A story in the Washington Post caught my eye: apparently the big banks that were ecstatic to sweep in bailout billions from the TARP funds from the Treasury Department have decided they don’t want our taxpayer money if there are (shock, horror) strings attached.
Jamie Dimon, CEO of JP Morgan Chase went so far as to refer to the $25B in money from the Treasure Department as “a scarlet letter”. He’s promised quick repayment and abstaining from taking any more. Others are quietly following suit.
Well, you might say, good riddance to bad rubbish. But you’d be wrong.
Because they’re not gone. They’re still holding out their goodie bags for filling from Federal funds that don’t come with restrictions on things like executive pay and bonuses, and a requirement for transparency in processes. They can and will continue to “borrow” from the Fed and take advantage of FDIC guarantees of any crack-brained loans they decide to issue. Those sources don’t impose any standards for prudent operations as conditions of getting the largesse.
Soooo. Let me get this straight: these billion-dollar bums don’t need the money if, in exchange, they have to promise to show any modicum of restraint? But they do need it if there are no conditions?
Uh, did our government just fall off a turnip truck?
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Friday, April 17, 2009
Bankruptcy bonuses
It has come to my attention that Nortel, the telecoms giant that filed for bankruptcy in January after losing $7B since 2005 and having former execs charged with fraud by both Canada and the US, have just paid out $23M in bonuses to 92 employees.
More than $7M of that is going to eight “key executives”. And there’s another $22M headed out to “other employees”.
At the same time they’re shelling out these millions, thousands of laid-off or retired Nortel employees have been refused any sort of severance packages or had their pensions stopped.
This isn’t a terrible surprise in the US, where companies aren’t required to make any provision under any circumstances for the employee-victims of their corporate stupidity. But in both Canada and Britain, there are labor laws that are meant to protect workers who’ve been laid off. I don’t know what it is in Canada, but in the UK they by law must pay out one month for every year you’ve worked for that company.
Nortel are able to stiff their staff because under bankruptcy law severance and pension payments are considered “unsecured claims.” There have been attempts in both Canada and the UK to stop the bonuses, but so far without success.
Now, these aren’t your common or garden variety bonuses, no, no. They’re the infamous “retention bonuses”. Naturally, when I heard this I had a couple of questions:
1) Why would you think the very idiots who got you into this mess have any hope of getting you out of it? And therefore, why would you want to retain them instead of firing their asses?
2) Why would you be so worried about these morons leaving that you feel you have to pay baksheesh to keep them? Where, exactly, are they going to go in this economy? Cisco? If Cisco's smart enough to not be tanking these days, why would they hire people who obviously are not good managers or executives? Alcatel-Lucent? Their stock as of this week is hovering around $2.37. (When I worked for pre-Lucent Alcatel in 2001, stock was in double digits to the left of the decimal point.) Plus they have their own problems with cooking the books; they don’t need to import outside talent to help with that.
Who else is left? They're certainly not going to start-ups, not after working in a behemoth like Nortel for a number of years. The culture, security and rewards are too different. And start-ups sure as hell won't want people who aren't willing to actually, you know, work for their compensation. Which mostly comes in the form of equity.
So, basically Nortel is (like so many other companies with their corporate heads up their butts) paying money for old rope. And we can expect there to be no change in the company’s outcome, business-wise.
And the workers, as always, continue to get the fuzzy end of the lollipop stick.
More than $7M of that is going to eight “key executives”. And there’s another $22M headed out to “other employees”.
At the same time they’re shelling out these millions, thousands of laid-off or retired Nortel employees have been refused any sort of severance packages or had their pensions stopped.
This isn’t a terrible surprise in the US, where companies aren’t required to make any provision under any circumstances for the employee-victims of their corporate stupidity. But in both Canada and Britain, there are labor laws that are meant to protect workers who’ve been laid off. I don’t know what it is in Canada, but in the UK they by law must pay out one month for every year you’ve worked for that company.
