The whole work hard and they’ll take care of you lie needs to die. I’ve seen top performers get axed after years of grinding, and the company just shrugs. People need to stop falling for that cr-p.
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Times have changed. Most people who have joined the workforce in the last 10 years no longer look at an employer as a lifelong partner. New employees have no loyalty to their employer.
Those of us who were raised in the 19xx's need to adjust to the modern world - getting a job is not the same as getting married.
I’m sorry to break this to people, but I joined the industry in the late 1980s and by the early to mid 1990s everyone with an IQ above room temperature knew that big companies having a sense of obligation to their employees was a thing of the past.
(There’s a terrific book called “The End of Loyalty: The Rise and Fall of Good Jobs in America” by Rick Wartzman published in 2017 that looks in depth at the postwar history of the employer-employee relationship in the US, focusing on GM, GE, Kodak and Coca-Cola. Strongly recommended.)
When I joined Conoco later on I was quite surprised at the number of employees I met who had 20+ years of tenure, then when it merged with Phillips a lot of people I met had been there even longer. But the industry has always been bo-m and bust on 5-6 year cycles. The car park is full of new Mercedes, BMW and Lexus vehicles, and every so often there are more spaces on the lower floors.
Loyalty in the 2020s isn’t a one way street. You’re completely free to go somewhere else if you see a good reason to do so. Framing layoffs as a betrayal by The Man is silly.
Be like the guy in the Coen Brothers film with the hangman’s noose around his neck - look around and grin. “First time?”
Loyalty gets paid back every month — it’s called your salary and benefits.
Harsh truth? Maybe. But this isn’t charity. It’s a job.
This is exactly the same advice a bo-b in the high performer discussion gave everyone.
Be incompetent and the worst because all the top performers are fired.
I suppose it worked out for that guy since he said it helped him make it through the last cuts, but I don't think it is advice that will help you if you do want to stay.
Do the bare minimum to rank in the middle of the bell curve. Nothing more. No weekend work. No Teams or email on personal phone. 1-hour lunch breaks minimum. Two 30 minute coffee breaks. Play busy and chime in on weekly team calls to appear engaged. F them.
Our employment relationship is we give them our time and they give us a pay check. That’s it. A 3 rating is behind paid for what it were hired to do. We are a corporation and the loyalty is to the shareholders. If you didn’t know this, that’s on you.
What is the alternative?
Show up late, leave early. . . . do mediocre work while you are here? Its hard for many people to do that, especially us old school folks. That's why loyalty being a one-way street from employee to employer is terrible. And before someone says it, the company giving you a paycheck isn't loyalty - its a transaction.