At this point in my life, at this moment in my career, I feel very lucky just to be employed. My entertainment career started at Disney as a temp for about a year in Publicity. Then I went to work at Nielsen Media Research. I started as a receptionist and was promoted to Analyst and then Senior Analyst. I left Nielsen for MCA/Universal working in their TV Research division as a Research Analyst. We handled research for network, syndication, cable, focus groups, basically all things TV Research for MCA/Universal. When Seagram's purchased Universal from Matsushita, 1000 of the 5000 TV employees were fired, including 2 in my department. We thought we would be immune, but 2 people were let go on what was affectionately called "Black Monday" at Universal. 2 months later I left Universal for New World TV, which was an independently owned syndicator about to launch a new entertainment magazine strip called Access Hollywood. There were some other 1 hours, but AH was the lead show. 6 months after I started there, FOX acquired New World (exclusively for their O&O station group, which became part of FOX's O&O now - including the #10 DMA, Atlanta). I knew we would all be fired. So, just like when I heard about Seagram's acquisition of MCA, I started looking before the ax could fall on me.
Fortunately, it never did. I was soon hired as an Senior Research Analyst at Warner Bros. International Television, where I have been happily for the last 12 (going on 13) years. There I survived the Turner merger (more firings), the AOL merger (even more firings), and usually a yearly staff restructing (1 or 2 people fired). Warner Bros. has promoted to me to Research Manager, and later Research Director. Warner Bros. has moved me from LA to London and back to LA and now to Miami.
I have always worked hard in my job. My motto is make yourself invaluable and never give a company a reason to replace you (not that that always works, it just seems to have worked out that way for me). Although I am fortunate to have some savings, very good credit, no credit card debt, and a decimated 401K, I also have a mortgage, maintenance payments and student loans. Without my job and in this environment, I would quickly find myself in a very uncomfortable position.
I have been through 2 recessions before, and I remember interviewing my grandmother for a high school project on the Great Depression and not even conceiving that anything like that would happen in my lifetime. (I was also 15). And yet, here we are right in the middle of The Next Great Depression. Make no mistake about it, people around the world are seriously hurting and it is going to take a long time to come out of this. And with this recession, I personally know 5 people who have been fired. I have known 1 or 2, but 5? That's a lot of people in my opinion. The stories both break my heart and make me thankful for my job.
And what disheartens me is everywhere I look, the people who have jobs and are employed do not seem to be working any harder. For instance, at the 2nd worse airport in the United States (MIA), there was 1 international flight that arrived. 1 airplane full of luggage to get to 1 baggage carousel. Besides the 6 baggagge attendants standing around the carousel doing nothing other than talking to each other on the job, it took over a half hour for the bags to get to carousel and to the passengers. I understand if there are several flights all arriving at once, but I have been travelling enough to know that when immigration beats your luggage arrival, something is very wrong with the baggage personnel. And it's not just the airport, I walk into malls and stores and I do not notice any additional customer engagement. Restaurants, bars, no one seems to be stepping up their game. What I would expect to see is a sharp refocusing on customer service. My hope is that the worse is behind us and that we will slowly start going up.
I feel bad for Wall Street bankers. Their golden age is over and the finance industry might not get another golden age for a decade or more. And a decade is a long time in a career. I do not want any more of my friends and collegues to lose their jobs. And who's to say if this is all over? If the financial situation does not improve in the next 6 months, there could be more job losses.
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