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Now that I am officially retired I can't get over the silliness that is corporate America. Even though I shouldn't, I lay in bed when I can't sleep thinking about all the craziness that I had to endure when I worked for a number of highly respected businesses.
I was either fired or laid off a number of times in my career. My boss and some idiot from personnel would come by my office and tell me to report to a conference room for a meeting. Arriving at the conference room I was told I was being terminated effective immediately and was given a box to clear out my things.
I tried to explain that I was in the middle of working with a number of people on a number of important corporate initiatives and had a number of meetings scheduled with employees, managers, and outside consultants, and emails and phone calls to return. Didn't they want to know where I was on these things so they would turn them over to someone else? They always said no. These were related to projects that I had worked weekends and evenings on and had cancelled numerous vacations at the last minute!
No, they weren't interested and wanted me out of the office in 15 minutes. No misconduct was involved. Just a personality mismatch or economic corporate cutback.
I would check back a few weeks later with my friends in the office and they weren't even told I was gone, they just assumed I was on vacation. What did the people who never heard back from me who had outstanding projects, emails or phone calls think! OMG!
I've been in the same position as you and know how you feel. Unfortunately, it is what it is. Try to forget about it; there are no answers. If on some level you miss working, perhaps you should get a contract position. All the best.
Now that I am officially retired I can't get over the silliness that is corporate America. Even though I shouldn't, I lay in bed when I can't sleep thinking about all the craziness that I had to endure when I worked for a number of highly respected businesses.
I was either fired or laid off a number of times in my career. My boss and some idiot from personnel would come by my office and tell me to report to a conference room for a meeting. Arriving at the conference room I was told I was being terminated effective immediately and was given a box to clear out my things.
I tried to explain that I was in the middle of working with a number of people on a number of important corporate initiatives and had a number of meetings scheduled with employees, managers, and outside consultants, and emails and phone calls to return. Didn't they want to know where I was on these things so they would turn them over to someone else? They always said no. These were related to projects that I had worked weekends and evenings on and had cancelled numerous vacations at the last minute!
No, they weren't interested and wanted me out of the office in 15 minutes. No misconduct was involved. Just a personality mismatch or economic corporate cutback.
I would check back a few weeks later with my friends in the office and they weren't even told I was gone, they just assumed I was on vacation. What did the people who never heard back from me who had outstanding projects, emails or phone calls think! OMG!
That never happened to me, though I was fired a few times. Had I really been in the middle of anything when I was canned, I would've let the company suffer from the loss of those projects or whatever. If they don't want me around, they can go bankrupt and vanish from existence for all I care.
The closest I came was when I got fired from a couple of car dealerships (and always for ridiculous reasons). At the time they fired me, given the stupidity of their "reasoning" (or lack thereof), I didn't care if any of the customers I'd worked with, called, otherwise contacted, whatever came back to buy cars. I would've preferred to see the company fail. Would've served them right.
I understand the OP question and feelings very well. Companies are really really stupid sometimes. You wonder how they survive and grow with some of the idiotic policies and ideas they come up with.
They also lament that "employees have no loyalty to them" and yet they have none for the employee either. More and more you are simply a number to them, not a human being. But I have been in the game long enough that I accept that situation and just roll with the punches.
There was one company I worked for and when we came to work on Monday morning and our keys wouldn't fit in the door we knew someone had been fired the Friday before. It could have been someone you worked side by side with for years and the only way you found out who it was is that they weren't there and their desk was cleaned off. It was like taboo to speak about them leaving or something.
So how would I react, with regard specifically to the projects I left behind? I think it is really important to understand the nature of termination of employment. My priority would be to be sure I can be in contact with the people I cared about - not the customers, not the suppliers, not the co-workers - but the people. And between having personal email contact with some, and LinkedIn connections with others, that's effectively covered.
That. That's what you do. Very well put.
And then you wake up tomorrow and begin your new life.
Just reading the first page on this thread reveals a somewhat shocking lack of empathy. The jaded and cynical responses you received are indicative of what is wrong with America: no one cares about anyone but themselves.
I got mine, get the Hell out of my way!
To the OP: no one deserves to be treated like you did, and it is a reminder of how those at the highest levels look at many of us in their workforce as a necessary evil to be terminated at their convenience.
Unless we're diverging into the hypothetical, this is a situation which the OP was in a long time ago and which he's simply rehashing for some reason which rather eludes me, anyway.
You should probably quit interrupting if you have nothing to add, which you clearly do not.
What you experienced isn't that uncommon. I think these companies generally go through a lot of employees like that. I've seen employees avoid parking in a spot because they thought the employee parked there and that employee had been gone over a month without anyone knowing. This happened with someone that I knew but when this person started, an ex-employee brought 3 bullets in and left them, with names of supervisors on them but this was kept quiet! So, I'm guessing they generally did terminations in a less than smart way. I think other employees and businesses are just used to the way the employer operates. Also, a lot of people in these companies are medicated or need to be!
No, they weren't interested and wanted me out of the office in 15 minutes. No misconduct was involved. Just a personality mismatch or economic corporate cutback.
I would check back a few weeks later with my friends in the office and they weren't even told I was gone, they just assumed I was on vacation. What did the people who never heard back from me who had outstanding projects, emails or phone calls think! OMG!
You just prove what I have learned a while ago. In a corporate environment the game is more important than the job. No one cares if you are gone, and if you think the company will miss a beat because of that, you are wrong. This is why I only look out for me. All the time I spent working hard so someone else could could get the credit and look good is time I will never get back. All that overtime-missing time with my family- is time I can never get back. If you are retired now you should be having the time of your life, not worrying about what people who forgot you exist are doing.
Wow! What a thread. I must remember to thank God every day I go into work that I don't work in corporate America.
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