeks?), knowing as I do so many bright, talented folks who’ve been out of work for months now. So much money in this area, so few jobs. Sort of odd.

Cross your fingers for me!

–Aaron

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Good luck, Aaron!

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My father used to tell me if you want to be happy you must be one of three things:

  1. YOur own boss

  2. Everyone else’s boss

  3. A professor with tenure


    Best of luck Aaron.

Doc

4

Aaron, I’m so sorry to hear that and I wish I could do better than cross my fingers for you.

I can’t believe the number of talented, clever and, these days, often young people who are finding themselves without jobs and I can’t help but think that there must be a fundamental change in the way the economy is structured somewhere in the pipeline. The policies that seem to make so many of the best seem dispensible seem to me to be the product of a system which is no longer conservative or capitalist but managerial, ie, a system designed to line the pockets of managers at the expense of investors, workers and customers alike, not to mention the long term health of the economy, the environment …

OK, rant over. Even if I’m right in thinking it can’t last, we’re stuck with it now and that doesn’t help you. I just hope the kind of job you are looking for comes along really soon. And, if I hear of anything … BTW, how flexible are you as regards moving?

Best,
John

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Wow, that really bites. I’m sorry Aaron. :frowning:

Hopefully you’ll find a position you can live with. All I’ll say is don’t snub a job just because you don’t necissarily think it will be a ton of fun though, you never know what you might end up enjoying, and besides, you can always find something else later when the economy swings back up and there’s actually a real job market again. Heck, try something totally ouside your field if it comes up. Best of luck!

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My sympathies. This state is not a good place to be outta work in now. :frowning:
And getting laid off with two days notice (my situation after 6 1/2 years emp.) leaves one angry for a LONG time.

Of course you know about Craig’s List but KITSList is good too. Will post email addy as soon as I get next one (I keep throwin messages away).
Check out UC Berkeley AND Office of the President at UC Berk. Though they are belt-tightened, your priors might help.

You will discover, from KITS, that there are plenty of marketing jobs (Marketing Managers, Executives, etc) that nobody wants. They make up 80% of KITS jobs. In a bad economy, they must be the folk who are axed regularly and absorb the pain.

PS: Dont forget whistle party Nov 8 in San Pablo. We can drink a toast to an early unpleasant death of the weenies who fired us (kidding, honestly, NOT!!! :devil: )

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Aaron, tough break.

Send me an email with your quals and possible types of possitions. Our company has some openings.

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Oh no, not you too Weeks. This is bleedin’ ridiculous. My sympathies to you too. I can’t help thinking that there must be some alternatives just waiting in the wings, but I suppose this is a bad time for new initiatives and what can you do if you don’t have the capital?

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Aaron,

I’m very sorry. This is tough.

Please hang in there. You’ll pull through one way or another, I know. And I expect, at the other end of the ordeal is a better situation that gives you the satisfaction you deserve.

Best wishes,
Jerry

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Good rant though. Best of luck to you herbivore. It sounds scary to me.

Steve

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dang i’m sorry. IMO this state sucks. I wish you the best.

one word: do not let your days become empty. staying positive, confident, and busy are essential.

make sure you hit all the online search engines and stuff.

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Thanks, everybody, for the well-wishes and support.

Doc: funny thing is, I was everybody else’s boss. Well, except for my own boss, who was located in San Diego. The company has decided it’d be cheaper to keep him on and fly him back and forth between each office, spending alternate weeks between two offices, than it would be to keep me on, as well. So there it is.

You may be right. Although I somehow managed to work my into a high-level directoral position within my company, I’ve always felt a bit out of my element in the corporate world. It’s always seemed a strange dichotomy to me, the way we clamor so loudly for individual freedoms and rights and so on, but willingly cede those things for a third to a half of our daily lives. We demand the right to elect our leaders, to live where we choose, to behave (mostly) as we choose, believe as we choose, then we go to work for a corporation where we have no real choice in our leadership, our behavior, our actions, our movement; essentially, we revert to an almost feudal system, except instead of land, there’s capital, and instead of dukes, we have management. We get enough to live on, while the “excess” we produce goes into the hands of a few.

I’m not saying that I wholly disagree with how corporations work, by the way; after all, I do get to choose my employer (sort of), and we are compensated monetarily for our agreeing to certain modes of thought and behavior. I’mnot sure if they can be managed more effectively in another manner, at least not if we’re to make the sort of profits investors demand. I just never have wholly bought into the system as such, so always felt uneasy. That’s one of the reasons I’ve been looking for something new of late.

Too bad my disaffection didn’t coincide with a great job market, I guess.

Fairly flexible in regards to moving, with caveats: my wife is currently attending several courses at a local university as refreshers prior to (we hope) beginning vet school in a year or so. Her bio degree is ten years old now, so the dean of admissions at the UC Davis school suggested she take a couple courses now to show her competence and refresh her knowledge. Thus, we’ll have to stay at least until this term ends. And since her dream is to become a vet, and I’m determined to help her attain that goal, we’re limited to moving to areas where there is a school of veterinary medicine. So we’re a bit limited at least for the next few years.

