The First Layoff...

Lately the topics of the recession, the economy, & unemployment (10+% is the number reported, but the real number is closer to 20% (after a year out...you are no longer counted, which means 1 in 5 of you are un/fun-employed) come up all the time...so it made me wonder what ever happened to working for the same firm for all if not most of your career like our fathers & their father before them...when it hit me just who the first poor slob to get Fired, Riffed, Downsized, Laid-off, Pink-Slipped, etc., was ...none other then Lucifer. That's right, the first guy to lose his job was Jack Scratch, The Devil, Satan! As legend would have it the first guy to lose his job was due to a disagreement with Senior Management in the form of the sole proprietor of the firm...God. The story of why seems to vary between Lucifer wanting God's job, to him being jealous of God's love of man to he wanted to force man to be good while someone else (another Angel? JC?, his brother JC?!?) wanted man to have free will. Regardless of why, he was God's favorite...his right hand man. Unlike the Senior Management of firms like Bear & Lehman who fell from grace Lucifer was truly a "Master of the Universe".

Now this is where it gets tricky. While on the one hand Lucifer lost his job...with no chance of EVER being rehired...much less a reference (Yes...he worked here. Start date?...creation. Termination date?...a long, long time ago) he started his own firm from the ground on...down. He hired his own staff, developed his own marketing strategy & created his own business plan. George Costanza was obviously not the first guy to "do the opposite of everything!" Which for better or for worse(depending on your point of view) has been fairly successful throughout recorded history. So whether or not you believe in a divine being, if he has a son, if there is a counterpart to said divine being, take comfort from this story at least in the form of an allegory...that no matter how bad or high you fall...no matter how much you thought you were "a Master of the Universe" you very well may end up landing an even better job then you had...you may even start your own business that may give your previous employer a run for his money. And by chance if you ever run into your previous employer & he asks.."hey did you really need to compete directly against me after all I did for you!?! You can always reply(with a smile on your face) ..."the devil made me do it"...