Nortel are able to stiff their staff because under bankruptcy law severance and pension payments are considered “unsecured claims.” There have been attempts in both Canada and the UK to stop the bonuses, but so far without success.
Now, these aren’t your common or garden variety bonuses, no, no. They’re the infamous “retention bonuses”. Naturally, when I heard this I had a couple of questions:
1) Why would you think the very idiots who got you into this mess have any hope of getting you out of it? And therefore, why would you want to retain them instead of firing their asses?
2) Why would you be so worried about these morons leaving that you feel you have to pay baksheesh to keep them? Where, exactly, are they going to go in this economy? Cisco? If Cisco's smart enough to not be tanking these days, why would they hire people who obviously are not good managers or executives? Alcatel-Lucent? Their stock as of this week is hovering around $2.37. (When I worked for pre-Lucent Alcatel in 2001, stock was in double digits to the left of the decimal point.) Plus they have their own problems with cooking the books; they don’t need to import outside talent to help with that.
Who else is left? They're certainly not going to start-ups, not after working in a behemoth like Nortel for a number of years. The culture, security and rewards are too different. And start-ups sure as hell won't want people who aren't willing to actually, you know, work for their compensation. Which mostly comes in the form of equity.
So, basically Nortel is (like so many other companies with their corporate heads up their butts) paying money for old rope. And we can expect there to be no change in the company’s outcome, business-wise.
And the workers, as always, continue to get the fuzzy end of the lollipop stick.
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Functional illiteracy
This came to me via one of my distribution lists. I shan’t name either the list or the originator, for reasons that will become apparent as early as the subject line:
SEEKING: Guide for writing online content (not writing articles!)
Hi wrls,
I've recently been put in charge of the org I work for's website. It's not reader friendly, it is far to long and wordy for web, and aside from that.Length aside, when we ran a test it came out as being for people on a PhD level!
I'm not a writer so I need a dummies guide for writing online to give to my coworkers, I will be asking them to pair down their content and rewrite their bios (which often go over 400 words!). Ironically, I know they won't read anything lengthy (*rolls eyes*) so need to give them something *short and sweet* -- along the veins of how they *should* be writing.
Maybe I'm not searching the right keywords, but so far everything I've come across is really lengthy (so do they really know what they're talking about?) or about writing articles for online. Any guidance is appreciated!
Thanks,
XX
P.S. am I long-winded or what? ;-)
This is the sort of thing that’s eaten my lunch my entire career as a writer. Business people simply do not value writing—their fervently-held belief is that anyone can write, so why should they pay someone to do what they can get any twit who’s good with smiley-faces to do as a sideline to their real job?
No matter if said twit has no concept of the difference between possessive and plural, can’t see beyond the end of a sentence, flings punctuation around like birdseed at a wedding and thinks spellcheck will prevent you from looking like an ignoramus.
I see this everywhere—sadly, even on the pages/screens of reputable mainstream periodicals—but especially in the corporate world. At one company where I worked, before they handed over the blog to someone who knew 1)the product/market and 2)how to write, the CEO actually blogged about something that “peaked” his interest.
I’ll just bet it did.
One of my current colleagues continually amazes/amuses me with his PowerPoint decks displaying an utter failure to grasp the basics of English usage. The very few documents I’ve seen him produce (he’s a performance-art kind of guy, not an actual, you know, thinker—nothing’s real for him unless he has an audience) only reinforce that observation.
Of course, as happens all too often in the business ecosystem, no one notices or cares.
Back to our query originator—you’ll notice she wanted something quick and dirty, not anything that would require any actual, you know, effort on her part to understand what makes for good web content. Just gimme somethin’ I can copy and paste and be off to something useful.
I’d so love to see the before and after of that web site.
SEEKING: Guide for writing online content (not writing articles!)
Hi wrls,
I've recently been put in charge of the org I work for's website. It's not reader friendly, it is far to long and wordy for web, and aside from that.Length aside, when we ran a test it came out as being for people on a PhD level!
