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.