When One Door Closes

As someone whose professional career has been spent as a contracted employee for the federal government, this is the first time a government shutdown has directly affected me; in the words of my fifth grade teacher Mrs. Luftig, boy did I get a doozy. Usually when shutdowns happened, the military and contracted employees would still be able to come into the office. For every other shutdown, the contract I was on was fully funded, which meant business as usual. This time that lovely contract roulette wheel did not land in my favor. The contract I was on ended, and the new one was not in place when the clock struck twelve on October first.

To their credit, our organization's chief, an Air Force Lieutenant Colonel, and his government counterpart (AKA Blue Falcon), tried to exercise a six month extension to ensure we maintained the same pay and more importantly, to prevent future contract issues occuring when the fiscal year ended. This attempt was a roller coaster in itself, with a discussion of their intent shared after a staff meeting in May, and continued reassurance that we would hear something in the months ahead. First, we were supposed to hear an update on the extension by June, then July. In July I traveled to Guam with the government counterpart and one of our test directors. One morning, the government guy came down to the hotel lobby looking dismayed. "I wish I hadn't checked my email," he said. I sensed this was about an change in the new contract, but I also knew as a contracted employee I couldn't outright ask for more information. By the time August came around and we were less than two months from the contract's end, skepticism rose, hope plummeted, and lunchtime chatter on the front porch of the extended trailer where we worked became more and more disgruntled. We speculated on the changes being negotiated, which positions would be cut, and which ones on the team would be kicked off the island.

I also got updates from my manager who trusted me as the next in line whenever he was out of the office, or needed to sit down with me and pass on information that couldn't be widely shared. The contract extension discussions had gone south because the company and the government could not come to an agreement. The company wanted to eliminate certain employees, and the government wanted the company to receive less overhead from the contract. My manager had offered multiple solutions. We could take paycuts if certain employees worked 35 hours a week, the minimum allowed for employees to continue to receive full time benefits. His goal was to keep as many people there as we could as the work we had done that year was more than we had ever done in the span of a year, or when considering the pandemic, multiple years. As much as he tried, nothing stuck. One day he entered my office, shut the door, sat down and said, "The contract is fucked."

From what we knew, my manager's position would be eliminated. Our technical editor, the person who laid eyes on every written report our organization was supposed to deliver, was also eliminated. The facilities manager position was amended to include a 60 pound lifting requirement, knowing that the guy who had held the job for over 20 years had a 10 pound limit due to health issues. The individuals in these positions were the oldest members of our team, but age discrimination doesn't come into play when everyone loses their job at the end of a contract. There is no penalty for not asking these people to return, and no penalty for eliminating their jobs or adding requirements. This is a tangent in the story, but my inner justice warrior felt compelled to mention it anyway.

We learned there would be a 30% cut in funding and the addition of an "engineer type," because when you're cutting that much, it only makes sense to add a highly specialized and high salaried position to the team.

In our final month at work, morale was in the toilet. The government guy, bless his heart, threw a short notice that we would have a lunchtime cookout. Cookouts were popular because we had acquired a few grills on our site, our location was very much a "by invitation only" setting. There would be no surprise drop ins by high ranking individuals because one had to get through two controlled gates to reach our site. That said, some of the freedoms we enjoyed got nixed in the recent months. Our permission to telework one day a week was no more, our work hours became constrained, and no contractors were allowed to enter the trailer or lock up for the night. We also weren't allowed to work the grill for cookouts. Our subsequent non-cookouts meant cold fried chicken from Royal Farms and whatever else anyone could bring in after preparing it from home. For this short notice affair, I asked if we'd be allowed to use the grill. The answer was yes, and I took that as an indication of our impending doom.

The company contacted me for a couple of reasons unrelated to my job ending. For my three year company anniversary, I received a congratulatory email message including a code for $175 in company funny money to buy company-branded merch from their company store site. How timely, I thought, I have money to spend on something advertising a company I won't be working for much longer. Couldn't I just get the money? All they could say was no. I replied:

Is there any way to convert this to money as I am about to be laid off this Tuesday -- the contract I am on is ending and money would be more useful than {company} merch.

