Revenge is A Dish Best Served Cold

[German_EE]

A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine was fired from his job after about 25 years of service, they fired him to avoid the expense of severance payments which, I think you will agree, is not the best way to go about it. The thing is, my friend knew about three days in advance what was going to happen so he decided to leave a present.

The Managing Director's office has a suspended ceiling and it's easy to get to the other side just by pushing up a tile, you just need to be careful of the dust and clean up afterwards. Up there in the ceiling he's left a plate with a couple of fish on it. It's warm in that office so by now those fish won't be too fresh, however the ceiling tiles will provide a reasonable barrier so that, say, a few parts per million of the odour of rotting fish will drift down. Just enough to be noticed.

By all accounts they have already deep cleaned the carpets and the curtains yet that slight odour remains, I wonder how long it will take them to discover what has been left?

[grumpydoc]

A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine was fired from his job after about 25 years of service, they fired him to avoid the expense of severance payments which, I think you will agree, is not the best way to go about it.

No, not nice

But, assuming this was in Germany which in common with the rest of the EU has fairly strong employment protection, it is normally impossible to fire someone with only three days notice.

[Ian.M]

Raw potatoes in the air conditioner condensate tray

[Throy]

Wouldn't he have a good chance against them in court? I've always been told that the judges here tend to be very sympathetic to the workers.

[zapta]

A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine was fired from his job after about 25 years of service,

What is so special about the time mark of 25 years?

[SL4P]

Sorry, too many indicators this is a troll...
Quite rare on EEVblog!

[German_EE]

No troll, and I'm not going to reveal where this company is because the person responsible wants the MD to suffer. Twenty five years? that's a quarter of a century with the same company and all they did to mark this was fire him, I can understand why he did this.

[george graves]

I've heard this story before.

http://www.snopes.com/love/revenge/shrimpcurtains.asp

Mention of a similar stunt is included in John Steinbeck's 1945 novel Cannery Row: The character Doc advocates getting revenge on a bank by renting a safe deposit box, depositing a salmon in it, then going away for six months.

[SL4P]

No troll, and I'm not going to reveal where this company is because the person responsible wants the MD to suffer. Twenty five years? that's a quarter of a century with the same company and all they did to mark this was fire him, I can understand why he did this.

I have to admit, if this is legit', it's nothing like the Germany I knew about 15 years ago, where loyal employment was rewarded with similar loyalty by the company.
Oh well, as long as the profits keep on rolling in.

I suppose this correlates with the poll I'm running n a different thread.
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/experience-is-worth-very-little/?viewresults

[langwadt]

No troll, and I'm not going to reveal where this company is because the person responsible wants the MD to suffer. Twenty five years? that's a quarter of a century with the same company and all they did to mark this was fire him, I can understand why he did this.

did the company have some internal police of extra severance with more than 25 years of seniority ?

afaict tell there is no way around the many months of severance anyone with near 25 years would have

in Denmark you get at least 6 months when you have been with a company for +9 years, 25 years gets you
the privilege of being harder to fire, i.e. unless there is a very good reason everyone else has to be fired first

[Rick Law]

A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine was fired from his job after about 25 years of service, they fired him to avoid the expense of severance payments which, I think you will agree, is not the best way to go about it. The thing is, my friend knew about three days in advance what was going to happen so he decided to leave a present.

The Managing Director's office has a suspended ceiling and it's easy to get to the other side just by pushing up a tile, you just need to be careful of the dust and clean up afterwards. Up there in the ceiling he's left a plate with a couple of fish on it. It's warm in that office so by now those fish won't be too fresh, however the ceiling tiles will provide a reasonable barrier so that, say, a few parts per million of the odour of rotting fish will drift down. Just enough to be noticed.

By all accounts they have already deep cleaned the carpets and the curtains yet that slight odour remains, I wonder how long it will take them to discover what has been left?

I too think the employer is a jerk.  That said, I think what your friend did is not helpful to himself.

They already took away your friend's means of making a living, which is low by any measure.  But by his own action, your friend took away his own dignity.  He allowed other's action influence himself to take down his standard of civil behavior.

It was not the first time (nor the last time) when I had a conversation with a staff about his being laid off.  What he/she didn't know is, I got my own notice "separation agreement" in my brief case.  I had a later date - so as I can finish closing up the department but laid off just the same.

In my opinion, keeping a positive attitude and professional behavior helps one landing on the next job.


On a side note:
In the modern days of global economy, a good reading for anyone: "Who Moved my Cheese?" by Spencer Johnson, 1998.

[DimitriP]

He allowed other's action influence himself to take down his standard of civil behavior.

