This one's a long one so TL;DR: No matter how hard you work, how good you are at your job, or what you bring to the table, you are expendable to management.
So I've been meaning to post this for a few months now. Back in March, I got fired from my IT job. A little backstory, back in 2020 I got a job working for a small mom and pop Aerospace Parts manufacturing job as an IT helpdesk tech. This was my first tech job, I was an EMT/Fireman before that and took a year in between that and the tech job working as a mechanic for my FIL. So I got hired on with No professional Tech experience, mostly just home labs and the side stuff I did helping the older captains at the firehouse.
The first year and a half was great. It was a team of 3–4 people, including myself, that had a few people go in and out. The manager that hired me moved to Chicago, our sysadmin took over, and we brought on the guy whose role I filled when he left. Everyone was super knowledgeable and taught me a lot. I was brought on to be the onsite tech for our second location across town. What my boss didn't tell me is that he hired me to punish them, by putting an inexperienced tech there for running the other tech into a bottle. That location had a bad reputation for being a viper's pit of catty bullshit and backstabbing tendencies. The COO over there was a loudmouth entitled asshat, but for some reason he respected me. (I had pushed back at him for trying to rush me and micromanage, and he calmed down after that). Well, long story short, I dug my heels in and learned as much as I could as fast as I could. My firefighting/EMT experience helped me with the social and interpersonal relationship with the users. I wound up fixing a bunch of big issues they had that were on going for months, and kind of just took over managing what I could over there.
Fast-forward about a year, and the main location gets rocked with deathblow. Turns out they knowingly made a bunk part for a vehicle and got someone killed. Their biggest contractor put all of their current projects on hold and did a full investigation (80% of that site's revenue). So after a few months of trying to float, Everyone came in one day and all of their logins were deactivated and everyone was told to gather their things and leave. They were going bankrupt.
100+ workers unemployed in a matter of mins. Well, this left me with questions. So they informed the IT team that my location will be sold off to another investment group and that we would remain open. The other guys over at the Main location, not so much. They fired the Sysadmin that became manager and retained the guy that came back after I took his spot, until the liquidation was complete.
Well, my side jerked him around for months, having him do IT manager stuff without paying him for it. When he finally said something and gave them his requirements for being IT manager, they showed him the door. I told my new boss (the CFO) that I was not going to be able to take all of this on my own, and we needed an MSP for the heavy lifting server side of things, because I still was shakey on that. So they did. Well, we got bought out by a pair of Venture Capitalists, I started to get drug into meetings with them for IT related issues and I could tell right away that they were going to be bottom line people. I got nervous that they were going to look at me and wonder why they are paying me my small hourly wage and an MSP, and I was going to get let go. I spoke with my CFO (who I had a mutual respect for, and he was helping me learn how to navigate dealing with C levels), and he told me that wasn't going to happen and that he has my back on that. Well, a few months later, they canned my CFO, and I was kind of left in limbo. I wound up just reporting to the MSP for the time being.
I made my second year in October, the year all of this was going down. So When I didn't get my review, I kind of brushed it off as transitional issues. Come around to January of this year, they promote the head of sales (a Younger guy around my age, we would sit and talk about how fucked the system is and shit on the issues of capitalism) who was a friend of mine at work, to VP of Operations and he effectively became my boss. So I bring up the review thing and How I didn't get my raise, and now that things are settling down, I'd like to start talking about that. I get reassured that it's going to happen, and he will get back with me. At the same time, I was told that all my overtime was gone effective immediately. I had a long email chain explaining what I do and why I need it being a one man on site team, but to no avail. I kept harping on it because stuff was breaking, and I knew it was because I couldn't do my usually maintenance. A few weeks go by, and I start getting that shakey feeling again, so I have a meeting with the VP and kind of lay it all out there. He told me I'm fine, they need me here, I'm the only one who knows where the skeletons are buried, and they can't afford to lose me. They also hired a new head of “HR”, that was really just a corporate hit woman. She put in a bunch of new policies and rules in place that just added red tape to everything. She was also putting everyone under a microscope to trim fat. I had another meeting with the VP and HR lady about Overtime or a raise because I'm not making ends meet with my pay, and I'm due a yearly raise from October. You want to talk about corporate cold, that HR lady was on par with the Bob's from office space.
Then the second bomb hit, my psych was closing his practice, and I was going to be without my meds for a while. I have ADHD, Major Depression, PTSD, and Anxiety (All things management knows about). On top of that, I'm starting to get slammed with tickets because I don't have the time to do my usual after hours cleanup and maintenance, and the VC's want all kinds of reports and projects done that I have to learn how to do. So Mid-March hits, I have a convo with the VP again about my mental health and how I'm having panic attacks every day without my meds. He calms me down, gives me the same you're doing fine, we are proud of how well you're doing, we need you BS. He even offered to try and get me into his wife's Psych Practice she works for. So I'm okay and I head out. He left to go on vacation for a week.
And Here is where all hell breaks loose, while he was gone our main server crashed. Well It took all day to boot it back up because the after hours updates hadn't been done since I lost OT. I get reamed, and I'm the worst off mentally I've been in a while. I come back that next Monday on edge. I had a particularly shitty department head yell at me on the phone and I had a full on Panic attack. I email HR and the VP letting them know I'm using my vacation time to take 3 days emergency mental health leave. I spent those 3 days putting in applications to new jobs because I was done, I did not want to be there anymore. I come back on Thursday, go to clock in on my phone and all of my accounts are locked out. Walked into the building and was met at the door by the VP and the HR lady with all my stuff in a box. We went to the VP's office, and they told me I was fired. Their reasoning, Destruction of Company Property and Failure to follow procedure. I asked what did I destroy, show me what I destroyed and got met with “We aren't doing this, just sign the paper or don't and leave”. They then said some shit about downloading games on a company laptop. Well that was done waaaayyyyyy back when I first started with written approval by my old boss for “team building” (we would stay late off the clock and play Star Citizen). I then brought up that it seems like this is retaliation for me taking mental health leave, which was quickly shot down by the HR lady with legal jargon and bull shit to throw me off that. I look at the VP dead in the eyes and said, so this is what comes of “we need you, we are proud of you, you're doing a great job I spent 2 and half years working my ass off at this place, and you watched me do it, and now it's fuck you?” And he just sat there silently. The gave me a severance package to look over and sent me on my way. 1200 dollars is what I was worth to them. To add on to that, the PnP's charge was bullshit as well. We never had a fully ratified PnP in place. I never signed one when I started, so they had no legal recourse on it.
Luckily, I already had 2 other job interviews lined up and one of them panned out (where I'm at now) so I wasn't hurting for money. I had my last full check and vacation pay out to tide me over, and my wife had just gotten a good job a few weeks prior. I tried going to a lawyer but since not much time had passed from the firing to my new job, no one would take it because there isn't a pay-out for it. So I took my severance and just paid off bills with it.
But in the end it worked out. I learned a lesson and got paid 1200 to go to my other job. From what I hear from friends still back there, they aren't doing good. They've fired a lot of long time managers and employees (one of my friends), and added new rules that are pissing people off. On top of that, they used to be pulling in a couple Mil every month in sales, and now they are lucky to hit 30k this month. Just remember, kids, no one up top cares about you. They will cut you the min they think you aren't useful to them anymore.