Re. Unions
The main purpose of a union is to protect and improve its members' work lives, and the dignity that goes with that. But it' goes beyond just that:
In my younger days I worked for a small telecoms company called BT - at first was very grateful to them, they took me off the unemployment register, paid decently and gave superb technical training. A few years later in 1991, they reported £3 billion in profit, a lot of money in those days; and at the same time announced that for the first time in their corporate life they were going to the City to borrow a further half billion - not to improve the network, or to pay for the next generation of telephone exchanges or for any other infrastructure, but to finance a redundancy programme!
Capitalism is sick and it makes people do sick things - on my floor everyone over 40 was 'offered' redundancy - never mind that they were the most experienced members of the core billing system; they'd been there longer than younger people and their salaries had progressed, so they were targeted.
Whoever made this decision were quite possibly decent people at heart, who loved their homes and children, but the twisted logic of the situation drove them to it.
If you just accept that this is natural and normal and make no protest, then it seems to me that a small part of you dies with that acquiescence. You need an organised voice to have any hope of combatting obscenities like this. For whoever's left on the payroll, no surprise, BT's shaft-the-staff mode is regarded as completely 'normal' and natural, and continues to this day.
PS Re. With HCL No Surprise here!!!
Heartily seconded! After 2 years' exposure to their work 'culture', Hermann Goering's saying comes to mind: "Whenever I hear the word 'Culture' I reach for my revolver."
Biting the hand that feeds IT
