please help me understand this

I worked a "fun job" for a while. By "fun" I mean that it wasn't for the money. I did have fun there, but it was "at-will" employment which means that they could terminate your employment (and you could quit) without any notice.
On my last job, the sociopath project manager whined about the "unprofessional" way in which a friend (to whom they lied about a raise to get him to become a team lead) quit without notice to take a job for $10 an hour more.

A couple of months later, they laid me and several others off... without notice. The cur of a project manager didn't even have the guts to tell us himself, pushing that off on our recruiters. In fact, my recruiter had to go to our work area and recover my personal property.

Gee, I wonder if the project manager cursed himself for his "unprofessional" behavior. Somehow I doubt it. That's just not what sociopaths do.
 
I always tried to do my best and get the work done both as good as possible and a quickly as possible. I had others tell me I worked tto hardd, that I should take it easy, it didn't matter. When I worked as a contractor in oil refineries this was always the case. But, when others were looking for work I was working and companies were calling me. I always got paid the top money. I always stayed till the end of the job. I became the foreman and the general foreman. They wondered why they didn't get called out, why they didn't get to run the job. I was there for the money, I also got some self satisfaction from doing good work. I was offered more opportunities. Even in retirement I am still called and offered. I have also been called by a couple of my old employers for my opinion on who to hire and who to promote. The guy who is the general foreman at my home plant, is the person I recommended when I left. The guy who is the foreman inn my first area of responsibility is a young guy who once had a problem with me because I chewed him out over something many got away with. After a long drive and explaining to him his potential and why I expected more out of him than others he became outstanding. He is where he is because I told the superintendent he would do well. The super was surprised when I recommended him.

Ya its about the money. I wanted the most I could get. I got it by not acting like it was only the money.
 
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Hey big bill...will you please be my hero...an outspoken man of the world, wow, who'd athunk it?
 
Sometimes you just might have to.
That's what my wife and I did. We used to live in the Washington DC area about 4 miles from the pentagon. I sold Toyota parts and she worked as a government contractor. After 911 we had enough of the corruption, terrorists, beaurocrats and crackheads, pulled up roots and headed for the West Virginia mountains.
The mortgage on our house is about a third of what our rent used to be for a nasty tiny little apartment in Alexandria and in about 5 or 6 more months our house'll be paid off.
We didn't leave lookin' for jobs, we knew there was work for people that are willing to work hard. We left to improve our enjoyment of life. If we ended up flipping burgers and mucking out sewers then that's what it took to keep our brick house in the mountains. We ended up working in factories and warehouses.
Now, due to my peripheral neuropathy, I'm on disability and my wife works as a home health care aid right here in town.
And because we live in an area with a lower cost of living, we're doin' just fine.
 
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There are no doubt times in one's life when you find yourself needing to do things you don't really want to do. I believe, however, that life is too short to do something you dislike long term. If you are doing something you like, you will excel in it, and enjoy it as well. This will cause the money to come.
 
when making a move, there are other factors than just money. it's not always just that easy. we've looked into other areas. cost of living goes up a lot for us.some of the places that i have considered applying for jobs has monthly rent 3 to 4 times what our mortgage is. we have 2 kids, one is 12, the other is almost 4. our parents watch them so if we moved day care would then be needed. moving and changing jobs does not always solve the problem, it would make our financial situation worse. it's a gamble i'm not willing to take with my family.
 
There are no doubt times in one's life when you find yourself needing to do things you don't really want to do. I believe, however, that life is too short to do something you dislike long term. If you are doing something you like, you will excel in it, and enjoy it as well. This will cause the money to come.
I did what I had to do in order to keep living indoors while I looked for something else. I'm doing temporary work with one of the other companies I applied to while I worked for Himmler, Inc.

As I said, I was miserable working for my previous employer. I would have been a lot more miserable living on the street. And make no mistake, that's EXACTLY where I would have ended up if I'd quit to work at McDonald's or with no job at all.

A friend of mine did the latter when his job became unbearable. That was going on three years ago and he hasn't found work yet. He's an engineer who designed part of the wiring harness for the B-1. The phone company disconnected his phone a couple of months ago. Fortunately for him, he owns his own house. I don't.

Things are NOT like they used to be. I've lost jobs before and could get by reasonably well working as an independent contractor PC/Network tech. Not only weren't there any jobs, when I got laid off during the [continuing] recession, half the COMPANIES I'd done work for were going out of business. Just about EVERY available IT job in Cleveland that I or any of my acquaintances hear about are Windows 7 roll-outs. Those are invariably low paying. And just how long do you think those are going to last AFTER all of the Windows XP systems have been upgraded or replaced?

Yeah, I could go work at McDonald's. The thing is, would they actually HIRE a homeless person with no place to shower...?
 
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I don't know?

Mstuhr, you stay because there are no other jobs anywhere local. i can't just uproot my family for something that may not pan out.


