Were you laid off? Did you get 6-12 months severance pay? Have you spoken with your lawyer? Being replaced by the guy you trained seems to border on an the edge of the law.
At least here in Canada, employees have quite a few rights, but they're not very good about putting them into practice. I think that apathy rules the roost with a healthy dose of "don't disturb the sh*t" as rationalization.
Being laid off when a company is under financial hardship is very different from being laid off and supplanted in one fell swoop.
*** The following is for everyone: *** If you haven't talked to a lawyer or two, I'd get on the phone. Start mailing out resumes with a similar salary range and keep copies of everything that you mail / fax / e-mail. If you've been out of work for two or three months, start looking for some night courses or PD courses that you can take to improve your employability. Basically, mitigate the problem of being laid off.
If you get to court and the judge sees that you've been mailing 15 resumes / week and that you've enrolled in the newest MS Sys Admin course (and it still took you 6 months to find a job), then he'll see that you are trying. If he then sees that you've been slashed and replaced by a lower-paid employee as a direct result of your own hard work, then your ex-company looks even worse.
Severance pay for senior employees can range into a year of full pay (or beyond, look at Carly Fiorina from HP). That's a lot of money, and you can even make that money when you're working your next job! If you are asked by the next prospective employer the reasons you've got an outstanding court case, tell them, give them the stuff that's already public court knowledge. Make it clear that you were unjustly turfed. If the prospect balks, then he's probably not the manager for which you are searching.
The other big thing (at least in Canada) is EI. If I can prove that I need to go back to school to upgrade my skills (b/c I've been looking for 6 months). Then it's way easier for EI to justify this decision and to help fund my schooling.
I could go on about the stupid things I've seen people let slide. But I'm already ranting. If you lose your job, you already have a new one: find another job. Job hunting is a full-time job, go through all of the processes: visit appropriate government agencies (so they know you're looking), talk to your lawyer, your accountant, your previous employer(s), your friends and old work colleagues, track all of your paperwork, look into schooling options and be prepared.
I'm an MS guy, through and through and I won't deny that MS has pushed it's weight around in what would be regarded as an illegal fashion. Their standards modifications have been a thorn even for MS developers. My real worry is how far MS can be pushed. I'm completely behind forcing MS to acknowledge a few standards and I really hope that's what we'll see with IE 7 and Office 12. OTOH, it seems to me that bundling Media and Internet software is pretty much required these days for any OS.
My deep worry is that MS has the ultimate trump card here. MS maintains 2 years staff salary in cash! That means that they could turn off the lights tomorrow and give all of their staff an excellent severance package. Of course, this would destroy the IT world as we know it.
The EU is making it difficult and expensive for MS to do business in Europe. What if MS simply decides to leave Europe to the Linux gurus? At USD 3Mil / day, it's not going to take long before the EU market is no longer profitable. And then the EU won't have an issue or a lawsuit and they won't have Windows either (for better or for worse). Then what happens when Mac is given the same treatment (10 years from now), after it becomes market leader?
Yes, this documentation release is definitely uncalled for, they don't have my support. But the EU is simply siphoning money from a ready source while asking MS for trade secrets, so they don't really have my support either. I think that MS should simply withdraw from the European market and leave the EU to their own designs.
Imagine Europe if MS stopped producing tomorrow. Imagine the world if MS stopped producing tomorrow.
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Were you laid off? Did you get 6-12 months severance pay? Have you spoken with your lawyer? Being replaced by the guy you trained seems to border on an the edge of the law.
At least here in Canada, employees have quite a few rights, but they're not very good about putting them into practice. I think that apathy rules the roost with a healthy dose of "don't disturb the sh*t" as rationalization.
Being laid off when a company is under financial hardship is very different from being laid off and supplanted in one fell swoop.
*** The following is for everyone: ***
If you haven't talked to a lawyer or two, I'd get on the phone. Start mailing out resumes with a similar salary range and keep copies of everything that you mail / fax / e-mail. If you've been out of work for two or three months, start looking for some night courses or PD courses that you can take to improve your employability. Basically, mitigate the problem of being laid off.
If you get to court and the judge sees that you've been mailing 15 resumes / week and that you've enrolled in the newest MS Sys Admin course (and it still took you 6 months to find a job), then he'll see that you are trying. If he then sees that you've been slashed and replaced by a lower-paid employee as a direct result of your own hard work, then your ex-company looks even worse.
Severance pay for senior employees can range into a year of full pay (or beyond, look at Carly Fiorina from HP). That's a lot of money, and you can even make that money when you're working your next job! If you are asked by the next prospective employer the reasons you've got an outstanding court case, tell them, give them the stuff that's already public court knowledge. Make it clear that you were unjustly turfed. If the prospect balks, then he's probably not the manager for which you are searching.
The other big thing (at least in Canada) is EI. If I can prove that I need to go back to school to upgrade my skills (b/c I've been looking for 6 months). Then it's way easier for EI to justify this decision and to help fund my schooling.
I could go on about the stupid things I've seen people let slide. But I'm already ranting. If you lose your job, you already have a new one: find another job. Job hunting is a full-time job, go through all of the processes: visit appropriate government agencies (so they know you're looking), talk to your lawyer, your accountant, your previous employer(s), your friends and old work colleagues, track all of your paperwork, look into schooling options and be prepared.
Good luck Guru Gamer
I'm an MS guy, through and through and I won't deny that MS has pushed it's weight around in what would be regarded as an illegal fashion. Their standards modifications have been a thorn even for MS developers. My real worry is how far MS can be pushed. I'm completely behind forcing MS to acknowledge a few standards and I really hope that's what we'll see with IE 7 and Office 12. OTOH, it seems to me that bundling Media and Internet software is pretty much required these days for any OS.
My deep worry is that MS has the ultimate trump card here. MS maintains 2 years staff salary in cash! That means that they could turn off the lights tomorrow and give all of their staff an excellent severance package. Of course, this would destroy the IT world as we know it.
The EU is making it difficult and expensive for MS to do business in Europe. What if MS simply decides to leave Europe to the Linux gurus? At USD 3Mil / day, it's not going to take long before the EU market is no longer profitable. And then the EU won't have an issue or a lawsuit and they won't have Windows either (for better or for worse). Then what happens when Mac is given the same treatment (10 years from now), after it becomes market leader?
Yes, this documentation release is definitely uncalled for, they don't have my support. But the EU is simply siphoning money from a ready source while asking MS for trade secrets, so they don't really have my support either. I think that MS should simply withdraw from the European market and leave the EU to their own designs.
Imagine Europe if MS stopped producing tomorrow.
Imagine the world if MS stopped producing tomorrow.