I'm not a writer so I need a dummies guide for writing online to give to my coworkers, I will be asking them to pair down their content and rewrite their bios (which often go over 400 words!). Ironically, I know they won't read anything lengthy (*rolls eyes*) so need to give them something *short and sweet* -- along the veins of how they *should* be writing.
Maybe I'm not searching the right keywords, but so far everything I've come across is really lengthy (so do they really know what they're talking about?) or about writing articles for online. Any guidance is appreciated!
Thanks,
XX
P.S. am I long-winded or what? ;-)
This is the sort of thing that’s eaten my lunch my entire career as a writer. Business people simply do not value writing—their fervently-held belief is that anyone can write, so why should they pay someone to do what they can get any twit who’s good with smiley-faces to do as a sideline to their real job?
No matter if said twit has no concept of the difference between possessive and plural, can’t see beyond the end of a sentence, flings punctuation around like birdseed at a wedding and thinks spellcheck will prevent you from looking like an ignoramus.
I see this everywhere—sadly, even on the pages/screens of reputable mainstream periodicals—but especially in the corporate world. At one company where I worked, before they handed over the blog to someone who knew 1)the product/market and 2)how to write, the CEO actually blogged about something that “peaked” his interest.
I’ll just bet it did.
One of my current colleagues continually amazes/amuses me with his PowerPoint decks displaying an utter failure to grasp the basics of English usage. The very few documents I’ve seen him produce (he’s a performance-art kind of guy, not an actual, you know, thinker—nothing’s real for him unless he has an audience) only reinforce that observation.
Of course, as happens all too often in the business ecosystem, no one notices or cares.
Back to our query originator—you’ll notice she wanted something quick and dirty, not anything that would require any actual, you know, effort on her part to understand what makes for good web content. Just gimme somethin’ I can copy and paste and be off to something useful.
I’d so love to see the before and after of that web site.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Taxing situation
Today being Tax Day, I hope you’re all timely & accurate in your filing. You don't want to appear in one of those cheesy cable commercials for law firms that bail out chiseling deadbeat taxpayers who brag about owing $350,000 & getting away with paying only $8500, do you?
(Am I the only person who wonders why I'm paying all I owe when these guys not only shortchange everyone around them but brag about it on national TV?)
After all, your country needs every penny you have to hand over to the corporate big boys who have been getting any manner of tax breaks (corporate income taxes? You kidding?) for decades, but still have managed to drive their businesses & our economy seven klicks into the earth’s mantle.
What the hell—may you have enough left over for at least a pint down at your local. If ever there’s a day for drowning your sorrows, this is it.
(Am I the only person who wonders why I'm paying all I owe when these guys not only shortchange everyone around them but brag about it on national TV?)
After all, your country needs every penny you have to hand over to the corporate big boys who have been getting any manner of tax breaks (corporate income taxes? You kidding?) for decades, but still have managed to drive their businesses & our economy seven klicks into the earth’s mantle.
What the hell—may you have enough left over for at least a pint down at your local. If ever there’s a day for drowning your sorrows, this is it.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
How we got here
I’ve just finished reading A Peace to End All Peace, David Fromkin’s account of how the modern Middle East emerged from the demise of the Ottoman Empire.
I have to say, I don’t know why I read it, because I knew it wasn’t going end well, even if I didn’t know the precise mechanisms. (I felt the same when I read An Honourable Defeat, a history of German resistance to the Nazis. The efforts were indeed honourable, but defeat was definitely the operative term. Likewise when I went to see Glory. I didn’t really know anything about the Massachusetts 54th, the regiment of black volunteers sent to fight in South Carolina. But I did know those coastal forts weren’t taken until the end of the war, and only then from the sea. So I knew the film was going to end badly.)
