In the past four years, I have worked at 12 jobs, all of
which “ended.” What does “ended’ mean?
1.
Show closed
2.
Vacation coverage ended, original employee
returned
3.
Contract is complete
4.
Contract is cancelled
5.
Medical leave ended and original employee
returned
6.
Job eliminated due to merger
7.
Job eliminated due to budget cuts
8.
Job redefined and eliminated
9.
Company closed
All in all, these phrases boil down to one thing: You don’t work here anymore. This has been relayed by the manager, the
co-worker, the agent, the company manager, the business manager, the office administrative. The conversations have sounded like this:
1.
“Thank you for your excellent work. Your contract is complete.”
2.
“Temping sucks.
Your contract is complete.”
3.
“I don’t have much feedback, but I got a call
from your assignment supervisor and your contract is complete. Come by the agency and we’ll have collected
your personal belongings, you can pick them up then.”
4.
“After much consideration, we have restructured
and eliminated your position.”
5.
“The show is officially closing in two
weeks. Consider this your official two
weeks notice.”
6.
“I hate having to say this, because I really
like you. But your contract is over.”
I attended a National
Seminars Training conference recently, and I found a book by Mark Levine and Stephen
M. Pollan, who is very clearly an attorney.
It’s called “Work
Scripts.” The authors discuss
the communication culture in post 2008.
In Work
Scripts , they relate “Terminating an employee used to be considered a
milestone for a young manager…because it was so rare.” Terminations happen far more frequently now
than before, and for financial, headcount, and even short term fiscal
reasons. Consequently, managers have to
terminate people far more frequently, and are a fact of business. They go on to say, “It’s a shame because it
makes management a less humane process.”
In former years, it was a dramatic occurrence to see an
employee emerge from a one-on-one in tears, get a box and pack up their
belongings while being supervised, hand over their tag, computer and keys, and
escorted out of the office. At my last
job, I witnessed this occurrence to 8 people in two months. People who had been with the company for as
long as 15 years. And this was in 2013!
The radio constantly reports job growth numbers, then gives
the disclaimer that 50-somethings have “given up looking for work.” Really?
I have seen so very many people leaving a job and starting a new
business, even a sole proprietorship or LLC, and begin a consulting business –
far more, in fact, than I have seen applying for unemployment.
They are contractors.
Not contractors like a temporary worker, but small businesses that
submit applications and proposals for job requisitions, and sometimes even
employ other independent contractors to do the work. Admittedly, around this area they are almost
all Government Contractors, but Contractors nonetheless.
With the Affordable Care Act,
everyone will be offered some form of health care, which will drive up the
costs doing business for those sole proprietorships dramatically, while big
businesses already have that cost in their budget. So it
will be very interesting to see how these small businesses survive. I sincerely hope they do.
It may be that many small businesses will be sold to bigger
businesses, and then the proprietors will retire or join the workforce
again, and where will the jobs come from?
I like working for and with other people. I hate riding the Metro home on Friday evening,
getting a phone call and being told my contract has ended, then being informed someone
is going through my desk right this moment, packing up my personal items for me to
retrieve from a the consulting agency on Monday.
I long for the day when terminations were rare, and when
they did occur, they were done so with compassion and respect.
As always, I welcome your input on this subject.
