Not fired but I have been denied a promotion primarily due to age. Delta's Reservations had what was called a Leadership Development Program. This is quite different from the Airport where Supervisors are promoted on the basis of seniority and knowledge. In Reservations it's based on the LDP classes and so called performance or in other words, office politics. Because I had come from the airport to Reservations due to injury, I was considered by many in management to be an outsider or "old school." But because of my seniority and over 30 years experience, when I applied for the LDP program, they couldn't turn me down. After about 6 weeks of classes, I was assigned first to one supervisor and then about 3 months later to another supervisor, both very junior with little actual time with Delta. I realized about that time that I actually was being used to "impart knowledge" to them rather than them train me. Finally I got a chance for my own team of representatives but it was in the area I had worked so some of the Managers had a fit. Said it was too easy for me since I had worked that area. Two of them didn't want me promoted anyway and a third would go along with whatever those two wanted. But since I now had a team, I would have to be promoted to Supervisor Reserve. So I got called into my Managers office, told that I would be moving to work with another supervisor because the area I was in was "too easy." A week later, another LDP was moved into the spot I was pulled from and promoted to Supervisor Reserve. The problem was, the young woman who was given the job also worked in the same area I had and I was the one who trained her. Shortly after that, the remainder of my class was told we would go back to the phones at our previous jobs. Of course the other two besides me who were not promoted were given a "special project" and promoted about 2 weeks later. Not a single person over 30 was promoted out of the training class, every effort was made during training to make the older ones of us drop out. Two did, but I stuck it out until the end. It's funny that the first people promoted were the youngest minority females with one young guy(a total screwup) promoted to a job that was hard to screwup. Like I said, I've always felt two of the managers were determined I wouldn't get promoted plus with my seniority, it would have bumped 95% of management down the bid list for vacation. So the supervisors were not on my side either. So basically, I was passed over for promotion by much younger, mostly female trainees. I came close to taking it over to our EEOC office but didn't because, after finding out what a backstabbing bunch our management was, I really didn't want to work with them anyway!

I did get a little satisfaction though. A manager from another department in the same building, who was also a friend of mine, asked me one day if I would ever consider reapplying to the training program. I laughed and told him I wasn't that stupid. I named the managers and told him I would rather take a poke in the eye with a sharp stick than work with those old harpies again. I know that remark got back to them because before, where they had been so sweet it was almost syrupy when they saw me in the hall, it became a don't speak and don't even make eye contact. Loved it!

Oh about a year and a half later 9/11 occurred and many senior people were offered retirement incentives which I took. There was a three month window in which you could retire. I was working midnight shift at the time and my supervisor begged me to stay until the last day to help train my replacements. Because I actually had 32 different job functions (seriously) I had to train five people to take my place.

CW

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