Really, being a historian is a depressing vocation. Again and again you are faced with the reality that governments, being composed of people with all their venalities and foibles, act not for the common good, but for personal and short-term advancement. And decade after decade, century upon century, we the people end up picking up the tab for these policies.
In the case of the Middle East, our current geo-political pickle was put into brine during and after World War I by France, Germany, Britain and Russia/USSR, all licking their chops at the possibilities of scooping up land and assets once the Ottoman Turks went down the tubes. Regardless of their actual resources (which were being poured into the trenches of Europe like water down a drain), they planned and plotted to absorb great swaths of Ottoman territories, in utter ignorance of Turkish capabilities. The Turks, it seems, were expected to collapse on demand.
Alas, it didn’t go to plan. All the jockeying for land-grabs, putting up puppet kings and emirs to represent interests, intrigues, deals made with no intent to ever honor them—this is what we ended up with. The British pols in particular (including Churchill) thought they were so clever; but this is their legacy.
I’ve now turned to The Annotated Wind in the Willows. I’m hoping it will be less depressing.
I have to say, I don’t know why I read it, because I knew it wasn’t going end well, even if I didn’t know the precise mechanisms. (I felt the same when I read An Honourable Defeat, a history of German resistance to the Nazis. The efforts were indeed honourable, but defeat was definitely the operative term. Likewise when I went to see Glory. I didn’t really know anything about the Massachusetts 54th, the regiment of black volunteers sent to fight in South Carolina. But I did know those coastal forts weren’t taken until the end of the war, and only then from the sea. So I knew the film was going to end badly.)
Really, being a historian is a depressing vocation. Again and again you are faced with the reality that governments, being composed of people with all their venalities and foibles, act not for the common good, but for personal and short-term advancement. And decade after decade, century upon century, we the people end up picking up the tab for these policies.
In the case of the Middle East, our current geo-political pickle was put into brine during and after World War I by France, Germany, Britain and Russia/USSR, all licking their chops at the possibilities of scooping up land and assets once the Ottoman Turks went down the tubes. Regardless of their actual resources (which were being poured into the trenches of Europe like water down a drain), they planned and plotted to absorb great swaths of Ottoman territories, in utter ignorance of Turkish capabilities. The Turks, it seems, were expected to collapse on demand.
Alas, it didn’t go to plan. All the jockeying for land-grabs, putting up puppet kings and emirs to represent interests, intrigues, deals made with no intent to ever honor them—this is what we ended up with. The British pols in particular (including Churchill) thought they were so clever; but this is their legacy.
I’ve now turned to The Annotated Wind in the Willows. I’m hoping it will be less depressing.
Monday, April 13, 2009
It's raining men
The AP reports that the higher cultural value placed on male offspring has resulted in an excess of 32 million males in China. This is attributable to the widespread if unauthorized practice of sex-selective abortions, along with abandonment & infanticide, which has resulted in the birth of 119 males to every 100 females (in contrast to 107 to 100 in industrialized countries).
They’re predicting an uptick of antisocial & criminal behavior when all these men hit adulthood & find they’re in intense competition for women so they can produce an even greater imbalance of males.
I’ve never understood the cultures who place such an inordinate value on males because, without, you know, women, it’s really hard to produce more of either sex. To the extent that females are kept in ignorance & poverty, & made the objects of violence, the entire social structure is impoverished. I have no major degrees in anthropology, political science or sociology, & even I can see that. What’s wrong with these governments?
It’ll be interesting to see how it plays out in the People’s Republic. Let’s hope they don’t turn to the usual escape valve for an excess of frustrated males & start invading other countries.
They’re predicting an uptick of antisocial & criminal behavior when all these men hit adulthood & find they’re in intense competition for women so they can produce an even greater imbalance of males.
I’ve never understood the cultures who place such an inordinate value on males because, without, you know, women, it’s really hard to produce more of either sex. To the extent that females are kept in ignorance & poverty, & made the objects of violence, the entire social structure is impoverished. I have no major degrees in anthropology, political science or sociology, & even I can see that. What’s wrong with these governments?
