And the job search is on
Tags: webdev
Published: 2023-09-23 20:33:02

I'm writing this because honestly I'm not sure how else to express how I feel.  I'm currently looking for a job and have been processing the past few weeks in my own way.  This is just a way for me to personally get some closure on a situation that I never thought would happen to me.  It has nothing to do with tech or dev just a story about what happened to me a few weeks back.  

So on September 8th I got an invitation to a call for 12:00pm and it was roughly 11:45am.  I hopped on the call and should've known from the get go something was wrong as it was a service that we don't use at work.  Myself and 20 plus other talented employees, from web application developers, to managers, to migration assistants, to hr employees just to name a few, were all laid off.  During this call we were kicked out of our company slack, emails, and all other web services.  I personally have never felt like more of a criminal in my life, and to be bluntly I've gotten arrested before.  A mass layoff where all of our microphones were muted and no one was able to ask any questions.  Medical benefits ending at midnight, so gotta immediately get a prescription filled, a two week severance, and not even a true explanation of what happened.  

Just over two weeks now and I guess all I can say and I still have no closure and never will.  I joined the company three months prior and left a relatively great job based on what the CEO and others sold to me.  In the end the decision to job hop was mine and mine alone and I completely understand that but upper management always spoke of transparency and there wasn't any signs or warnings.  In fact prior to that 12pm call we were all told to put in our holiday PTO and I had just finished up a project after working till 10pm the night before, and for what?

This was my first layoff from a company and truly the first time I felt disposable in my programming career.  In the 5 almost 6 years I always felt like I had job security until now.  I have never left a job without having one and have never looked for a job without currently being employed.  This is just a really odd situation for me right now.  It gets so much worse because CEOs and companies don't realize what they truly are doing to people.  So yea I'm losing out on a vacation that I had planned, tickets, accommodations, but that's not the real kicker.  I have a new home build set to be completed at the end of October and now without steady income obtaining a mortgage is 100% in jeopardy.  

I'm not saying that I'm special in compared to the other people who got were let go as well but during the interview process I felt like I got to know the upper management and we had a 1 on 1 conversations and I explained to them I'm building a home.  In the end I left a good paycheck to pursue something that I thought had potential.  I took a huge risk on this company and I have no one to blame but myself.  

So now that that is done I'm applying everywhere to find my next role.  Probably going to have to take a 20-30k pay cut but at this point I just want some stability back in my life.  The thing that bothers me the most about this entire situation is that during my interview process I asked about stock options because I thought this company was a startup and multiple times from HR and from the CEO himself I was told options are not available because we are done with our rounds of funding.  Turns out that wasn't the case and the reason we were all laid off was a money issue.  

That's about all I have to say here but I'm gonna continue writing about the application process and how it's going.  I feel like writing things like this is good for me and keeps my spirits up.  Thanks so much for taking the time to read this and have a wonderful day and weekend.