Crap! Reorg!

[JTO]

This has been coming for weeks. Today my company's reorg hit my office and my group. Good people with families were let go. I feel sick and angry. There has got to be another way to live so that we don't depend on these souless people and companies for our livelyhood. I know, become self employed etc. Most people have been led to believe that we should strive to get a good job, work hard, retire. That's BS. That's what their grandfathers and fathers did. Not anymore.

There's no such thing as a secure job.
Sorry folks. I'm pissed and I knew this BBS was a safe place to vent.

Troy

[widebody911]

I'm note sure you're safe here - in a few minutes, some Big Business apologists will chime in to tell you that you have no rights to a job or to make a living.

[JavaBrewer]

Originally posted by widebody911
I'm note sure you're safe here - in a few minutes, some Big Business apologists will chime in to tell you that you have no rights to a job or to make a living.

Yeah this whole business/layoff/reorg thing is something we've never seen before.

Troy, you mention it's been "coming for weeks". Hopefully that was enough time to organize your resume and hit up some contacts? What industry are you in?

[djmcmath]

There is an alternative, of course. I'm in the Navy, with job security that just won't quit. Of course, I go to sea on submarines for a living, totally isolated from the outside world (ie family, loved ones, etc.) for months on end. It's posts like yours that really make me want to stay, 'coz job security really is pretty important. Thanks for sharing, and sorry to hear about your friends.


Dan

[JTO]

My business is adhesive resins. I'm a technical manager and a chemist by education and training. Basically my functions is to take the technology from the R&D group, do applications studies and if they're promising, offer the technology to customers. I am usually involved in the plant trials helping to ensure the trial is successful.

I have hit up a couple of contacts. Trouble is, how secure is a new job. Not!

Supposedly the cuts are done. I'm not going to allow myself to become complacent though. My wife and I need to keep pushing to develop multiple streams of income until we are independant of one employer.

Thanks guys.
Troy

[RickM]

Troy,

Sorry to hear the bad news.

During my 24 year career in IT I have learned one thing...."the only thing to count on is change".

Unlike our parents there are very few places that offer a one-stop career opportunity.

I have weathered many, many layoffs, resizings, reorgs, right-sizing, etc. One time it got me layed off. No hard feelings from me (for the most part). It's part of business. While many organizations chop for investor profit many do it for the sake of survival and/or being competitive. Additionally, I've seen layoffs by the largest Giants where associates thought they were untouchable (ATT sound familiar?). Then I've seen people working for much smaller, family owned (less "secure"?) businesses for 25 years.

I look at it his way, If I own a business and I need to change direction or simply can't afford the staff I'd have to make some tough decisions. This includes laying people off.

That said, I wish you the best of luck and start networking your butt off now. If you need tips I'll be happy to share.

[island911]

Originally posted by JTO
. . . I'm not going to allow myself to become complacent though. My wife and I need to keep pushing to develop multiple streams of income until we are independant of one employer.

Smart! This is the approach my wife and I took.

I learned quickly, as a week into my first professional job I saw exactly what you described.. . .a whole bunch of people who thought they were in a safe, big company job, were looking like deer in the headlights.

[HarryD]

Troy,

They say they are done?

Have they make significant changes on how they conduct their business or just lop off some heads, and ask the survivors to pick up the load?

If it is the latter, they may have given themselves some breathing room but the cause of the need to layoff has not been exorcised.

I find it odd that corporate management has convinced themselves that you can "Save your way to propserity". In a captial intensive business, you need to spread the cost of capital equipment over many units. If you are selling less units, reducing the variable cost of labor, does not (on a 1 for 1 basis) improve profit margins (it actually lessens them) or total profitability.

I suspect they read the old (60's) MacKinzie report that says you can chop off 15% of your staff with no impact to your company (since they were doing unecessary work anyway) and enjoy the savings. Since this is a great plan, the Corp MBA's figure you can do this over and over again. Unfortunately, I do not think any of these fellows has every trimmed a steak and dicovered that after you trim all the fat, you are cutting meat and your steak suffers. In addition, if you remove all of the fat from your steak, the taste suffers.

Best of luck. Remember, you are the only one who watches out for #1.

[Shuie]

We just had one a few weeks ago. Im a IT guy working for a non technology company so I feel like a gopher on a rifle range everyday

[Rot 911]

I hope none of you think this is a recent phenomenon. Hell I remember losing my job in an aluminum foundry in 1982 when they found cheaper labor in Arkansas! Troy it truly sucks to be let go, but I am not sure from your post if you were let go or just some of those around you. But keep in mind that it goes both ways. Remember in the 90's when people were changing jobs every few months just because they found another job that paid more? Job loyalty for both sides disappeared in the 90's.

[JTO]

thanks guys,
Let my clarify. I survived the cuts. But yes Harry, I think they expect the remaining folks to pick up the load. Truth be told, my boss doesn't even know what the new organization looks like.

Hi Rick,
I understand and agree with your statements. Adhesives used to enjoy a specialty chemical status but that has been largely replaced by a commodity status. Due to this change, prices have been driven down. My company was/is unique in that a lot of great technical sevice comes (came) with the price of the resin. Our current customers decided that the little bit extra our resin cost was worth it due to all of the technical help they received along with it. This is our (my group's) fear; the current customers we have chose us due to the package we provide. Now, are we going to abandon that philosophy of service and try to go head-to-head with our competetion? If so, we will see our adhesive volumes drop due to the fact that a) we aren't providing the service to justify our premium and b) our cometition is four to five times larger than we are and therefore enjoy better buying power of raw materials and can offer lower prices. Its a spiral of declining volumes causing more cost savings to prop up returns, etc.

As Island and others agree, I need to continue to build those multiple streams of income. Maybe we need to start a new thread called "your multiple streams of income".

