On getting fired

I am not feeling particularly inspired today, but I do want to get into the habit of posting something daily or at least every other day; otherwise the few people who –I hope- will visit the site will stop doing it if there’s nothing new in days…isn’t that how these things work?

On the other hand, given yesterday’s events is not like I don’t have material to write about…yesterday, once again, for the third time in a row, I was fired; for my own comfort, it was under the same circumstances as the previous occasions…cause: downsizing, in a meeting room: full, with all my colleagues receiving the same news. Not that this makes things easier on anybody, but at least you know it was not purely based on your performance, or lack of it.

I have this brainstorming going on in my mind about the amount of importance people tend to give to their jobs, how much of their lives is dedicated to it, neglecting some of the things that really matter in life…or am I going to far in generalizing what the priorities for everybody should be, and my values are truer and more significant than those who find absolute reward in their jobs? Nope...not by any means.

I don’t want to sound self-righteous, this is just my insight on how I see the “corporate world”; the “great team”, “you are doing brilliant”, “keep on the good work”, among so many other memorable one-liners.

Don’t fool yourself, no matter how important your position is, how good you are at what you do, nobody is irreplaceable, it might sound harsh, but nobody said the truth was always nice to hear…Think about it this way, if you don’t go to work tomorrow, the company will not fall apart, they will manage to find somebody who’ll take over your daily tasks. Am I saying this because I’m bitter about getting fired? Absolutely not, those who know me (me referring to the eternal cynic), know it’s been a longtime since I think this way, which is why I always took my job very lightly. Not that I was a reckless employee, of course not, if your job is your bread and butter, you must at least be true to yourself , have some ethic and be responsible, but not to the extent where you sacrifice your family, or any aspects of your life over your job, that’s where I see –unfortunately- so many people go wrong.

I’ll take my ex-boss as an example, a lady so dedicated, doing extra hours all the time, never –and I mean NEVER- taking one day off sick, in three years I was there, focusing insanely in, what I considered meaningless, details. She kept all documents read-only, fearing people would mess them, and just in the blink of an eye, after thirteen years, she gets a kick on the but, nice working with you hand shake.

Today, who cares about those documents? Who cares about her dedication, about her constancy…can you believe she even halted her holidays once, just because our boss from London was going to come to Brussels?? How crazy is that? he didn’t even talk to her!!!

Don't get me wrong it's a great achievement in life what you can do professionally, but perspective is everything; being there for your family, for yourself, and not always postpone it, because you have "too much work" ... at least to me, those are the things you take with you at the end of your life, not an important job title or having been in a room full of guys talking about projects and making them sound better than life, when it's pure blah blah.

Well, as I always say, if that makes them happy…so be it; and of course not everybody, thankfully, has to go through this less than comfortable experience, some people do manage to start in one company and be there forever and a day, until their retirement.

There are two scenes from two different movies, that I always think of when trying to explain people my stand in this subject matter; they are Jerry Maguire and About Schmidt, the first when Jerry gives his speech in front of the whole office, after being fired, with “fish” on his hand, and how people just kept on working as usual the second he stepped inside the elevator. The later, when Jack Nicholson is explaining the new manager, a young graduate, that he is leaving in a box all the documentation about the things he did and implemented so he could take it from there, now that he was retiring, and when he (Jack) leaves the room, the new manager just asks his secretary to throw it into the bin. In a nutshell, as we were told yesterday “the show must go on” =)

I don’t want to be a zealot here, and actually I am realizing now, that my ideas today might sound too trite and commonplace …so bottom line, excesses are never good, n e v e r; so just keep perspective in life, and don’t give much importance to things that are not worth of it, it’s your life and the people you love and who love you, the ones at stake.

Comments will be highly appreciated, and thanks for the posted ones =))

AG