Not that I'm bitter or anything
Today, I get the privilege of leading a tour for the publisher who authorized my "position to be eliminated" in December 2001. He had owned the newspaper I worked for when his board of directors gave him the boot for bad business practices. He managed to regain enough financial support to buy the publication back. At this point, he comes in and does a big meeting telling us that nothing will change, our jobs are secure, blah, blah, more BS, and blah.
Slowly, but surely, people dropped one by one. I had a great cushy position making good money as a writer on the payroll as a full-time employee and being allowed to telecommute. It was awesome. The boss I have now was the editor and set up that gig for me. We both benefitted. I got to stay home with my new baby (at that time, he is now almost 6) and they got more copy out of me than any other writer that worked for them. Then, the dude bought the newspaper back. After his 'nothing will change' meeting, things immediately began to change. Two months later, I was called in to the office for a meeting and told that my services were no longer needed. Just like that. No warning. No severance. Nothing. My position was eliminated, I was told. Oddly enough, the paper hired two new straight out of college reporters as soon as my "position" was eliminated. However, I think the bent over position still exists there. Oh wait, wrong "position."
So, today, I get to walk this man around and show him how good I am to have the job that I have now making almost twice what he was paying me back then. He won't give a crap or a second thought to it. But, I will feel some sense of pride in feeling that I'm giving him the virtual finger and the "nanny nanny boo boo, look at me" dance. He should remember me. I won some nice awards for his publication. I will give him props for paying for me to go to Austin to receive my awards and for giving me a $500 bonus for the awards. But, the whole "position elimination" replaced by two new reporters to do what I was doing before ... sort of cancels that out. Silly me.
Not that I'm bitter or anything.
Slowly, but surely, people dropped one by one. I had a great cushy position making good money as a writer on the payroll as a full-time employee and being allowed to telecommute. It was awesome. The boss I have now was the editor and set up that gig for me. We both benefitted. I got to stay home with my new baby (at that time, he is now almost 6) and they got more copy out of me than any other writer that worked for them. Then, the dude bought the newspaper back. After his 'nothing will change' meeting, things immediately began to change. Two months later, I was called in to the office for a meeting and told that my services were no longer needed. Just like that. No warning. No severance. Nothing. My position was eliminated, I was told. Oddly enough, the paper hired two new straight out of college reporters as soon as my "position" was eliminated. However, I think the bent over position still exists there. Oh wait, wrong "position."
So, today, I get to walk this man around and show him how good I am to have the job that I have now making almost twice what he was paying me back then. He won't give a crap or a second thought to it. But, I will feel some sense of pride in feeling that I'm giving him the virtual finger and the "nanny nanny boo boo, look at me" dance. He should remember me. I won some nice awards for his publication. I will give him props for paying for me to go to Austin to receive my awards and for giving me a $500 bonus for the awards. But, the whole "position elimination" replaced by two new reporters to do what I was doing before ... sort of cancels that out. Silly me.
Not that I'm bitter or anything.
4 Comments:
At 7:17 AM, April 14, 2005,
Anonymous said…
NO not bitter at all.
That Austin trip was nice though, wasn't it?
At 10:35 AM, April 14, 2005,
Army of Mom said…
That was nice. My boss actually came and gloated with me about this tour we're doing today. He loves it, too.
At 9:57 AM, April 15, 2005,
Red River said…
I think you should point this out to him. He may not have known this OR if he did, you need to put his nose on the contradiction.
I knew the man who was the chief machinist for NASA - worked on Pioneer and and a lot of satellite projects. A German firm bought his company and laid him off - he was 58 at the time. Both Voyager and later probes hadd issues with their mechanical systems and he knew what the yooung guys hired to replace him did wrong. Oh well.
Corporate mergers and buyouts are notorious for shedding the high quality & high cost employees because senior management does not know the value of what they have.
This is why most mergers do not succeed.
At 11:16 AM, April 15, 2005,
Army of Mom said…
It is a shame when companies let go of successful people because they're afraid of the price tag. I honestly did work that probably took two people to do, plus it was better copy than a reporter straight out of college can produce. *shrug* I think he knew what he had, but quality wasn't his first priority. A colleague of mine stayed on for a while after they let me go and she told me that the editor asked her why it was taking so long for her to edit copy and she told him that she was checking AP style, facts, correcting typos, etc. He SERIOUSLY told her that he didn't care about the quality of the copy as long as it was in on time. Now THAT is one reason why the media, as a whole, have no respect from the masses. This guy cared more about making deadline than producing a high quality product. That is just sad. Not that I'm bitter or anything.
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