The answer, which was dressed up in sympathy and understanding, was (of course), no. The Monday before my last day I picked a set of over-the-ear company-branded headphones that would use up most of the $175 without going over the designated amount, and I ordered them. Yes, the value was inflated (I checked the price of the non-company-branded version of the headphones), and yes, I already had a pretty good set of over-the-ear headphones that worked fine, but this is capitalism, isn't it? Even if you don't want or need the thing, we will compel you to get the thing. I selected two day shipping. Do you think my unneeded but ordered anyway three year anniversary reward over-the-ear company-branded headphones ever arrived? If you said no, you'd be correct.

The next insult to injury was another company message received exactly one week before our contract was due to end, informing me that I had been nominated for the company's “People Powering Possible,” which was described as a series where we highlight and celebrate interesting, diverse and impactful employees through short profiles published on LinkedIn. I'd seen these profiles before, they would feature a nice headshot of the individual with their first name, last initial (Severance innie style) and a quote. Oh, so I was expected to use my personal social media profile to advertise for the company. Cool, cool. I replied:

Thanks for reaching out but my contract is ending on 30 September so I won't be a {company} employee for much longer.

You could practically hear the sad trombone at the end of that sentence. The person who emailed me quickly replied with her apologies that they won't get to feature me on social media, along with well wishes for my job search.

The final company gesture came in the form of a farewell lunch. The upper management mostly left us alone. The person assigned as program manager would come to our site for short discussions with the organizational leaders but no real engaging with the worker bees. I've worked for many contract companies and this is my long lasting resentment towards them. The reason the corporate types receive a salary is because of the contracts, the people actually doing the work, but we get treated like we're dispensable.

We joked that the lunch would be a pizza party, however I knew from experience it would be catered Panera in the conference room. I wish I'd taken bets because that's exactly what it was. Our company president and our higher level manager descended to our site for a final outbrief with our organizational leadership and their box of sandwiches and chips. I noticed the president had a salad from Panera, which spurred me to fetch my own salad from the breakroom, thinking, Too good to eat sandwiches like the rest of us, eh buddy? I'll show you! I later learned he was gluten intolerant, but even so, as a leader, optics matter.

This lunch was filled with talk from our program manager, who regaled us with stories of ski vacations and piping in with "that's amazing," any time one of us peons chimed in to add something. One of my coworkers said later how out of touch it was to describe a ski vacation when some of us would never be able to afford that. Right before they departed, the president stood up and let us know the company would cover our healthcare premiums for October, which I appreciated. He should have led with that, and read the room. Leaving the box of sandwiches on the conference room table, thanking us for our work and exiting stage left would have been preferable to an hour of unsolicited small talk.

The final farewell lunch for our team was on the last day of the contract. We went to our usual group lunch spot, a Mexican/Salvadoran spot with dim lighting and dusty velveteen sombreros on the wall, and sat together as a team one last time. A couple of us ordered margaritas, and we presented our manager with a gift, flowers and a birthday card (his birthday was the following day, and coincided with the end of our contract). In all of my professional experience, I had stuck around in this job the longest because I liked the work, I enjoyed the location and because my manager always emphasized that personal life always took priority over work, and he meant it. I'd gone through my separation and divorce at that job, sometimes feeling severely impeded by my personal life, and he never held it against me. He was not going to be the guy watching the clock to take note of when I arrived, or scolding me for a mistake. In over two decades of professional experience working with managers, not every manager was a leader, and while my manager wasn't perfect, he was considerate. He'd been working there over 20 years and this last gathering did not feel like an adequate thank you. He thanked us, and told us not to sell ourselves short, and to reach out to each other if we were struggling. Our group wasn't perfect, and we had our pockets of dysfunction, but it was far better environment than anywhere I had worked in the past.

After lunch, some of us returned to the site and the rest of us took off to go home. I had already turned in my keys and access card so I had no reason to go back. I had also cleaned out my office and taken things home over several weeks, a tactic I've named the "Andy Dufresne shuffle." I scolded myself for allowing myself to get so comfortable that I needed to make multiple trips to get everything home. I told myself if I returned, I'd keep a more spartan set up, something that allowed everything personal to be removed in one trip. This is a lesson I had to constantly re-learn, to never allow myself to get too comfortable or settled in a job, especially given the temporary nature of contract work.

My resume is in the pile for the new contract, whenever that starts. I've applied for other positions. A friend who started her own company has assured me that she is developing a proposal which will include me. I may return to my old job, but I know with my manager gone and others on our team with job prospects, it will not be the same as it was before. I don't want to look at a closed door for so long that I miss the opening of a new one.