Company loyalty: A thing of the past?

Even before the economy took a nose dive I had often discussed the change in company's perception of employees. I wondered what had happened to the days when a person went to work for a company and stayed there until retirement. Sure, there were the poor jokes about “… and all I got was this gold watch” but during the time of employment there was a sense of security, even a feeling of being trapped!

Over the last several years the professional world has changed. Companies no longer offer that sense of security and employees have become more volatile, jumping from one company to another with little hesitation at all. What happened?

I’ve recently started reading the book Only the Paranoid Survive: How to Exploit the Crisis Points That Challenge Every Company by Andrew S. Grove, the ex-CEO of Intel Corporation. Early in the book, page 6 to be exact, he makes an important observation; “Until very recently, if you went to work at an established company, you could assume that your job would last the rest of your working life. But when companies no longer have lifelong careers themselves, how can they provide one for their employees?”

Suddenly it made sense to me. Companies come and go much more frequently than they used to. Customers have become more demanding and more fickle. A small hiccup in service or perceived value can result in the crash of a company. A woman finds a finger-tip in a bowl of chili in California and people stop going to that chain. The story turns out to be a scam and the company is cleared but there are some people that never go back.

To me this means that I have got to make myself more flexible, more able to adapt and move to new ideas as well as make myself open and accepting of the fact that I may need to physically relocate in order to stay employed.

I think company loyalty still exists but it’s become more of “Love the one you’re with” type of thing.

A new endeavor

Hello.

I’ve attempted this blog a few times in the past and have let it lapse and fail. I think it was because I tried to make it about school and wasn’t sure what all I wanted to say. I’ve since created a blog for school and am posting general thoughts on business and how they relate to studies. However, now I no longer feel that I can use that blog for personal thoughts and feelings so I thought I would try to use this space for the more personal side of my life.

I’m liable to post thoughts on politics, society, people, movies, books, etc.

I don’t know if I’ll have many followers but I try to think of blogs as mostly for me, anyway.