It’ll be interesting to see how it plays out in the People’s Republic. Let’s hope they don’t turn to the usual escape valve for an excess of frustrated males & start invading other countries.
Saturday, April 11, 2009
We can hope
I don't usually scan anything on the comics page besides Doonesbury or Dilbert, but this caught my eye.
I guess it's all those years of jokes about liberal arts graduates finding jobs involving the phrase, "Do you want fries with that?"
Anyway, thanks to Jim Unger.
I guess it's all those years of jokes about liberal arts graduates finding jobs involving the phrase, "Do you want fries with that?"
Anyway, thanks to Jim Unger.
Friday, April 10, 2009
Recession update
The recession is reaching into high places, which would bring ein bisschen schadenfreude except for the fact that the working stiffs who keep those places exalted are taking the hit.
A story in the WSJ reports that the clubbable set are finding that finances (or financial straits) are trumping exclusivity. Country clubs & yacht clubs are closing either before or after foreclosure. The august institutions that have positively defined the term snootiness for scores of years are being reduced to admitting new members without waiting decades because they need the influx of cash.
They’re even offering current members referral fees for bringing in fresh ones whose money is new but whose checks don’t bounce, & relaxing the dress codes.
So clearly civilization is in the early to mid stages of collapsing entirely.
It’s also interesting to note that corporations have finally taken on board the examples of the outrage caused by Wells Fargo, Merrill Lynch & Northern Trust—accepting federal bailout bucks & then heading off for corporate jollies or redecorating the executive offices.
They’re conspicuous by their absence at the Masters Tournament in Augusta. The big wine-&-dine write-off parties are cancelled & if any companies are showing up, they’re not blaring their logos on rented stretch limos or in the yards of houses they rented for $50K a pop to house employees & clients.
Even the scalpers are having a hard time unloading tickets. Four-day passes that brought in up to $3500 last year have gone for $1350 this year.
I’d shed a few CrockTears™ about this, but the people who really get hurt are the waitstaff, limo drivers, caterers, housekeepers & others who keep the clubs & the tournaments running smoothly.
So the ones who are the last to have the wealth trickle down to them again are the first to suffer when the stream dries up.
Nihil novum sub solis.
A story in the WSJ reports that the clubbable set are finding that finances (or financial straits) are trumping exclusivity. Country clubs & yacht clubs are closing either before or after foreclosure. The august institutions that have positively defined the term snootiness for scores of years are being reduced to admitting new members without waiting decades because they need the influx of cash.
They’re even offering current members referral fees for bringing in fresh ones whose money is new but whose checks don’t bounce, & relaxing the dress codes.
So clearly civilization is in the early to mid stages of collapsing entirely.
It’s also interesting to note that corporations have finally taken on board the examples of the outrage caused by Wells Fargo, Merrill Lynch & Northern Trust—accepting federal bailout bucks & then heading off for corporate jollies or redecorating the executive offices.
They’re conspicuous by their absence at the Masters Tournament in Augusta. The big wine-&-dine write-off parties are cancelled & if any companies are showing up, they’re not blaring their logos on rented stretch limos or in the yards of houses they rented for $50K a pop to house employees & clients.
Even the scalpers are having a hard time unloading tickets. Four-day passes that brought in up to $3500 last year have gone for $1350 this year.
I’d shed a few CrockTears™ about this, but the people who really get hurt are the waitstaff, limo drivers, caterers, housekeepers & others who keep the clubs & the tournaments running smoothly.
So the ones who are the last to have the wealth trickle down to them again are the first to suffer when the stream dries up.
Nihil novum sub solis.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Break in the economic gloom
Apparently there are ways of looking at the collapsing economy as an opportunity, & the example is from a completely unexpected source: the travel industry is wooing people suddenly faced with more leisure time than anticipated.
