Blog of Billy

So here is the job situation that has kept me without internet access for the last few weeks. To sum it up, I'm unemployed. Well, kind of unemployed. More like I start a new job Monday.

Unemployment does have its perks: lots of time for naps, my yard is well-mowed, and I took a trip to sunny South Padre Island over the weekend. I'm also now a Starcraft master.

The work situation is 2-fold. For the last few months, we've (The Hertz Corporation) been looming under the threat of outsourcing. It's pretty much a guarantee that some of us are going to be outsourced, the only question is who. We'll find out sometime in the next couple of months. Late September probably.

Some of it is happening even as we speak. We were told that there would be a "handful" of people layed off in the coming month or two to get ready for outsourcing analysts to come in after that. That "handful" turned out to be about 500 people.

I have 3 plans to deal with that:

• Plan A : Stay with Hertz, and be pretty sure I'm not getting outsourced. My department is not one that could go easily, and if the department stays, I'm fine. Another option is that if my department goes, I can use my Lean/6-sigma training to stay at Hertz in a different area.
• Plan B : Find another comparable job. I don't like change, but I may be forced into it.
• Plan C : Take on another roommate (Bryan or otherwise) and a part-time job doing...something, take out loans to finish school as quickly as possible (3 semesters). This operates under the assumption that the reason that plans A and B didn't pan out was the lack of a degree. This wouldn't be that big a deal, but is the bottom plan for how big a change it would be.

Now, at the beginning of May, the rumors around the IT campfire have been about a massive offshoring of jobs at IBM. The media has it that there are to be about 150,000 layoffs in the States, and slightly fewer hires in India. They'll take over about half of IBM's Global Services division. That means that, in a world where Hertz outsources me a couple of months afterward, I have to compete not just with the 3000 or so reasonably qualified, degree-holding people for jobs nearby, but also the 150,000 similar professionals country-wide. The pickins may get rather slim.

My response was to start moving forward with Plan B, to see what the world could offer me that was more stable, but comparable with Hertz. I freaked out about that one night, and couldn't get to sleep over it so I updated my resume. The next morning I had 2 offers, and more came in the following few days. After a round of interviews, I decided to take a job with The Harris Corporation that is just a few miles from my house and seems to be a pretty happenin' place. I was also able to hook Chris Brodt up with one of the jobs that I didn't find quite as attractive. He's a sell-out now too. Commence the fun-making.

So that's the story. For obvious reasons I didn't really want to post too much information about it where people from Hertz could easily find it. Thoughts?

This Sunday night, btw, is a Roller Derby bout. 7 p.m. at the Rocking Roller Rink in Edmond.

Welcome in readership to attractive girls from Australia. Always glad to have a more international look at my daily grind.

It was always worth it
That's the part I seem to hide
And the busy ant empire
Put up the closing sign.