Even before the current financial crisis, people have lost their jobs. However, as the economy began going downhill, more and more American jobs have disappeared. I’ve been there several times, and it isn’t fun!
The first time, my position ended because the manufacturing company I worked for decided that doing business in California was too expensive. So they outsourced the basic operations to China and the Dominican Republic. The administrative functions, including Document Control for which I was the manager, were sent to Texas. This was one of those special companies where the employees became an extended family. We genuinely cared about each other, and even after our work ended, we continued to meet at least once a month.
I was originally given two months’ notice, but ended up working seven. The company provided lots of resources and assistance with resume writing and retraining. Nearly everyone was reemployed within a couple of months. But that was in 2003.
I moved from manufacturing to banking, a ‘secure’ profession. I was unemployed exactly one day, and only because the bank had that Monday off as a holiday. I was hired as the Document Control Lead in the Information Technology Department. A few years later, I became the Change Manager.
The bank was a smaller, local one where the employees were very close. We still hold reunions, including one last year at our house.
As the banking crisis began, we started to hear rumors that our own bank, previously the ‘gold standard’ for conservative fiduciary responsibility, might be in trouble. In November of 2008, the FDIC shut the bank down, and another larger institution took over.
This time, the resources provided were few. Since the acquiring bank had its own IT Department, there was no need for most of us to stay on. I assisted with the transition for six months, and then my job ended. This time I was out of work for two months, following which I accepted a contract as a Sr. Technical Writer.
A year later when that contract ended, I was again unemployed for two more months before accepting another contract as a SharePoint Administrator.
Even though I was fortunate to have found employment so soon after each job loss, the period of job hunting was frustrating and disconcerting.
So whenever I hear about a friend or acquaintance losing a job, I truly understand the stress and uncertainty.
This is the situation the protagonist in my new book, Ghost Writer, to be published this summer by Oak Tree Press, finds herself in. Nan Burton is employed as a computer programmer by a bank which is taken over by the FDIC. Sound familiar? I could feel all her concerns and frustrations, which made her story an easy one for me to tell. Have you lost a job in the current economic crisis? How did you cope?