> But not for a very nice reason.
>
> Today was nicknamed "Black Monday" at the company I (used to) work for. Today the "restructuring" took place at HQ and one out of every fifth person went home unemployed.
>
> Here's how they did it. Nothing was said all morning long. Somehow, the news media got hold of the story...one of my coworkers was interviewed by Channel 2 on her way in this morning, and of course she knew nothing and had a positive outlook for the interviewer.
>
> At 1:00, an email was sent to ALL corporate employees, informing us that the HQ restructuring was taking place today. There was no forewarning. I had heard a rumour Friday that this was taking place, so we were all a litle nervous this morning, but we weren't certain what it meant.
>
> Around 1:30, our dept. VP came in and summoned my manager to his office. Soon after he left, a woman came in with two large packing boxes, shut off his lights, and powered down his computer and locked it out. The process was soon repeated with my coworker (the same one who gave the interview this morning). During all this, I was frantically bringing up on my machine and printing out as many samples of my work for my portfolio as possible to take with me. I didn't get very far before they called me in.
>
> I guess this is how they do it in corporate America. It's not too much different from when I was laid off before, when I worked for a ministry. But at least I got a better severance deal.
>
> We were hoping that this wouldn't happen. We know that God is in control and that this didn't take Him by surprise. No doubt there is something much better already waiting for me out there...I just have to get busy finding it.
>
> Gri"ya might see me in RinkChat during the day more often for a while!"shny

This sounds very similar to what happened to my boyfriend. He arrived at work in the morning to find that he had to go to a meeting with about 40 others and was told that he had no job. He and the other draughtsman were both retrenched and when they arrived back at their office, they had ben logged off their computers so they couldn't access any of their work.

They had no warning at all, and they figured their jobs were safe, because they were the only ones who could do the work.

The funny thing is, he then began contracting for several other companies, and was indirectly doing the same work for the same company, but was charging them twice as much.

It was a very cruel way for the company to do it, and we were both quite shellshocked by the whole thing. However, in the long run, everything is much better now. He had a short holiday and then got a much better job, earning more money, working more flexible hours, for a much better company.

I've always believed that things happen for a reason, and that it's up to us to treat this as and opportunity for improvement, both economically and spiritually.

Good luck, Grishny!