Workin for The Man

OK, first let me say this, I'm no blogger. Why? Because I don't feel that I'm a good writer and I'm a horrible speller (thank god for spell check). But, I'm going to give this a shot anyway as it seems like a good place to vent.

Some back story for ya'll... I am a user interface designer. I love it. Not a lot of people can say that about their day jobs, but it's true. Doodi and I used to work together building websites and web apps. Those were the good old days... Freedom! But, I needed a consistent paycheck. So, I got a "real" job working for a big ass corporation. I took the job because it didn't feel like a big ass corporation. The office I work in is in Chicago in an incredible location, just a couple of blocks from Millennium Park. The office is very laid back, jeans and t-shirts, flops during the summer is cool etc. Very creative environment and really, really cool people to work with, for the most part. I've been with this company for a little over two years now.

So, lately the company has been doing pretty poorly, two bad quarters in a row (may be three at this point I've stopped paying attention) and now we've slipped from the #2 company in our industry to #3... analysts are predicting a slip to #4 after next quarter!! And it's my department that's to blame. Granted it's the upper management who have fucked up here and not us lowly designers who have been complaining about our "leaderships" decisions over the last year and half, but we still take the brunt of it. Which is to say our bonuses suck and we are the ones who get laid off, not the upper management fuck-ups? Nice huh, yeah I think so too.

Due to these last several poor quarters employee moral has been in the shitter. We've been hemorrhaging employees left and right. I think we've lost about 2 people a month on average for the last 9 months. So many of my cool co-workers have left and are continuing to leave.

Ok, now check this out. In my line of work the only way to get a new job is to have a portfolio which of course shows what you've worked on in your career to date. The problem with the business I'm in is that it takes at least two years to release a product. This means I'm not allowed to show anyone outside of my company what I've been working on for the last two years. Bit of a catch-22 wouldn't you say? A few months ago I updated my portfolio site with everything I could show, which is nothing from my current job, which is nothing from the past two years of my career. All the calls I get from recruiters are pretty much the same and I get many because my field is fucking on fire right now! And there is a huge shortage of us, nice to be wanted... They call, we talk then they ask to see what I've been working on lately. Ahh, "sorry, I'm not allowed to show anything publicly" The best I can do is offer to show printed version in person. This isn't so bad as this is a fairly common practice, annoying, but common. And we go from there. Sadly there aren't any cool jobs in my field in Chicago so I'm staying put for the time being (I hope I don't regret this later if/when I am willing to move west). The cool jobs, right now, are all pretty much west coast, Google, Adobe, Yahoo, Microsoft (I was actually talking with MS's Xbox/Zune team at one point, but I was literally just about to close on my new condo so I backed out) etc.

Anyway, I finally decide to add a post to my portfolio site discussing the highlights of what I've been up to for the last two years. I do the right thing and don't show any of my work and barely mention what I've been doing. I have a pretty little graphic at the head that shows miniaturized versions of deliverables. Due to the size of these graphics they are 100% unreadable, whether they are proprietary to my company or not. I mention that due to the long lead times I'm not able to show anything here so contact me for more information.

Keep in mind that it took me TWO YEARS to finally mention this company to my portfolio site. In fact it came at point just after I'd gotten a promotion/raise so I wasn't really looking for a job.

A week later, guess who calls me... some Nazi HR group that is apparently in charge of finding anyone and everyone that is dissing their precious company and making them seize and desist. I really couldn't believe it, I was literally flabbergasted and at a loss for words. I tried to discuss it with her over the phone to resolve it right there, but instead she wanted a face to face the next day. Which of course wasn’t a great idea because it gave me some time to gather my thoughts and get SUPER PISSED! Needless to say I walked into our little meeting with a large chip on my shoulder... nearly called her and her group a bunch of Nazi's, but I do still want to keep my job because as I said earlier I do like it and for the most part I rarely see these corporate types, so I bit my tongue.

You know what was really funny, she couldn't seem to understand why I was so defensive. I was like because you are calling my character into question you fucktard!

You guys need to understand that I have access to everything that is sacred to this company in terms of future secrets. I've had access to this stuff since I've worked there. And I've never, NEVER done anything to betray their trust and I never will. It's not who I am, it's not what I'm about. So, this entire issue has, as I said, PISSED ME OFF!

After the meeting she called me and requested that I remove the banner. She didn't say anything about editing the post so I guess that was ok (I edited it anyway, like I said I'm not a writer so after re-reading it I noticed some spots that should be fixed). I didn't feel like arguing with her so I just consented, but I had an idea of what I would do because at the end of the phone call she said something like, of course I'll have to check-in on the site in a few days to make sure you've followed through... what a Nazi.

I made the change the other night, but I made sure that when she checks it out, with a little mouse over she'll know how I feel about her ;)

Alas, The Man still sucks to work for. But, I am lucky that he doesn't come around very often.

Thanks for reading.