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This thread certainly hits home for me. My current company is likely to go out of business within a month. This is a company that went from $240 million in sales two years ago to sales of $60 million or less this year--why?--because the company decided it didn't want to invest in people that knew the market, but instead would use new hires to do the sales in an effort to reduce costs without any leadership from those who were already doing the marketing and sales up to that point.
Now, I'm applying for new jobs (because this company is going out of business) and I've been talking to an extremely well-known solar start-up here in the Silicon Valley and here's what they tell me--they are interested in me because, unlike their current new hires and interns, they need someone that knows how to do the basics--and that can train the new hires they have in the finance and IT fields. The CFO--who I talked to earlier today--tells me that the new hires have no idea how to do an accounting close--much less to enter the journal entries needed into their accounting system--so the CFO is doing it herself. This company has problems even putting together the financial statements from the general ledger. We are talking about a company with over half a billion in venture capital and that did $150 million in sales in their first year, but that can't handle their 50% a year expansion because they have no talent to do the basics.
It's amazing, since they hired new people in an effort to keep their costs relatively low at startup time, and by substituting stock options in place of upfront money. Although the stock options may be worth millions when they go public in a year or two, the lack of skills in the people they have may keep them from capitalizing on an absolutely amazing growth opportunity. Getting down the "learning curve" in a short time could make this the next "Google" of the valley (in fact, both Google owners are major investors). The simple short-sightedness of it all is amazing to me.
On the other hand, this may be a great opportunity for me to go help rescue a badly underskilled group that can be an American success story and help us lead the green revolution--I just hope they give me the chance to do so (and overlook the fact that I'm not 25 like everyone else but the CFO and CEO).
And the fallacy of Sakky's argument is that all experienced workers need high salaries. Experienced workers like myself bought when houses were cheaper than they are now--and as a result, we can sometimes take a significant cut in pay if we are willing to take risks as well--especially if we have spouses who are also working. On the other hand, the new people are the ones who have it tougher--having bought when housing prices were higher and who are now underwater on all their houses--and who have these toxic mortgages that reset to higher rates on a regular basis (although not lately). There are two sides to every story--and sakky needs to consider the other side of this one.
Last edited by Calcruzer; 03-11-2009 at 12:13 AM.
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