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Historical

Kind of a shame

I read a profile about Northwest’s increasing outsourcing of their aircraft maintenance to overseas corporations. The best line of the article comes at the end, by a quote from the wife of the individual used as the focus of the article. “We’ve been through the mill before with corporate America. People wonder why there is […]

I read a profile about Northwest’s increasing outsourcing of their aircraft maintenance to overseas corporations. The best line of the article comes at the end, by a quote from the wife of the individual used as the focus of the article.

“We’ve been through the mill before with corporate America. People wonder why there is no employee loyalty. There is no loyalty to employees.”

Given the increasing use of layoffs as a “cost containment” mechanism with no regard for the effect that this has on individuals, combined with an increasing tendancy to be more than willing to send work offshore, corporations should wholly expect that, should the job market improve markedley, they will be left in the lurch by employees. In fact, I hope this happens again and I look forward to enjoying it when it does, as it is “just desserts” in my opinion. If, as seems clear by many large corporations, you’re willing to treat your employees by dirt merely to satisfy the profit gods on Wall Street, it is my fondest hope that your clients, your customers, and your employees reward you in kind.

In one sense, it’s funny I say this, because my ambitions are high, and some part of me would love one day to be a CEO. Yet if I ever made it to upper management, I would do my damndest to show people the respect they deserve. Profits aren’t everything.

I do worry, though, because thankfully I work for a company that believes in its mission AND its employees, and so far has resisted the labor cuts used by so many others. Yet the screws definitely feel as though they’re tightening again in many ways. And with Zocor moving closer to a patent expiration…

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