That said, we’ve often talked about emigrating to Australia one day (not because we dislike America, but because we so loved our time there, and because it’s a naturalist’s dream continent in many ways. And so uncrowded!). So if you have a juicy lead in Wollongong, I’m all ears! (Sure . . .)


Unemployedly,

Aaron

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Ouch. Ouch. Ouch.

I was laid off at the beginning of June, but I’d known it was coming (my employer was slowly sliding towards bankrupcy), so at least I didn’t have that sick feeling that comes from being blindsided. Even though legal, that kind of “pack and leave NOW” policy hurts.

I was lucky - I was already interviewing and found another job (one that I’m happy with) and only missed a couple of paychecks, but it was both luck (I happened to have some hard-to-find skills in a small specialty) and connections (a lot of people I know already worked here). But I’ve got members of my former team still looking, even though they’re good people with solid references.

Wish I could do more than offer sympathy and encouragement.

Best wishes,
Dana

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Aaron, good luck! Best wishes for your job hunt. I think you have great credentials and the right attitude, so I am confident that you won’t be out there too long.

Best,

15

Aaron -

So sorry to hear that. I was in that exact position a little over a year ago - downsized without notice. We were supposed to get severance (about three months worth for me ) - but the company conveniently filed bankruptcy right after the layoff so they didn’t have to pay it. It really really sucks.

Stay positive (that is very hard) and try (somehow) to enjoy the “free time” while looking for something new. The only upside of my layoff was that it happened at the beginning of summer so I got to spend a lot of time with my kids while they were out of school. It was very cool, but hard to just relax and enjoy it.

Be prepared to deal with the anger that comes along afterward - it is pretty intense. I really hadn’t anticipated it and it almost crippled me for a while. In some ways, I am still dealing with it.

Best wishes for finding a new job quickly that turns out to be the best job you ever had! You will be in my prayers.

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Can’t really say more than good luck, Aaron.

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I’m so sorry, Aaron! That just reeks! We’re lucky in that my husband still has his job (for now…though he gets told at least once a week that he’s “expendable”), but we’ve been trying to find something else for him for months now with no luck at all. The job market in this state is just horrifyingly bad, and at any moment, we could be in the same boat. I love California, but I’ve been thinking more and more these days that maybe we should cut our losses and get the heck out of Dodge. It’s scarey.

I’ll keep my ears open for anything in the non-profit sector, though I imagine Santa Cruz would be a pretty bad commute for you. Maybe all of us Nor-Cal whistlers ought to form a network…sounds like an awful lot of good people here are taking a hit, and I know that just about everyone in our area who HASN’T lost a job lives in fear that he or she will be next.

Redwolf

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Aaron–So sorry to hear about your job loss. (And nice to meet you, by the way.) I was in the same boat about 2 1/2 years ago. I was lucky enough to find another job pretty quickly, but something that helped me was thinking about all the things I DID NOT LIKE about the old one. That helped me not dwell on it and move on. (Using the negative to get to the positive?) It sounds like you’re pretty flexible and you seem to have a good attitude. That should help. I will send lots of good thoughts your way. Maybe you’ll find your dream job next. :slight_smile:

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Gee, I wish I had a lead for you, but since I know what you are looking for I’ll let you know if I see something.

On the question of mangerialism, I wish I had the answers. I suppose I think that senior managers have succeeded, without investers really noticing, to create an environment for themselves in which they get the rewards that only entrepreneurs could once get, but without exposing themselves to the risks that go with being an entrepreneur. CEOs awarding themselves multi-million dollar pay rises when they are fully aware that their company is going to the wall is the most visible manifestation of what I’m complaining about.

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That’s the scary thing, isn’t it? That even people who are employed now feel so insecure in their positions, and suffer the attendant anxiety.

It used to be that you could count on your job being there for you, or at least expect to be treated well if your position was cut. But now employers have no compunction about simply cutting employees loose at any time, and employees have likewise become less loyal to employers, knowing that they are just an asset or liability, not a person. Anxiety goes up all 'round. That can’t be good for the Mental State of the Union, can it?

What I find almost funny is that employers demand quite a bit of loyalty from their workers, to whom the employer is not ultimately very loyal. I remember a few years ago when Bank of America reported its best earnings year ever and threw a party for employees, and then announced just days later that they wree laying off thousands of workers in an attempt to be even more profitable. Hey, thanks for helping us make record profits; here’s your pink slip! There was muted outrage for a few days, but then everyone accepted the new reality of the workplace.

I guess we’ll just have to learn to be comfortable with the idea of an almost freelance workforce, where most workers will switch jobs (or be released) on a regular basis. It’ll be an adjustment for those of us who grew up with the notion of finding a stable job with a stable employer, but judging from the number of freelancers and independent contractors now out there, it’s possible to be succesful and happy in that situation.

It’ll be interesting, if nothing else, this unemployment thing. Never been out of work before. Give me something new to experience, at least!

And time to post more frequently to the boards, of course. Heh.