What he did was the civil version.

In recent times , Disney employees had to stay on long enough to train their replacements. If they left early they would lose their severance package. I'm sure it wasn't professionalism that compelled them to stay on.

That's when it helps to have "screw you money" as Dave has put it in the past. Only then you have a choice.

[miguelvp]

We are 7.2 billion people and counting, all with our own unique characteristics.

Granted I myself think I am among the unique individuals and of course I am because we all are.

Not trying to make a point but yeah, pretty much we are all indispensable even if there are so many of us we are all unique and we have our own unique strengths.

Even the noobs questioning everything and knowing nothing, they are still vital for this human experiment.

As for training your replacement, well that can only go bad, because you won't train them thoroughly, just enough to get you by since you are on your way out if you are really that replaceable, but of course you won't bring the caveats unless they become an issue.

My Dad was replaced by younger cheaper labor, he did comply and also looked for other jobs and he got one at least temporarily because in a couple of years they begged to hire him again at a premium. I guess you can't condense experience when the mentor is not willing to impart it fully since they know they are on their way out.

Not sure if he didn't try to impart all his knowledge, but that doesn't really matter because there is no way you can do that anyhow.
As for the other thread, well.... experience is not worth very little because the ones that don't have it don't know the value until it bites them back.

True, we are all replaceable in a sense, life will go on and this and that. But it all comes with a cost.

[DimitriP]

Disney and outsourcing stories below:

The first disney story:  http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/us/last-task-after-layoff-at-disney-train-foreign-replacements.html?ref=topics

and an about-face a few months later :  http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/17/us/in-turnabout-disney-cancels-tech-worker-layoffs.html?_r=0

and somewhere in  between, someone decided to take a peek at outsourcing companies : http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/12/us/politics/outsourcing-companies-under-scrutiny-over-visas-for-technology-workers.html?ref=topics

[miguelvp]

Outsourcing is not a bad thing really.

Sometimes you can't maintain a full workforce year round, in that case you can outsource the extra tasks so you can stay in business and keep your salaried employees fully employed.

[Kjelt]

It does suck getting the sack after 25 years but also probably a self fullfilling prophecy.
As is the rest of the outcome, no other company is going to hire a 50+ engineer that worked for 1 company in 1 job his entire life (not saying that is the case here).
New motto of the 21st century:
- make sure you take another job around every 5 years (could be in the same company, but be sure it is in a different field)
- stay in touch with new developments and be flexible KEEP LEARNING/STUDYING and preferably make your employer pay for it.
- don't trust your employers promises before they are black on white
- make sure that you are (very) good in what you do and have uptodate knowledge so in case you are sacked tomorrow, you know you can find a job soon.

[Rick Law]

It does suck getting the sack after 25 years but also probably a self fullfilling prophecy.
As is the rest of the outcome, no other company is going to hire a 50+ engineer that worked for 1 company in 1 job his entire life (not saying that is the case here).
New motto of the 21st century:
- make sure you take another job around every 5 years (could be in the same company, but be sure it is in a different field)
- stay in touch with new developments and be flexible KEEP LEARNING/STUDYING and preferably make your employer pay for it.
- don't trust your employers promises before they are black on white
- make sure that you are (very) good in what you do and have uptodate knowledge so in case you are sacked tomorrow, you know you can find a job soon.

"Keep learning" is an absolute must.  I've trained my replacements, professionalism was a large part of it.  The lady thank me, but I just said I am still being paid - just that my job now is getting you guys capable of taking over.

I like to think I did that solely because I am a professional, but often I fail to meet my own standard.  What does kept me going is the idea of walking out as tall as I walked in.  The idea of walking out like a defeated kitten just was not appealing.

All in all though, we all have to understand as employee, we are valuable as long as we bring in the value.  There are times what we know and/or what we can do is no longer as valuable as it once was, and loosing sight of that is deadly career-wise.  That we are no longer valuable at employer X doesn't mean we are not valuable.  There are skills we have that perhaps employer X just doesn't need but someone else may pay dearly for.

As to changing job every 5 years, I am not sure I agree with the way you put it.  One should be growing in ones job.  A job without growth is by definition a dead end job.  One should be doing more than one was a year ago.  That said, one should also look at job ads every few months if not every week and ask: what am I worth in this market.

Frequently looking at job ads allows one to know the direction of the market, and allows one to know the market value of ones own skills.  A side benefit: I told a friend of mine, his company is outsourcing to India.  He asked how would I know.  I said, well, they are hiring this this and this technical skills, willing to do international travel, willing to live in India for x months...  What do you think?  He choose not to think and it hit him like a ton of bricks a few months later.

