The semiconductor industry is on the turn down yet again

If you work in the semiconductor industry or any industries that support it..........sorry but I have bad news. The market is now flat again. As most of us that have worked in the electronics industry, it has its ups and downs. The semiconductor portion of the industry has a 3 year cycle. That means it is up for 3 years, then it is down for 3 years. It looks like this is the end of the 3 year up cycle.

How do I know that? Simple, I know people who work in the industry and they are telling me that some of the major companies are now letting their temp workers go - all of them. The temp workers are the first to go in a down cycle. It is how the companies make themselves look good on paper to their stockholders. The dumb shit stockholders think that the company is doing good if there are no lay offs but they don't know that the majority of the company's production workforce are temps.

If you want to check out when those big companies lay off their regular workers just head on over to the unemployment website for the state of California and look at the listings for the WARN notices. Of course temp workers are not listed but you can be assured that they went long before the regular workers did.

Case in point, Lam Research just let all of their temp workers go in April 2014 so that means their customers are not placing that many orders with them. Applied Materials is letting go a few permanent employees in May 2014 so you know that the temps are gone already.

What the industry is waiting for is THE NEXT BIG THING. The PC market is shrinking, cell phones are now reaching the saturation point (everyone has one that wants one) and everyone is looking for the next invention to take hold. Problem is, there is nothing, yet.


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Companies that love to layoff people but are great to work for

Have you ever started to work for a company and thought to yourself that this is the company that I will stay with until I retire? Your initial thoughts are great co-workers, the work is easy for me, no pressure and a wonderful boss. It was only after you had been working there for a few months did you realize that in the good years everyone was happy but when poor upper management decisions went south the first thing the company did was lay off people.

Well I have work for 3 of those companies.

The first one had a layoff about every 3 years. Each time roughly 20% of the workforce went. Then for the

Why do employers think they can control you when you are away from work?

It makes you wonder when companies require access to your Facebook account during the interview process, but how about this one that is now showing its ugly head in the internet age? The company you work for prohibits what websites you can visit in your "off" hours!!

That little gem showed up in an employee handbook that I know about. I can understand about not visiting Twitter and Facebook while at work but not allowing an employee not to use Linkedin in their off hours in something new to me. Also the fact that they cannot mention where they work or what kind of work the company does............people this is a service company that does not have government contracts nor do they make weapons for 007. The company is run by people who are absolutely paranoid about "reputation" on the internet............so far they are doing good........no one even knows who they are. Internet marketing is not one of their strong points.

So why do companies think they can get away with this rubbish? Because no one challenges them. It was only recently that several states have banned the practice of wanting Facebook passwords or that you have to friend your supervisor so they can keep tabs on you.

I say burn employee handbooks that violate your rights.

Being physically sick of the place you work at

I think most of us have had headaches develop during the day at a work place we just couldn't stand to be at anymore. But how many of you have ulcers, high blood pressure and other ailments due to work place stress?

The place I work at right now use to be a low stress work place, I said "use to be." As of the last few months the stress level has gone through the roof. Let me just highlight the several causes of that:

• hired new production boss who has no previous experience of being a manager or knows anything about production. He was hired because he is a friend of the owner.
• production boss fires lead production person and promotes a dip shit from off of the assembly line to run things. Dip shit has no leadership qualities and has no idea how to run a production line.
• Vice-president does not like new production boss, mainly because she did not hire him
• Vice-president tries to run production as well - driving all of us bonkers
• Queen Bee as we call her is in charge of QA and enjoys stirring the pot of emotions on the production floor. She is tight with the VP so she can get people fired, in trouble or what ever she sees fit for herself. 
• time studies are being done all the time. As production workers we are timed for every little part of a unit down to how long did it take to tighten a screw - to the second. This has been going on for almost 2 years now but the last few months it has gotten worse.

After reading what I just wrote, I now realize I should be grateful that I have not suffered a stroke or heart attack from working there. It is one of the worst places I have ever worked at. There is so much backstabbing and political rivalry going on that I almost want to up chuck it all.

