Excerpt

One of the reasons that I am writing this book is that I have been fired before. Another is that I have also had to fire people. I learned a lot from those experiences. I have always hated being on either side of a firing and I am not convinced that taking peoples jobs away from them is an efficient road to improved long-term profits. Quite often, firing people disrupts companies. It is bad for employee morale and productivity. It is lousy for the economy and a very cruel and unimaginative way to cut costs. I think my experience can help people deal with the crisis and trauma that accompany job loss because I see little in the press to indicate that corporate management has as yet devised any more intelligent means to restore profit. Finally, I look around at the literature on business and management and see countless books and articles on how to find the job you want. I have seen very little on how to lose the job you wanted, or thought you wanted.

Our jobs are important to us. We spend at least one-third of our lives (and actually more) involved in our work. Even if we dutifully put in only the requisite 8 hours per day, we think about our work when out of the office, we worry about our schedules, we go out after work for drinks with our colleagues, and we often define ourselves in our communities by the work we do or the company that employs us. We might be proud of the company, its reputation, its products, our role in the development of the business, and the glory and satisfaction we get from doing something well. We get a feeling of accomplishment and satisfaction from our work. More often than not, we let it define us.

We put a great deal of our ego into our jobs. We build our lives and the lives of our children around them. Our spouses might brag about our accomplishments and our importance to the lives of others in our jobs. We invest enormous amounts of time and energy in our jobsmuch more than the paltry one-third of our lives that many claim.

We spend a great deal of our time in our youth thinking about and preparing for what we want to be. From the time we are little kids, we are asked, What do you want to be when you grow up? We take vocational tests, talk to school counselors and discuss our professional options with parents, teachers, and friends. Some of us go off to colleges or universities to gain professional credentials. Afterwards we go through numerous job interviews, rehearsing what we are supposed to say, and being told how to dress.

And then, all of a sudden and most probably many years later, some cog in the corporate wheel comes into your office (or calls you into his or hers) to tell you that all of that is being taken away from youNOW!

The higher up you are in the corporate hierarchy, the more traumatic it is likely to be. At one moment you are sitting there in the midst of all the trappings of your corporate power and in the next, you are handing over your keys, your corporate credit card, your parking permit, and putting what now looks like a very meager collection of private stuff into a cardboard box. Someone will stand over your shoulder as you log off the computer. They want to make sure you wont delete files, destroy information, format the system or your hard disk, etc. They might even cut off your telephone. When you finish packing your cardboard box, you will be amazed how little of you actually resided in the office. A security guard might be standing theremaybe the same one who saluted you that morningto make sure you dont take anything belonging to the company or punch your former boss in the nose. The guard will escort you to the parking lot. Perhaps he or she will scrape the parking sticker off your windshield and tell the gatekeeper that you wont be coming back and if you do return, you are not to be allowed in.

Your loyalty to the company over the years will mean nothing as the machine protects itself against your real power. Every prerogative you enjoyed in your job will immediately cease to exist. At that moment, the janitor has more corporate power than you. Your years of loyalty will be reduced to a number of statements pushed in front of you for your signature. You will be expected to sign a document saying that you will not:

* Divulge any company secrets (even though you have never done so throughout your entire career);
* Work for a competing firm (even though you know the business well and now need a job);
* Hire away any employees that want to continue working with you (even though they now have limited opportunities because of their association with, and loyalty to you);
* Seek any further redress other than what is being offered you at this moment (even though you are hardly in a position to evaluate your rights at this time).

Some people you thought were friends will look at you with a smirk as they witness your fall. Some colleagues you helped throughout your career will pretend they dont know you or will even express satisfaction at what they think is your comeuppance.