Thanks guys. I'm feeling my hope return.
Troy

[HarryD]

Originally posted by JTO
thanks guys,
Let my clarify. I survived the cuts. But yes Harry, I think they expect the remaining folks to pick up the load. Truth be told, my boss doesn't even know what the new organization looks like.


Troy

Hate to tell you... but a reorg without a plan in place ... the chain saw is just being warmed up.

While you are ok for now, i would start my networking both inside and outside the company to see if there is a better place for you to be.

(If you want to see a ship slowly sink, look in the "Statesman Journal" archives for the history of Siltec--> Mitsibishi Silicon --> Sumco for a worst case outcome. A more sucessful story can be found in the history of Tektronics but watch how it changed)

[RickM]

Troy, I'm glad to hear you're still there.

Funny enough, at the one place I was layed off from we built very complex websites. One of our potential customers was an adhesives guy. He wanted the science of selecting the proper adhesive to be automated and webafied. Was a pretty cool idea.

[JTO]

I hear you Harry. I have networked within the panelboard industry and have a standing offer with a pretty large company. Just don't want to move if I don't have to. I will continue to work on having something else in place before the other shoe falls. Also, I want to put my energy into obtaining independance and use the fear of job loss as motivation.

Rick, sounds like a good idea. Trouble is, the typical old plant in the West is so poorly controlled and the raw material (wood) so variable in quality and species that what works one month may be suspect the next. I don't know, maybe the wave of the future is what they do in Europe, a resin kitchen on site that takes basic raw "resin" and modifies it to the mill.

Anyway, wood products continue to contract in the US. It is not a good industry to count on anyway. China, Chile, NZ, etc can put a superior quality panel into Portland for less than a local plant can produce an inferior panel. That's a different story.

Thanks for your support and conversation guys. It really has made things feel less nasty.

Troy

[nostatic]

After fighting today with multiple people on multiple fronts, I started thinking "screw this, I'll start my own production company up north." Don't know that I have the guts to do it, but there always are other options if you're willing to learn something new and take a risk. When I gave notice leaving my faculty position (giving them 6 months notice) I had no job to go to. I beat the bushes pretty hard, and got my foot in the door in a new field, then went up from there.

[masraum]

I'm in IT, 3 years ago I was laid off from Sprint's network consulting division, then I went to another company that did batches of lay-offs for the 2 years that I was there, fortunately I left that one voluntarily recently, hopefully that means someone else there will keep their job.

The worst part is that the jobs that the last company were removing were lost to India, Mexico, Costa Rica, Manilla... Fortunately the support from these locations was suffering for several different reasons, so Cisco has begun rethinking this move.

If things keep going the way they are anything that can be done over a phone will be done from outside this country where it's much cheaper. Fortunately I've moved on to something that requires physical proximity.

Not only that, but these days, in IT, at least, to get decent raises you usually need to change companies, but at the same time companies want people who don't move around much.

Things are just not what they used to be.

[HarryD]

Originally posted by JTO
I hear you Harry. I have networked within the panelboard industry and have a standing offer with a pretty large company. Just don't want to move if I don't have to. I will continue to work on having something else in place before the other shoe falls. Also, I want to put my energy into obtaining independance and use the fear of job loss as motivation.

Rick, sounds like a good idea. Trouble is, the typical old plant in the West is so poorly controlled and the raw material (wood) so variable in quality and species that what works one month may be suspect the next. I don't know, maybe the wave of the future is what they do in Europe, a resin kitchen on site that takes basic raw "resin" and modifies it to the mill.

Anyway, wood products continue to contract in the US. It is not a good industry to count on anyway. China, Chile, NZ, etc can put a superior quality panel into Portland for less than a local plant can produce an inferior panel. That's a different story.

Thanks for your support and conversation guys. It really has made things feel less nasty.

Troy

Troy,

Good plan.

I hear you about moving. This is just too nice of a place to leave.

[Moses]

Some small companies are more sensitive to layoffs. Some of the big boys will fire thousands just to keep the stock price up. Heartless.

There was a Westinghouse factory in southern California that made a profit every single year since 1952. In 2001 they fired everyone and moved the plant to Mexico in search of even higher profit margins. How do these CEOs sleep at night?

[nostatic]

Originally posted by Moses
How do these CEOs sleep at night?

zolpidem and alprazolam...works for me.

[tabs]

My Daddy was an Aerospace Engineer (Chemical, Mechanical)...who worked for a number of Aerospace companies starting in the 1950's. Whenever a contract was completed the companies would lay off the entire engineering staff...who than had to find other jobs within the industry. Once an engineer hit 45 or so he would find it increasingly difficult to find new employment in the field. You can hire a new college grad for less money. Remember tis is the 1950's and early 1960's. So whats new boyz????

Finally Daddy went to work for the US Navy as a civilian engineer when he was 52. He was hired in as a GS-13. He mainly did that to creat a retirement for himself.

My Daddy always said if you have substantial money in the bank, it makes it alot easier to go to work and pick up the stick when the boss tells U to... The way Daddy got his money was by SAVING it, and investing it.

I personally owe no company any loyalty as an employee, the only time I would feel loyal to a company is if on the day I died they wouyld lower the flag to half mast and give a day off with pay to the employees for my funeral....I have always felt that when I went to work I was there working for MYSELF and not the company. It is up to me to chose what I do with the money I made as an employee...they don't force you to buy that SUV. So I say live behind the curve and invest the rest.....

BTW: I/ my family never lived high on the hog.....I remember once my Daddy took me out to dinner...he has never forgiven me for ordering a $7.00 Desert. He always throws that in my face...I had to tell him I learned how to make that desert in order to shut him up...will that old sob ever give me a break?