We saw the new Steve Jobs movie, appropriately called Steve Jobs. We had both seen the previous movie about his life starring Ashton Kutcher, but this movie is a lot different. The previous movie was more of a biography, whereas this new film is more of a character study of the man himself. For the real bio, try Wikipedia or something. Suffice it to say, Steve Jobs was a visionary technology leader who made many enemies, lost his job very publicly, only to get his job back a few years later and grow Apple to one of the largest tech companies in the world. I'm going to focus on the part where he lost his job and some of his personality traits that made him a horrible human being.
The truth:
Losing his job affected him in a very personal way - Obviously, for Steve Jobs, losing his job was like losing his child. In fact, he valued his company way more than his actual child, but more on that later. He had founded the company and hand-picked the CEO to lead the business side of things. That CEO ended up being the guy who somewhat helped get him fired. I say somewhat, because really the CEO, John Scully, wasn't at fault. Steve refused to function as a part of a team, and he outright refused to recognize where the business was at and where it was headed. He had grand visions for the future, but he was way ahead of the times. His refusal to see reality made him ineffective in any capacity.
I assume he felt some embarrassment, but it's hard to tell - I was too young to care about corporate business when this all went down, but I have to think losing your job in a way that makes national news would be more than a little humiliating. I was humiliated when I got laid off, and that barely made the local news. At any rate, there certainly weren't any articles that mentioned me or my failures by name. Not so for Mr. Jobs. The difference is, he channeled his humiliation down more of a revenge path.
He was filthy, stinking rich, even without a job - Here's the difficult thing about comparing Steve Jobs' job loss versus a normal person (like me); he didn't need a job. He was worth billions in stock holdings for a company that was failing. My husband likes to point out that CEO and Director level positions are the only kinds of jobs where you get paid exorbitant amounts of money because you were terrible at your job. Must be nice. I was just good enough to leave with normal severance. Guess I should have tried sucking a little more. Obviously most people who get fired or laid off actually need the job and the income that comes with it. It's hard to feel sorry for someone who built their own gold-lined coffin.
When it came to dolling out layoffs himself, he felt no emotion about it - Later in his career, Steve Jobs resumes his post as CEO of Apple. Having not learned anything in his years as a total asshole, he ends up having to lay off massive amounts of people to keep his failing pet projects funded. Even when friends try to explain how he needs to at least acknowledge their service to the company on the way out, he refuses. He thinks he built Apple all on his own, and those who worked on discontinued but formerly successful product lines have nothing to do with any success he's had. From a corporate perspective, this is spot-on. He doesn't feel anything personal for his employees. They are merely there to facilitate his ideas. And when they are no longer needed, they are shown the door. It's not personal, it's business. And in my opinion, it's the attitude that will destroy civilization if we keep going down this road.
The lies:
There aren't really any lies in how the job losses were handled, because these were true events.
What can we learn from this:
No amount of career success is worth working for a company that doesn't value its people - I've been thinking about the truth of this statement for the past few weeks. The whole, "it's not personal, it's business" attitude is an impossible but necessary feature of large corporations. If my employer had cared about all of us who got let go, then they wouldn't have been able to do it. It just would have been too impossibly hard, and they would have let the company sink instead. Anyone still there who thinks they are somehow important to the company should really get a dose of reality. If you work at a big (especially public) corporation, you are there to make the shareholders money. If the company makes terrible financial decisions that inhibit this goal, you will be cut very unceremoniously, regardless of how important you think you are. That's sweet, isn't it? But I'm starting to see that not all businesses have to operate in this cold manner. Smaller companies can often actually care about the people they employ instead of just pretending that they do.
Corporate business is a huge game - Steve Jobs lost his job publicly and immediately channeled his humiliation into a new start-up that produced a product that he knew Apple would eventually need - all so he could eventually take back his old company. What a waste of time. But I've seen it play out over and over in the corporate world. A few years ago, my former company went through a huge reorganization and the CEO was ousted very publicly. He's been working ever since to create a new company, and now that his former company is in such dire straights, I don't think it's outside the realm of possibility that he'll try to buy it back. Game on. I'm all for a good round of corporate chess, but the problem is those pesky employees, like me, always get caught in the middle.
