On the trail of a job opening

It seemed today I had found an instance of a rare and endangered species: a technical opening in our office for a California associate.

I discovered it in a chat with a colleague. He was leaving the company, and wonder of wonders, it seemed his position was not going away. He would actually be replaced. This meant (gasp) a job opening.

It was a testing engineer position, not the most fascinating thing in the world. But it had some positives. The work closely involved the major database I have long worked with until last year. There was a local team leader, so management was on-site, and I knew a couple of other people on the team. Finally, the work would allow me to gain much deeper knowledge of our data structures for marketing. All in all, it seemed preferable to the position I've been slotted into.

Before getting too excited, I went over to learn more about it from the team leader. And a good thing I did. Unfortunately, it seems my colleague did not quite have it right.

The team currently is "in a state of flux" (like who isn't these days). The position would be on hold while things sort themselves out. It was unlikely the opening would be filled by an associate.

Instead, the position will be outsourced. In fact, outsourcing is the eventual direction for the whole testing function.

What's the title of that Beatles song again? Oh yeah.

I Should Have Known Better.

Layoff volunteers - the end of a humane option

Talking to an old colleague today, the subject naturally turned to recent layoffs in her unit. She's 62, and would welcome a severance package. However, during recent reductions, they laid off another man, a few years younger, highly capable, but not ready by any means for retirement. Yet both would have cost the same amount of severance dollars.

In other words, our company could have chosen a more humane layoff decision at no additional cost. She was ready and willing. She would have gladly gone. All they needed to do was ask for layoff volunteers. Why would they not do that?

My friend had the answer. Last year they were briefed by management and asked that very question. The reason? The Bank was sued. And lost. No more layoff volunteers.

Apparently the issue concerned "preference" and the bank could not prove objectivity. Reading between the lines, someone sued - and won - for not getting laid off. Is this a great country or what?

As I have written earlier, it's hard to see how this is a great victory for The Workers. People willing and able to be laid off are not. Others - for whom a layoff will be a great hardship - get sacked.

One lawyer and their client hit the Legal Lottery. But the business was not the only one on the losing end.

Forcible "integration"

I have officially been "integrated" into the larger organization that swallowed up our "smaller" 1000 person division earlier this year. Although I've been at this place 29 years, this is something new for me. And that's saying something.

Don't get me wrong, reorganizations around here come fast and furious. Nothing new there. I've been through reorganizations where my team gets a new manager, the team is moved to some other organization, we get a new higher-level manager, etc. Any of these I've gone through numerous times (I'm on my sixth manager now in the last 12 months).

This time was different. The team I was on was broken apart by function, and each person sent to a different place in this new monster organization. A team of familiar faces is quite helpful in times of change - but that security blanket is not there this time. My old team no longer exists.

Instead, like the Army, I have been told to report to G, my new manager. My entire team is on the East Coast; I've never heard of them, and they've never heard of me. None of the team members has been an employee more than five years; my manager has been here eight months. Oh, and I'm the oldest on the team by at least 15 years.

Last year when I joined this team, I had to interview for the job - they chose me for the position. Although I was new, my new manager had heard good things about me, and I had a local West Coast teammate that I knew.

But in this situation, I was literally dumped on this team, apparently whether they liked it or not. No one had a choice, there was nothing voluntary about it. Hopefully it will all work out, assuming this is not simply a short way station before the vaunted "economies" of this integration are realized.

However, no matter which way I look at it, it's rather unsettling.

Our Outsourcing Continues

Three more senior-level programmers have been laid off from our West Coast offices. With this one move our organization let walk out the door 90+ years of specialized, highly valuable experience. Left behind in their place: two young, freshfaced Indians - and a number of their offshore compatriots - filled with several weeks of "knowledge transfer".

Our department a few years ago numbered 83. We ran the technical side of the organization's database marketing operation with great success. But now only 23 workers remain - a reduction of more than 70%.

Our workplace - so tightly packed at the peak that visitors needed to use cubicles of those out sick or on vacation - is now rather sparsely populated. Many aisles are deserted save for the window cubicle. Of the 36 available cubicles near me, all but two sit empty. I half expect to look up one day soon and see a tumbleweed blowing past.

Meanwhile the survivors soldier on. Why don't we just leave? Well, of course the younger and most marketable of us have moved on to greener pastures. Many of the remaining are over 50 and would prefer to put off the day when they put our open, diversity-loving society to the All Ages Are Equal test.

Unfortunately, that day has been coming all too soon for many of us lately.