[Kjelt]

As to changing job every 5 years, I am not sure I agree with the way you put it.  One should be growing in ones job.  A job without growth is by definition a dead end job.  One should be doing more than one was a year ago.

Well what I meant in my line of work, knowledge is worth something for about 4 years max. , then it is already replaced by new technologies.
The way you deal with new technology you grow in, you can relate to older standards to better understand the new ones.

So if you are an analogue opamp expert and your company needs that skill till you retire you are right, such a person should be an super expert and know all the new opamps coming out, all applications, parameters etc. Same with doctors, the human body will not evolve significantly in the coming decades.
If you are in the (internet)software business as I am and you're terrain is new tech and developments, a lot changed the last few years and there is so much info you never ever be an expert on all of the languages, technologies, protocols, standards and interfaces that are popping up as mushrooms in a mushroom farm.

[tggzzz]

If you are in the (internet)software business as I am and you're terrain is new tech and developments, a lot changed the last few years and there is so much info you never ever be an expert on all of the languages, technologies, protocols, standards and interfaces that are popping up as mushrooms in a mushroom farm.

True.

But I would hope that you would know what technical questions should be asked when you are evaluating the next set of technologies that might be used for your next project. Some things don't change: the disadvantages or new products are merely unpublicised. I, for example, decided to totally ignore the SOAP-derived web standards that erupted a decade ago: I decided RPC over the web was peverse and dimwitted, and that REST was a better foundation for the way forward.

[Rick Law]

As to changing job every 5 years, I am not sure I agree with the way you put it.  One should be growing in ones job.  A job without growth is by definition a dead end job.  One should be doing more than one was a year ago.

Well what I meant in my line of work, knowledge is worth something for about 4 years max. , then it is already replaced by new technologies.
The way you deal with new technology you grow in, you can relate to older standards to better understand the new ones.

So if you are an analogue opamp expert and your company needs that skill till you retire you are right, such a person should be an super expert and know all the new opamps coming out, all applications, parameters etc. Same with doctors, the human body will not evolve significantly in the coming decades.
If you are in the (internet)software business as I am and you're terrain is new tech and developments, a lot changed the last few years and there is so much info you never ever be an expert on all of the languages, technologies, protocols, standards and interfaces that are popping up as mushrooms in a mushroom farm.

You bring up something important.  Beside the pace of business - or rather, the shortening shelf-life of knowledge, the other important aspect is:

"How much do you rely on your current job so as you can learn more skills."

The question pretty much brought up why it is an important question to ask.  Too often, we fall into trap of staying in our comfort zone and rationalize being there by wishful thinking...

I hope the OP's friend made out okay.  Being laid off is no fun.

[cimmo]

A tin of surstromming with a tiny hole in it would have done the trick.

[Kjelt]

What a waste of herring, we just eat them raw, delicious 

[continuo]

"In 1981, a German landlord evicted a tenant without notice after the tenant spread surströmming brine in the apartment building's stairwell (Treppenhaus). When the landlord was taken to court, the court ruled that the termination was justified when the landlord's party demonstrated their case by opening a can inside the courtroom. The court concluded that it "had convinced itself that the disgusting smell of the fish brine far exceeded the degree that fellow-tenants in the building could be expected to tolerate".

German food critic and author Wolfgang Fassbender wrote that "the biggest challenge when eating surströmming is to vomit only after the first bite, as opposed to before".

(Wikipedia)

 

[Kjelt]

How come swedes like it and eat it, perhaps it should be washed or something?
There is in Thailand a fruit called Durian that supposedly smells like sewage but people love it.
Would like to hear from someone out of sweden what the deal is?

[Rick Law]

How come swedes like it and eat it, perhaps it should be washed or something?
There is in Thailand a fruit called Durian that supposedly smells like sewage but people love it.
Would like to hear from someone out of sweden what the deal is?

Hey, here in the USA, we have people who eat cheese, and may even eat cheese while they are "cutting cheese"  (slang for letting gas out at "the other end", for those who doesn't know.)

That gassing out is called "cutting cheese" describes the stink of cheese rather well.

[Mechanical Menace]

How come swedes like it and eat it, perhaps it should be washed or something?

Because if you manage to get it into your mouth without puking it actually tastes nice.

Hey, here in the USA, we have people who eat cheese, and may even eat cheese while they are "cutting cheese"  (slang for letting gas out at "the other end", for those who doesn't know.)

You can't beat washed-rind cheese as an example of the similarity. But if my flatulence smelled like Stinking Bishop I'd be visiting the doctors...