Employers Are Baffled as U.S. Benefits End and Jobs Go Begging

[DFW]

39. Things must be different all over the place back there.

My elder daughter, who lives in the U.S., lost her job a few years ago when her employer (Lord & Taylor) went bust about 3 years ago. She went back out and looked for a similar job, found a prospective employer, asked for more money than she was getting before, and got it.

My outfit in Dallas only has about 500 employees worldwide, but we are still (selectively) hiring, and we have extremely low job turnover at any level. Most people age 40 or over have been there their whole working lives. I think I hold the record. I was recruited when I was 23, and there were about 14 of us working out of one office. I'm now 69, and we have a dozen or so offices worldwide. We also have a caring top level group, who makes sure everyone makes a decent living, and provides small perks to all where possible. Example--since we opened the office in Hong Kong, we rotate the people occasionally sent there for conferences, so that a maximum of people who would never be able to afford to see Hong Kong on their own get to do it on the company dime. There is also the little stuff, like yearly BBQs and monthly birthday parties for everybody, but when you talk 500 people, it's no longer small change. When the spouses or children of employees get seriously ill, vacation rules go out the window, and the rule becomes "take all the time you need." No one abuses it, because they don't want to mess it up for anyone else, or, in case they really need it, for themselves. Not social-ist, but very social.

We're obviously not typical, but definitely proof that stereotypes don't apply universally by any means. I promise you, I would not have stuck around for 46 years if I didn't like the job or the people I work with.