Yes, those same people who pile on the charges when it comes to you wanting to change your itinerary, cancel a tour package or travel alone are now bending every which way to lure folks who’ve been laid off, or (as in California) furloughed.
Airlines have announced they’ll refund fares & cruise lines are offering Hyundai-like options to get a full cancellation refund (even if in mid-cruise) for travelers who can prove they’ve been axed.
On the up side—those with severance packages (or retention bonuses accepted as the staff walked out the door) can get really good deals. After all—they’ve got the money, honey, AND the time, so—Kismet.
In the Golden State, ski resorts are offering all sorts of discounts to state employees who’ve been furloughed. Again—time on their hands, ski runs otherwise empty, win-win.
Once the economy gets back on its feet, the airlines will return to their normal level of indifference, inflexibility & arrogance that passes for customer service.
Yes, those same people who pile on the charges when it comes to you wanting to change your itinerary, cancel a tour package or travel alone are now bending every which way to lure folks who’ve been laid off, or (as in California) furloughed.
Airlines have announced they’ll refund fares & cruise lines are offering Hyundai-like options to get a full cancellation refund (even if in mid-cruise) for travelers who can prove they’ve been axed.
On the up side—those with severance packages (or retention bonuses accepted as the staff walked out the door) can get really good deals. After all—they’ve got the money, honey, AND the time, so—Kismet.
In the Golden State, ski resorts are offering all sorts of discounts to state employees who’ve been furloughed. Again—time on their hands, ski runs otherwise empty, win-win.
Once the economy gets back on its feet, the airlines will return to their normal level of indifference, inflexibility & arrogance that passes for customer service.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Working whines
The LA Times reports that the economic downturn is hitting the Y-chromosome-infested set harder than the XX crowd.
The stats: “In December 2007, when the economy started tanking, unemployment ran nearly even at 4.4% for men and 4.3% for women. In February, that tally had shot up to 8.8% for men and 7.3% for women, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.”
Mark Perry, an economist at the University of Michigan at Flint, explains this partly by noting the crash started in construction, which is an 88% male domain, & continued into the financial sector, also dominated by men.
Conversely, healthcare & education are relatively stable, & those two industries run to 77% female, according to Perry. He adds that women tend to be better educated than men, & that the degrees matter these days.
I wonder, though.
Men outnumber women in the labor force—according to this story, by 10 million. Seems logical to me that more of them are likely to get axed, because there are just more of them out there. They’re a bigger target, as it were.
Also, I’m reminded of a seminar on 20th Century US economic & political history in grad school. Each student researched the Great Depression in a different state, & when we came together we found that the Depression didn’t seem to hit as hard in states like Colorado or West Virginia, where people were already living at subsistence level, as it did in New York or California.
& since women in the work force have lived closer to the bone than men, they’ve developed coping mechanisms for dealing with cut-backs & economic upsets. If they get laid off, they spend less time berating the gods over their cruel fate, & more getting on with finding another job. Or two. Or three—whatever it takes to keep the kids in shoes & mac & cheese.
I have to say, the thought of all these men out of work isn’t pretty. Back in Virginia I occasionally attended job-hunt support groups, one primarily for men, the other for women. I just couldn’t handle the former. These guys—mostly telecoms professionals—were so outraged & hurt by the utter injustice of being laid off that they had no strength or will left for finding another job. They were there to prove to the group that they'd tried everything humanly possible, & nothing worked, & so there was just no hope.
The idea was that you come together to share your experiences since the last meeting, get advice on how to handle this or that situation, & find encouragement in your search.
But almost to a man, here’s what would happen: a guy would describe an interview, say, & wonder how he should handle a response, because it was just too weird or hopeless or insulting.
The group facilitator—an amazing woman who is extremely knowledgeable about business, networking & positive attitude—would make some suggestions, & the guy would spend the next ten minutes deflecting each one because of this reason or that.
Rinse & repeat.