After the production lead got fired I saw many people change who they hung out with during breaks. One guy who wanted to be the lead (but did not get the job) is now hanging out with Queen Bee. He probably thinks he can get her to help him get the production lead job. I don't have the heart to tell him that Queen Bee has always disliked him because he makes too many mistakes.

Yes the soap opera goes on, but unlike a soap opera this one will end.

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Unfair overtime laws

Don't you just hate it when a company takes full advantage of that states' overtime laws and uses them to short change their employees? Case in point - Last weekend was the Memorial Day weekend. The four days following that weekend was MANDATORY 10 hour days. Normally we the workers would be paid overtime for the 2 hours over the 8 hours each day but not this time since the state only requires that employers pay 1.5 times the pay for anything over 40 WORKED hours. Just PAID hours does not count. All worked hours in those 4 days were all paid as straight time. In California the state law is overtime is paid after 8 hours each day. They tried the over 40 hour rule for about a year and then the law got changed back to the over 8 hour rule. I miss living in CA.

So of course this coming week there is no overtime scheduled. The company had that planned ahead of time. Damned cheapskate company..............I have got to find another job but the economy has not improved enough to create more jobs yet - so I wait............and wait..............and look..............and wait some more.  


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Upper management in a failing company

I will never understand the mentality of upper management or ownership in a small and shrinking company.

Take for example one of the places I worked at. They lost 3 contracts one year due to mistakes on PCBs or so they told us all in a meeting that amounted to the 3rd degree. They (upper management) never got into how many boards or what the mistakes were. They just didn't want to lose more customers so they came down hard on production. They wanted us not to talk or be distracted in anyway and if we made mistakes we were to be written up and if that happened 3 times, we were to be shown the door. I know of no one that has not made mistakes, They wanted robots and they were not going to get any. Over the next few months the better production members found better jobs.

What they failed to do was practice what they put on their website and have processes in place to prevent mistakes and to have teams and use teamwork to proactively improve the process. The customers thought that what they read on the website was how things were done but in reality it was nothing more than a sweat shop that gave

What some companies will do for money

It was in the late 1980's when I got a job working for a temp agency. I had a lot of electronic technical skills and I was in high demand. At the time I had gone on several interviews for regular full time jobs but the weeding process was long in those days (gee, not much has changed) and I needed a temp job while waiting for a "real" job to come along.

I was sent out by the temp agency to a business in the industrial area, close to where I lived. The building was not marked in any way to let you know what the name of the business was. I had a very brief orientation and was shown what they did. I saw desk top computers being assembled but not from the component level but from the board level on up. I never saw keyboards or monitors.

My job was to match the orders being made to the packing slips going out the door. Simple right? Yes it was until I found out what they were doing. They were breaking the law!!

Workers that live in the past and can't let go

I have been laid off from a number of places during the past 10 years. Most of them were pretty cut and dry - you were laid off, period. Except for one company that laid off 6 people and told all of them that when the work picked up they would be called back. The company strung them along for

Stay away from Facebook if you don't want the world to know about your workplace

Since I am now laid off, I have plenty of time to spend on the internet looking for work and networking with people. Of course there are plenty of dumb shits that are networking the WRONG way. Facebook has got to be the last place you want to be if you are a gossip nut. I thought that rumors traveled fast at work, but no............Facebook is faster.

You would not believe what people put on their "wall" at Facebook. Most people are pretty smart and don't put

I hate job interviews

The main reason I hate looking for a job is not the applying or even the looking through pages, listings and websites just to find a job, nope, it is the interview.  It is the time when you get to met the dumb shit you will be working for and believe me there are some really dumb shits who are interviewing.

I had an interview the other day with a man at a new technology company. I asked him what he does at the company, his answer was "I'm a research scientist." So now I wonder why he is doing the interview for an admin job. Since the admin job was not working for him. Odd, very odd. But that does even come close to the bizarre job interviews I have had.

One interviewer had a list of questions that they had to ask so

Why can't I have that perfect job

You hear it on the news at least once a week........a person really loves their job and likes the pay too. They wouldn't even think about working somewhere else. Why can't I find a job like that?

