Corporate Love

So what is it that makes corporations demand our loyalty as empoyees without having to offer theirs?

You know what I mean - the contract THEY offer sets a policy containing rules and regulations that we must follow, and WE must exist within the limits of that policy until the day they let us go due to 'downsizing' or 'restructuring' or 'moving furniture and we think someone else's ass would look better in your chair'. And the policy that we expect them to follow: Don't fire me without good reason.

This is not about me. The way this has touched my life recently was the loss of a good manager. A man who had given the past 6 years of his life to his company. Knew the products and the relationships of the products to each other better than anyone else at the company. Knew the product and project managers and their relationships to each other better than anyone else in the company. Knew how to keep his mouth shut outside of the company. Spoke up when necessary, mediated when necessary, and told his staff (myself included) when to shut up when necessary.

This guy was a model employee whose position had become an unnecessary redundancy. The necessary parts of his job could have been handled on a part-time basis. So he's gone. Not relocated in the company, but gone. It was a time where the company needed to show some savings - for a couple of months.

But that's my point. There isn't loyalty to him. There wasn't a compassionate - we don't feel your job is necessary any longer, so let's look at other areas you may be effective within the company - conversation. Instead, the loyalty was rewarded with the run-of-the-mill, sit down, we're sorry, yada yada, here's a one-time offer of a one-month payout in exchange for signing away your right to bring suit against us, and a casual walk to the front door. No talking to anyone else. No farewell to his staff. Just gone.

So ethically, not morally mind you, but ethically - what do I owe my company? If my company feels all they owe me is a paycheck for only as long as my value isn't less than that paycheck why should I feel I owe them any more than my best work as long as i'm cashing those checks?

I really despise the abuse seen in unions these days. I won't defend the corruption that seems to exist throughout these organisations, but I have to say how much I envy having that collective security that they offer I don't for one minute believe that i'm underpaid, or that I need more time off. But I would like to know that in leaner times, our otherwise lucrative company is prepared to find more creative ways to work with me, rather than opting out of the relationship.