I finally realized that these people—who might never have had to look for a job since their first one out of college, having been recruited hither, thither & yon thereafter—only wanted to wallow in their misery, because they shouldn’t have to go through all this, & it’s completely unfair. The layoff shouldn’t have happened to them, & someone should just show up with a six-figure job with their name on it. Anything short of that was a completely unreasonable expectation of society.
I’m betting that’s happening all over the country, to hedge fund managers, auto execs & construction moguls.
So, while I’m sure that the stats on who’s getting the pink slips are accurate, I think the “he-cession” mentioned in the Times story is more to do with perception & spreading the misery than with just the reality of registering for unemployment & networking the daylights out of your Facebook friends.
& let me just say this: whenever I attended one of those meetings, I left feeling way more depressed & hopeless than I had when I arrived. Trust me, that sullenness, truculence & sense of broken entitlement radiates throughout every encounter you have with a recruiter, receptionist or hiring manager.
The stats: “In December 2007, when the economy started tanking, unemployment ran nearly even at 4.4% for men and 4.3% for women. In February, that tally had shot up to 8.8% for men and 7.3% for women, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.”
Mark Perry, an economist at the University of Michigan at Flint, explains this partly by noting the crash started in construction, which is an 88% male domain, & continued into the financial sector, also dominated by men.
Conversely, healthcare & education are relatively stable, & those two industries run to 77% female, according to Perry. He adds that women tend to be better educated than men, & that the degrees matter these days.
I wonder, though.
Men outnumber women in the labor force—according to this story, by 10 million. Seems logical to me that more of them are likely to get axed, because there are just more of them out there. They’re a bigger target, as it were.
Also, I’m reminded of a seminar on 20th Century US economic & political history in grad school. Each student researched the Great Depression in a different state, & when we came together we found that the Depression didn’t seem to hit as hard in states like Colorado or West Virginia, where people were already living at subsistence level, as it did in New York or California.
& since women in the work force have lived closer to the bone than men, they’ve developed coping mechanisms for dealing with cut-backs & economic upsets. If they get laid off, they spend less time berating the gods over their cruel fate, & more getting on with finding another job. Or two. Or three—whatever it takes to keep the kids in shoes & mac & cheese.
I have to say, the thought of all these men out of work isn’t pretty. Back in Virginia I occasionally attended job-hunt support groups, one primarily for men, the other for women. I just couldn’t handle the former. These guys—mostly telecoms professionals—were so outraged & hurt by the utter injustice of being laid off that they had no strength or will left for finding another job. They were there to prove to the group that they'd tried everything humanly possible, & nothing worked, & so there was just no hope.
The idea was that you come together to share your experiences since the last meeting, get advice on how to handle this or that situation, & find encouragement in your search.
But almost to a man, here’s what would happen: a guy would describe an interview, say, & wonder how he should handle a response, because it was just too weird or hopeless or insulting.
The group facilitator—an amazing woman who is extremely knowledgeable about business, networking & positive attitude—would make some suggestions, & the guy would spend the next ten minutes deflecting each one because of this reason or that.
Rinse & repeat.
I finally realized that these people—who might never have had to look for a job since their first one out of college, having been recruited hither, thither & yon thereafter—only wanted to wallow in their misery, because they shouldn’t have to go through all this, & it’s completely unfair. The layoff shouldn’t have happened to them, & someone should just show up with a six-figure job with their name on it. Anything short of that was a completely unreasonable expectation of society.
I’m betting that’s happening all over the country, to hedge fund managers, auto execs & construction moguls.
So, while I’m sure that the stats on who’s getting the pink slips are accurate, I think the “he-cession” mentioned in the Times story is more to do with perception & spreading the misery than with just the reality of registering for unemployment & networking the daylights out of your Facebook friends.
& let me just say this: whenever I attended one of those meetings, I left feeling way more depressed & hopeless than I had when I arrived. Trust me, that sullenness, truculence & sense of broken entitlement radiates throughout every encounter you have with a recruiter, receptionist or hiring manager.
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