Effective this morning, I have separated from my employer that I've had for the past year and a half. It was brought about by a confluence of events that I can now make public. I was offered employment two weeks ago down in Sorry Vista by the company that took over the contract I was working on in the last half of 2017.
I had kept tabs of what was going on down there, mainly out of curiosity, but more recently out of my desire to not retire just yet. After one month of furlough, I began to realize that I had better get a plan B going, and with not even three weeks of searching I landed something.
Upon advice of Sheila, I held fire of resigning what was until this morning, my present position. I made some discreet contacts with connections that I had with their Oro Valley customer, and learned that the new management is going to make the attempt to squeeze blood out of the turnip, and they are suffering from the delusion that they'll be the first to succeed.........even though corporate managers have been trying that for decades.
Their other major customer up in Phoenix that I supported kept trying to convince me to take a 30% pay cut to join them. They went through a third party recruiter to keep their fingerprints off of this scheme (as of yesterday they are still trying to get me to take it). As interesting as commercial aviation can be, I was realizing that the good money was going to be elsewhere, thus one month ago I initiated a serious search.
One of the possibilities was my old job down in Sorry Vista. I kept tabs on the new company coming in. They have an EXCELLENT reputation, and I felt it was in my interests to apply for an opening that emerged. It wasn't quite my old job......instead of leading efforts to test and certify HF radios, the requisition was more steered towards UHF SATCOMM....where I had previous experience as a satellite engineer.
I applied for the position on a Monday, the 16th of April. On a Wednesday afternoon I got the phone call from a hiring manager. It was a great conversation. It was positive. I trolled for information, as in has the engineering manager been identified? Have the other team members been selected? I heard the names I wanted to hear and did not hear the names of who I did not want to hear.
I then asked, "are you bringing me down for an interview?" "We just had that. I'm going to put together a package." The next day I got the offer, and I accepted. And then now what? I've got to write a resignation letter that I hoped I would never have to write.
Sheila talked me out of doing that right away. The plan was to resign this coming Friday. But then I got a phone call yesterday.
I was told that due to business conditions, they couldn't continue my furlough very much longer, and I was going to be laid off. Then I brought up that I had gotten an offer two weeks ago, and that I was going to have to resign anyway. What do we do now?
I learned that if I resigned, one of the owners would veto any attempt to return to them in the future. However if I accept the layoff, they pick up my medical/dental/vision for the month of May, and I'm eligible for rehire. I felt it was in my best interest to accept the layoff.
Whether or not I go back is unknown. I'm leaving a company that is really great to work for to join another company that is also great to work for. Yes, the commute to Sorry Vista is long enough to where I'm going to stay down there and live out of a motel room three nights a week. But the new employer is going to pay me more (they even exceeded my salary request) and I will be allowed to flex hours and go home early on Fridays or get every other Friday off.
Yes, they really wanted me. Part of it is that I know where some of the bodies are buried, and that I can start on day one and be up to speed one day before I report to work.
As for my now ex-employer: I hated to see it end, but the commercial aerospace industry is an in extreme state of dysfunction as I write this. It will be one year minimum before things change for my ex-employer. And the other issue is, is that even if their Phoenix customer restores funding for environmental testing of that new unit and creates a job opening for me............how do I trust them?
About half as far as I can throw my house.
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