I could be wrong, but If you are there by choice then you are not a victim of circumstances, you are a victim by choice..
I didn't want to be a minimum wage bus driver after leaving a good job. I knew it would sustain me long enough to gain my feet and head in the right direction.
People move everyday to seek opportunities. If you think you can't then you probably can't. If I were to choose to stay and take the abuse I'd try not to cry about it. No one can victimize you if you don't let them.
I'm really not trying to be or sound mean. It is how I see things and why I'd go if I were you and why you stay.
Thanks and good luck.
Mike
 
I could be wrong, but If you are there by choice then you are not a victim of circumstances, you are a victim by choice..
I didn't want to be a minimum wage bus driver after leaving a good job. I knew it would sustain me long enough to gain my feet and head in the right direction.
People move everyday to seek opportunities. If you think you can't then you probably can't. If I were to choose to stay and take the abuse I'd try not to cry about it. No one can victimize you if you don't let them.
I'm really not trying to be or sound mean. It is how I see things and why I'd go if I were you and why you stay.
Thanks and good luck.
Mike

the grass is greener on the other side...it worked for you...it won't work for me...

i'm not whining about my job...what i am doing is giving examples of why it's not always the employees fault...that management can be just as much to blame.

i'm not going to put my family into a worse situation in hopes of a better future unless it is a guaranteed. my family comes first.
 
No one can victimize you if you don't let them.
Nobody can victimize you better than you can victimize yourself, and the best way to do that is to do foolish things to impress people who really don't care what happens to you anyway.

My quitting a lousy job with nothing to replace it, or an even worse job at half the salary will neither hurt the people I'm leaving nor benefit me.

Being homeless doesn't make you noble. it just makes you dirty, hungry and sick.
 
I quit once!

Before I launched my LE career I had just graduated college and was working as a department manager for Montgomery Ward which was at the time just behind Sears as the world's largest retailer. It was a well-paying job with significant responsibilities. Unfortunately, my boss was perhaps the world's worst boss. He was indecisive, inconsistent, rude, obnoxious, ignorant, and a pain in my arse. One morning I had started the day with what was the every single day routine re: store opening when he showed up and asked what I was doing. I said what I do every single day yet he failed to comprehend due to his ignorance. I then said 'guess what I am doing next?' With that I left the sales floor and went directly to personnel, tendered my resignation, cleared out my desk, called my then girlfriend, and went to Virginia Beach. :D

Absolutely the best and smartest thing I ever did re: work. Well...maybe not but surely was at the time. :p

When I began my LE career I decided I would leave that job, too, if I was not successful and also good at it. (Those descriptors...'successful' and 'good at it'...are different measures.) Thankfully I was very successful and good at what I did. I was also fortunate to have fine mentors and supervisors for the most part. I learned far more from them than the bad bosses. I also learned that not all my associates shared the same work ethic and professionalism. I also learned that every occupation has its share of nincompoops and whining sniveling malcontents who blame all that is wrong in their worlds on others and never accept personal responsibility for their incompetence.

Bottom line: I would not work a job that I despised...period...non-negotiable.

Be safe.
 
Hey big bill...will you please be my hero...an outspoken man of the world, wow, who'd athunk it?

Out spoken? Maybe? Saying the wrong thing at the wrong time give that man a cigar. Hero? All the real hero's are dead. I was always taught you treat a worker the way you want to be treated when your in charge. Words are like bullets once there fired and n there way there's no calling them back.

I'm not a people person, never wanted the group leaders job, I was told to take it or your fired in the beginning. I just wanted to do my job and go home.

Being retired from there is awesome. My life is over work wise it's time to wear out that new fishing rod.
 
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This thread should be closed before someone gets in trouble.....I think this dead horse has been beaten enough (no pun intended of course).
 
I honestly don't blame the OP too much. I've saved my company hundreds of thousands of dollars, bend over backwards to serve them, took on more and more responsibilities over the years, and brought my work location from below company standards to above company standards. I barely make more money than when I first started working for my company. After taxes, it really isn't noticeable in my weekly pay check. I'm currently looking for a new job. I understand the whole "you get what you earned" mentality, but that is not always the case. If I were to leave my company, my location is going to go down hill quickly. Loyalty is a two way street. In the end, what's best for my family comes first.
 
Help you understand? how? You got your mind made up first of all, second, if I'm reading this all, even with the spelling errors and the overall misuse of the language, I read you are retired, living the good life, outearning all your enemies, so my question, what are you #$^&(&%# about? The only problem I'm seeing is an ego that is way larger than my pants.
I was pretty full of myself one time too, then I learned...to SHUT UP...life got a whole lot easier when I stopped blaming everybody else for the fact that they didn't give me the RESPECT that I KNEW I deserved. The real problem as i see it, and i read it somewhere...when I am upset, angry, mad at something that I have NO CONTROL over, I need to remember that that circumstance, that happening, that obstruction to my plan is just what it is supposed to be, I am not in CONTROL. HE or She is...
 
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