The old job

Like any job, the old job had problems, but they were far outweighed by the good in the job. I was micromanaged by a woman who had never managed people before. The woman above her also tried to micromanage me. For some reason, I was called out for a lot of ridiculous things the the guys were not called out for. One guy literally did nothing but was promoted. This is honestly the story of my life. I am efficient, hard working, and I made immediate improvements to the things they wanted improved but I was not a man, so....

On the good side, there were lots of young people, and lots of energy. Lots of love, honestly. Everyone looked out for everyone else and people were pretty understanding that I have kids and my schedule was all over the place. I could work from home occasionally. The work was fine, and the hours were reasonable. The job wasn't that hard and it was fun because of the people. They did put some pressure on us to perform at certain times, but I think this is any job. Communication was awful, to be sure, and that's something that I cannot figure out - like, why is it so hard?

The layoff was dramatic. An entire team, gone in the blink of an eye. We got an email - a mea culpa from the CEO that there would be "big changes" and to wait for an email to tell us if we were laid off or not. Mine came, along with a lot of other peoples. They gave us an hour to vacate the building. They had a security guard outside. We all called family, friends, checked with each other. The CBO was walking around, and sitting in a conference room and never said a word to us. The VP got coffee in the break room and walked right through us, not saying a word. I packed up my desk, took my things to my car. Called my husband. Hard to believe it was over, but it was. And it had been a good experience. I had made lots of friends.

We ended up going to lunch, getting a drink and the heading home. We've gotten together a bit since then. It's always nice to see them, but it's not the same. I'll never have that job again and that's OK, but also sad. For a while I was really angry. Like, how does the C-suite still have their jobs when they are the ones who fucked up? How was my team the ones who were actually doing the work and we got let go? How do those C-suite people get that job? What makes them qualified to make those decisions? Why could the management live wherever they wanted and the company would pay to fly them to work? WTF is going one here?