Today is the first day of the rest of my life ... [Well, technically the next phase of my life began eight days ago, with the unexpected end of my professional, working life.] It's all play, now (or so I'm told).
What's better than a bike ride, on a sunny day, to raise one's spirits?
I crafted a route suitable to share with a former teammate, met up and led the way to the end of Cañada Road. The distance, and hilliness, was just right. Given the lingering effects of recent storms, I guessed (correctly) that these roads would be clear (enough). A little work in progress to clear mudslides led to some short delays, but we were not beholden to a schedule.
In addition to more water in the Crystal Springs Reservoir than I can recall ever seeing, there were a couple of surprises in store at the Pulgas Water Temple. A stream of Hetch Hetchy water was flowing out into the reservoir, after spraying into the far end of the reflecting pool.
Many years ago, there was some belt-tightening during a downturn at the (large) company where I worked. My boss was recruited to help look for cost savings. Reviewing records for the cafeteria, he spied an outlier. “Oho, what's this? Why are we paying this guy so much?!” Um, that's the guy who makes the Eggs Benedict ... “Say no more.”
In the tech sector it seems that nearly every company “over-hired” during the height of the pandemic, and now they have buyer's remorse. Their regrets play out in jobs lost and lives upended—but not the jobs or lives of the people who miscaluated in the first place.
So what's a company to do? What does the company value?
Perhaps the easiest approach involves taking a hard look at the product portfolio, and dropping some. The associated jobs are no longer needed, so eliminating all of them is straightforward.
Or a company might start by apologizing and paring down the people who were over-hired.
Maybe it will focus on job performance, parting ways with people who don't measure up.
Whatever the approach, there will be a real, human toll.
Late last year, I spoke on a panel for our extended team about work-life balance. They're stressed under normal circumstances, and news about layoffs at other companies was spooking people.
I opened with a hard truth: The company pays you in return for the work you do; it doesn't owe you anything else. For many of us, it's easy to get our identities entangled with the work we're doing (speaking from experience); when you leave (voluntarily or not), the process can be gut-wrenching.
This being Silicon Valley, one can imagine another approach. The scale of the hiring and the laying off (tens of thousands of people) begs for a computational solution. (It's really just a math problem; no fancy generative AI needed.) Focus on how much money would be expended on each employee over some fixed period of time vs. how much money it would cost to send that person packing instead. Rank everyone accordingly. [Well, almost everyone. Leave the executives out of this.] Factor in protected class attributes (race, age, gender, etc.) to achieve a non-discriminatory balance. Crunch the numbers, draw a line, and in the wee hours of the morning, send a personalized form letter to every surplus person.
How efficient! How tidy! No need for uncomfortable face-to-face meetings. No need to witness anyone's distress.
Ah, well, I don't know how the sausage is made (as they say). I do know that, despite the hard truth I shared with my colleagues last year, it still stings to be cast aside.
And I also know that the company I joined on this very day, well over a decade ago, is but a treasured memory.
The power went out shortly after 2 a.m. The ferocious wind hurtling rain horizontally at my south-facing windows gave me a fright; I considered relocating to a less-exposed room, but ... my bed was warm and the house would just be getting colder without any heat. [Note to self: Next time there's a forecast like this one, get cozy away from all that glass.]
When I woke up after daybreak, I heard some sirens and noticed the lack of traffic (no electricity, no school?). I also noticed that passing vehicles were slowing, making a u-turn, and re-routing. After breakfast, I stepped outside to see a towering oak tree blocking the road. There were no detour signs, and only a pick-up truck from the local utility company positioned alongside the tree. [Without that, more than a few drivers would likely attempt to pass through. Read on.]
I bundled up, pulled on my rain boots, grabbed an umbrella and decided to head toward town.
I quickly saw why I'd heard sirens.
It was that driver's lucky day; the tree cracked the windshield, landing just shy of the passenger compartment. No injuries.
Hmm, maybe going for a walk today wasn't the best idea ... Until now, I'd never mused about the health of the massive trees that are squeezed into a narrow patch of dirt between a curb and the sidewalk. I gave more thought to the route I was taking.
Another tree down; I'd strolled that stretch of sidewalk just yesterday.
At an intersection, the town had blocked one lane to send drivers in the other direction. So, what did they do? Instead of turning left, one car drove around the barriers—on the wrong side of the road—followed by (count 'em) two more. The word dummkopf came to mind.
Without power, the vaunted 5G cellular network was overwhelmed and unusable; I thought I might have a better chance for a signal in the business district, but the whole town was dark. Since it wasn't particularly windy, nor pouring rain, I decided to walk alongside the creek. I wondered if I would find the reservoir spilling over [nope], but there was plenty of water all the same.
Despite having hiked along that trail many times, today I noticed a few things for the first time. Walking kept me warm. Back at home, power was finally restored at 4 p.m.
It's been a catastrophic week for so many local communities: floods, mudslides, multi-day power outages. We're the lucky ones.
As one storm after another sweeps through the Bay Area, roads flood and winds topple trees whose roots lose their grip in the saturated soil.
We do need the water, but ... not all at once?
I took advantage of a break in the weather yesterday, once the roads dried out, to go for my first ride of 2023 (21 miles, 300 feet of climbing).
Almaden Lake was brimming with muddy water, its shores ringed with debris (natural, and not). The Santa Teresa hillsides are turning bright green, and streams of water they can't contain seep onto the streets.
I'd chosen this route, in part, because there would be little exposure to toppling trees. [So I thought.] Next time, I'll stop for a photo of a mighty one that had been cut back to clear the road (and, the bike lane) after it fell.
With another break in the rain today, I donned my boots for a walk into town—pausing to kick mud and leaves from blocking a few storm drains along the way. Some folks are still spreading a little holiday cheer, California-style.
Posts