I know what you are thinking, they probably have a college degree and worked hard to get where they are. In some cases you are probably right but the ones I see have no upper level education.

When I was in high school I did so well that I had a teacher who was willing to help me get a scholarship to a Junior college. All I needed was my parents OK and backing but they would not

The layoffs continue

I just got word that 5 more people have been let go from where I use to work. Three of their (the company) major customers have either been put on credit hold due to non payment of their orders or are not placing orders at all. One of those companies is shutting down for good and laying off 240 people.

Another company in the town where I live is shutting down operations and

Get a degree and get a better job - what a load of crap

Yes I have a college degree but that does not open doors for you when you need to get a job.

Since I have some time off now I started a Facebook account and hooked up with some former co-workers. Some have gone on to other jobs, some retired, and some went back to school. I was chatting online with a few of them and saw that they had their college graduation photos on Facebook. I asked them if they were working and most of them said no. One even remarked that she could not

I will not kiss ass to keep a job

I have been looked over or ignored for promotions due to the fact I will not, I repeat, will NOT kiss ass.

What bugs the heck out of me is the fact that others do it and get ahead, not on their ability to work and work well but that they can kiss up to a boss and the boss loves it. It makes me sick.............

I have never been part of a layoff that was done just to "clear house" but this layoff has all the markings

Well, it finally happened - laid off again

Yes, I saw the writing on the wall this time. The leads were too busy cleaning and machine maintenance was becoming an all day occupation of some of the workers. The 2 biggest customers were not accepting shipments and the products were in boxes ready for shipping. The total work orders on the books for October 2011 were only 3 as of mid September - not a good sign when that is the number of work orders shipped in a day.

I can't say that I did not see this coming. That is what I get when the company I work......worked for catered to obscure industries or ones that were failing. Their sales staff are

WTF is adjusting the payroll?

This next paycheck should be interesting. Everyone was called into a company wide meeting and told that there would be "an adjustment in the payroll." No one will know what they are earning now until the next paycheck - in 2 weeks. So WTF are they up to now?

Of course all the dumb shits are expecting a pay raise.......me? I am not so positive. You have got to remember that this is the same company who is known for hiring a lot of people and

Critters at work

Today a very large.....and I mean HUGE beetle wandered out from under a storage unit in the work area. Everyone remarked that they have never seen anything like it before............but I have. It was one of those exotic beetles from South America, a Titanus giganteus. Seeing that creature started a conversation among us about all the animals they have had in that building. There have been mice and birds but nothing more unusual. One man did tell me that one mouse made a daily visit to the break room for lunch until someone chased it out of the building. When I started working there, all I saw were those tin mouse traps, so no mice in sight.

Of course that brought back memories of other places I worked at that had some animals visit inside the buildings. I think the most memorable one was the rattle snake

10 months and counting

I can't believe that I have been working at this hell hole for 10 months now. I was hoping that the economy would have picked up by now so I could find a decent job and not slave labor.

About 4 years ago I could have actually survived on the wages I am earning now but back then gasoline and food was cheaper. Right now it costs me about $65 a week to commute to and from work and my car gets 30MPG. So I have to pay $65 up front just for the "privilege" of working here...............yuck. That means I have to work an entire day (after taxes) to pay for gas alone.

Of course many of you would say "be thankful you have a job" and I would say

Ever get that "something is about to happen" feeling?

Those of you that have gone through countless layoffs will know the feeling I am talking about. It is that uneasy feeling that something is about to happen. I have had that nasty feeling on more than one occasion.  It usually comes on with various tell-tale signs. Here is the list that usually gets my "about to happen" feeling going:

• Management is having more than a normal amount of closed door

Deja Vu

The place that I work for now is so much like a company that I worked for about 30 years ago. The products are similar. The organization is similar and even the people are similar.

I am so reminded of my co-workers at that company 30 years ago by the people I work with today, that I almost called my lead the name of my lead way back then.

Virgina was my lead 30 years ago. She has a similar build, height and general work ethic to my current lead. Miss "J" (my current lead) only lacks one quality that Virgina had and that was