Lay-off blues
I’ve been layed-off again for the 3rd week this year. The trouble with being told there isn’t work for you from one week to the next isn’t the financial. It is the emotional. I get partial compensation for being out of work from unemployment. I’m conservative enough in my spending that I can absorb the financial hit these weeks off cost my family. The hardship comes from the constant knot in my gut. Not knowing from one week to the next how much money will be in the bank. When I’m at work I worry about being sent home. When I’m home I worry that I’m not going to be able to go back to work. The uncertainty that my wife and I have been living with these past few months has far outweighed the monetary hardship. I find this far more exhausting than the work my job requires.
I work hard; I work smart, effective and efficient. A worker like me is not someone any business wants to leave idle. It gives me time to look for other possible forms of employment and to ponder how much my contributions are truly valued. If this goes on much longer my current employer will be left with workers with no other options but to stay and be jerked around by an uncertain schedule. Is this the work force they want? Is this a work force that can give them the quality and profit they are looking for? I don’t think so. Those making policy choices and schedules don’t look that far ahead. Immediate expenses are all that keep them from being hassled from the next layer of bureaucracy.
There is a tendency to claim that the American worker is under motivated and over paid compared to their foreign counterparts. The working class American has been blessed with economic advantages, others in the world can only dream of, for several generations. An argument can be made that many of us have grown complacent and feel entitled to a certain level of security and compensation that others in our positions do not share. At what point is it appropriate to begin to look at the managers and CEO’s as part of the problem? How motivated and efficient are they in doing their jobs? Some of these people get paid large salaries to solve problems in the manufacturing process. How many problems do you think they solve each year? How much profit do they bring to the company, dollar for dollar, by their work? Every day I work to put out product that adds to the businesses sales and ultimately to the continued existence and profits of the company. How many upper and middle managers can say the same? Many floor workers do just what they are told. They do just enough to get by without being scolded by the boss. Aren’t the motivations on the factory floor the same as in the office? How many managers believe that if the business looks good on paper, regardless of reality, that they have done their jobs? How many managers justify their lack of initiative with a diploma on the wall or a title on the door? I’m much easier to fire than a VP in charge of marketing, or a Supervisor in charge of “quality control”. For one thing my resume is not as interesting or as impressive and my job performance is much easily measured. Meanwhile, I sit at home and they sit in their office and I wonder how much longer I will be willing to carry the burden of the balanced bank sheet on my uneducated shoulders.
I work hard; I work smart, effective and efficient. A worker like me is not someone any business wants to leave idle. It gives me time to look for other possible forms of employment and to ponder how much my contributions are truly valued. If this goes on much longer my current employer will be left with workers with no other options but to stay and be jerked around by an uncertain schedule. Is this the work force they want? Is this a work force that can give them the quality and profit they are looking for? I don’t think so. Those making policy choices and schedules don’t look that far ahead. Immediate expenses are all that keep them from being hassled from the next layer of bureaucracy.
There is a tendency to claim that the American worker is under motivated and over paid compared to their foreign counterparts. The working class American has been blessed with economic advantages, others in the world can only dream of, for several generations. An argument can be made that many of us have grown complacent and feel entitled to a certain level of security and compensation that others in our positions do not share. At what point is it appropriate to begin to look at the managers and CEO’s as part of the problem? How motivated and efficient are they in doing their jobs? Some of these people get paid large salaries to solve problems in the manufacturing process. How many problems do you think they solve each year? How much profit do they bring to the company, dollar for dollar, by their work? Every day I work to put out product that adds to the businesses sales and ultimately to the continued existence and profits of the company. How many upper and middle managers can say the same? Many floor workers do just what they are told. They do just enough to get by without being scolded by the boss. Aren’t the motivations on the factory floor the same as in the office? How many managers believe that if the business looks good on paper, regardless of reality, that they have done their jobs? How many managers justify their lack of initiative with a diploma on the wall or a title on the door? I’m much easier to fire than a VP in charge of marketing, or a Supervisor in charge of “quality control”. For one thing my resume is not as interesting or as impressive and my job performance is much easily measured. Meanwhile, I sit at home and they sit in their office and I wonder how much longer I will be willing to carry the burden of the balanced bank sheet on my uneducated shoulders.
posted by kamuizot at 12:59 PM
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