Round and Round We Go...

Do you ever have the feeling that your life is stuck in an endless loop.  The terrible feeling that you may be living the exact same day over and over.  Getting up at the same time.  Eating at the same time.  Going to work at the same time.  Doing the same thing as the day before and will be doing the same thing the next day.  Going home at the same time (mercifully...).  Go to bed at the same time.  Repeat.

Yeah, that's the feeling that I've been having for a while now.  Don't get me wrong, having a good job these days is quite an accomplishment, and I'm thankful for it, but let's just say that the monotony sometimes becomes overwhelming.

Five years ago, if someone had told me that this is where I'd be stuck, I would've told them that they're full of shit.  Back then everything was looking up, and the economy seemed to have nowhere to go but up.  A few years and a few layoffs later, here I am.  So it goes.  For now.

The Machine

 This is a blog that I wrote a couple of years ago, in 2009, I believe, after I had already been laid off twice, and a couple of months before my third layoff.  I think the message still applies in 2012...

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I have realized that if you work for a Corporation, no matter the size, that Corporation will inevitably attempt to control every aspect of your life.

For a year-and-a-half I worked for a major Corporation in the housing industry, where I loved all my co-workers, the family atmosphere, and the close-knit work environment. I couldn't have asked for a better group of people to be around all day. When it came to the upper management, however, I quickly discovered that "the best and brightest" that the company had to offer had their heads so far up their rear ends that they could see their own tonsils.

The smaller Corporation that I'm at now isn't much better.

For the last 6 months there have been so many layoffs in the building and housing industry, and every time that it happened, management would send one of their "suits" give the "we're 'right-sized' for this market, now" speech. I think that this was little more than a [poor] tactic used to prevent morale from sinking too low, even though speaking from first-hand experience, I can tell you that morale did get very, very low. Even after their speech, they would come back two or three months later, and lay off even more people. Followed by the same speech again. And don't forget...they expect those that remain to do twice the work for no extra money. They better be glad they still have a job! Or so they would say.

You realize that these big companies do not care about the little guy who works long hours to keep the place running, and who relies on his comparatively meager paycheck to put food on the table, to pay bills, to buy the gas that he uses to get to work and to keep clothes on the backs of his family. The company is only looking out for the high-salaried Executives who are supposed to know how to properly manage a company to prevent such layoffs from happening in the first place. They have their BMW/Mercedes/Giant GMC truck paid for by the company, they take "business trips" on the company dime (which amount to little more than a company-sponsored fishing vacation). They don't really DO anything.

So, the point in all this is this:

Don't give a Corporation any more loyalty than they are going to give you...none. If a better offer comes along, snap it up...they would do the exact same thing. Keep your eyes open and keep your hook in the water. Look out for yourself.

Go well, my friends.

Time Enough, At Last!

Every day I hear about how sour the economy is, and I do feel very lucky to be working when so many are desperate for a paycheck.  But things haven't been this way for long.  I thought that I would share my story of the Great Recession, with an implied warning that it's not over yet!

Back in January of 2007 I started working for a company that did the structural design and layout of pre-engineered roof and floor truss systems for residential homes, multi-family buildings (apartment buildings, hotels, and the like) as well as commercial buildings.  It as a job that required a lot of creativity and ingenuity...to find a structural solution that would allow what the architect had put onto the paper, the visual elements of the building, to work in the real world.  Every day presented a new challenge, and a fresh chance to learn something new.  Ah, those were the days.

Fast forward to mid-2009.  By this time the construction industry had been in the grip of a crushing recession for months, and it was only getting worse.  Most of my colleagues had already been laid off, simply due to a lack of work.  I was hanging on because I was in charge of the most accounts of various national homebuilders who were operating in the Atlanta area.  I was actually laid off in March of 2009, but I was rehired two weeks later when they discovered that I possessed very specific knowledge of how these builders liked to have their projects designed.  Each one was different, and all were very picky about it.

But, as they say, all good things must come to an end.  I was laid off for a second time a few months later.  However, fate was still smiling upon me (albeit very dimly), because two short weeks after the second layoff, I was hired by another company, based in Oakwood, GA., that was in the same business.  Apart from learning a few different processes at the company, I was back in the saddle again...for a while.  But, as they continue to say, damn them, all good things will come to an end.  I was laid off from the second company in late 2009.  Hmph.  That made three layoffs in the same year.  Saying that the economy was bad, was the understatement of a very gloomy year.

The "New Hard Times."  They really were for me.  They still are for a lot of people.

And so began my journey through unemployment, scouring ever help-wanted ad, every job website that I could find.  Applying to at least two hundred jobs.  Nothing.  No one was looking for experience, they were looking for dumb and cheap, it seemed.  On the positive side, there was time enough for anything that I wanted to do, as long as it didn't cost much!  It turned out to be a bit of a blessing in disguise, even though when I look back on it myself, it's still hard to see it that way.  I was able to get a few priorities straight, made a few new friends with my abundance of [anxious] leisure time

Then came February of 2010, about a full year after getting laid off for the third time, and a full year of being on unemployment, hardly being able to make ends meet, although I did...miraculously.  One afternoon I received an email from a temp. service offering me an interview to a position as an Electronics Technician, which is what my college degree is actually in.  I snapped it up, of course, and later the same day as the interview, a Thursday, they called back and said that I had the job.  Report to work at 7:30am on Monday morning!  I've been at it ever since, working a couple of overnighters to get product out the door on time, working 10, 11, 12 and 13-hour days continuously to stay caught up with demand.  All-in-all a good job, although sometimes very exhausting and quite frustrating.  But I suppose that goes along with every job...

So, chin up everyone.  It could be worse, and things WILL get better.  I have a good feeling about tomorrow.  I think better things are right around the corner, as long as we work hard to make sure that it happens!