Family comes first - Steve Jobs was a terrible father. He wouldn't even recognize paternity of his own daughter until a court made him do so. And even once he was a billionaire, he still made his ex-girlfriend (and mother of his daughter) beg for money to keep the heat on and the car running. I wouldn't associate with a person who ran their life this way, and you know what, I don't want to work for them either. Now more than ever, I'm seeing just how important family is. Even at my worst in this whole jobless existence, I've got a husband who's ready to tell me how amazing I am. I've got parents and siblings who think I'm great, even without the successful corporate gig. That's worth more than a big bank account or a fancy job.
What you do for a living matters far less to how you act as a person - Steve Jobs was obsessed with his own accomplishment. I'm ashamed to say I've spent years of my life stuck in a similar rut of dysfunction. I obviously was not as big a deal as Steve Jobs, but I wore my corporate title like a badge of honor. Now that I've had some time to process it, I've realized that I wasn't curing cancer and the world doesn't need me as much as I had presumed it did. Once I'm fully down from my high horse, I'll be better able to get a new, normal job. I want my next career to either be service oriented for the greater good, or mundane enough that it pays the bills without me getting all uppity about it. I want to be remembered for the kind of person I was, not how much money I made.
Failure at one thing doesn't mean failure at everything - This has been a tough pill to swallow. I know that right now during this period of my life, how I respond to adversity is more important than the adversity itself. The problem is the internal self-talk that's ready to tell me I'm a total failure just because I got caught working at a company that can't manage its own budget. It wasn't my failure that led to me getting laid off, it was my company's failure. But somehow, I doubt the CEO goes home at night and licks his wounds, worried about how the world views him. I need to similarly get on with life and embrace whatever comes next, while giving myself a clean slate.
Today's Updates
Today's Updates
- Being unemployed is its own brand of torture. Sure, there's all the perks of having free time, but all I really want to do is go back to work. That's proving difficult since nobody will even interview me for a job. I've applied for about 20 positions so far. I've gotten outright rejections from 4 without even an interview. The others I can't get any response from anyone. It could be the time of year, but it feels personal. I know that's the negative self speak, but it's hard not to start to believe it.
- A friend hilariously asked me the other day if I was depressed about being laid off. What I wanted to say was, "why would I be depressed just because a company that I poured my time and effort into fired me without warning or cause? Why would I be depressed because there are no jobs in the field I'm best suited for, and probably won't be for several more years? Why on Earth would I be depressed about the fact that I can't have kids now because I can't afford to?" It's clear that my mind wanders to dark places when I'm under stress. I wish I could be one of those people who naively walks around and thinks that everything is wonderful even when there's zero proof. I'm not. That being said, I wouldn't call myself depressed. I just need to go back to work. With that in mind...
- I lined up a temporary internal audit job at a company I used to work for back in Missouri. I called my old boss and it just so happened she has a girl going on maternity leave so she could use some extra help. I'll be making the journey to Joplin for 3 days each week. I don't need the money, but I'm delighted to have an opportunity to feel useful again. I loved working at this company many years ago, so I'm happy to have something pleasant to look forward to in December. My husband is a saint for making this possible for me. He knows I need it really bad, so he's being an excellent sport.
- As for my plan progress, it's holding steady. I'm not being rigid about it, but most days I get up between 6:30-6:45am, do my bible study (which has been awesome), work-out at the gym, get dressed, work on job stuff, handle household issues and budget stuff, make dinner, and enjoy an evening with my husband. My goal in having a plan was just to keep moving and be better able to transition back to the working world when the time comes. It must be working, because I had to get up at 5:30am the other day for a continuing education conference. That's my old usual wake-up time, and I thought it would be difficult, but it was super easy! Score one for the plan. My husband is similarly pleased with the variance of our dinner menu. I'm trying out all kinds of good recipes and having fun expanding my culinary range. Luckily, because of my serious gym commitment, I'm not expanding my waistline at the same time.
