[TheForge] Celebration! - Long and Way OT

Sun Dec 2 18:53:15 EST 2007

Wow Bruce!  This is intriguing to say the least.  Sounds like you have all 
of your ducks in a row.  Keep us posted as things develop, we all like 
success stories, whether it be in knives or otherwise.  Who knows, you may 
end up changing the lives of several people....You have the confidence, 
that's for sure!
Robert

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Bruce Freeman" <freemab222 at yahoo.com>
To: "theforge" <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Sunday, December 02, 2007 5:09 PM
Subject: [TheForge] Celebration! - Long and Way OT

> Well, gang, we share our ups and downs here, so I
> decided I'd share my latest good news.
>
> After MANY years of trying, I've finally managed to qu
> it my d e a d - e n d j o b and go to work in a field
> of very great interest to me.  (The field is so
> esoteric that it isn't worth describing here.  Let it
> suffice that it is a form of chromatography - which
> you all know about through Quincy.  Until I settle
> into this thing, I won't be mentioning the name of the
> company - which you will never have heard of anyway.)
>
> This is after negotiations of increasing pace and
> seriousness over a period of about six months,
> involving hiring a CPA and an attorney working for me.
> I am now the CEO (translation: "chief cook and bottle
> washer") of a division I'll refer to as "CI" of the
> aforementioned company, and I will soon be elected to
> the board of directors of the parent company.
> (Currently, CI has one employee - namely me!  The
> parent company has a total of five shareholders.  This
> is NOT h i g h  f i n a n c e s!)
>
> I have Andy Vida to thank for this, because without
> his interest and enthusiasm, I might never have looked
> into the possibility again.  Andy has been in on this
> from the start, and we are now both shareholders in
> the company in question.
>
> My first interest in this field was twenty years ago
> or so.  I met and became friends with a fellow who ran
> his own company doing business in the field, and it
> wasn't long before I broached the subject of jo in ing
> his firm.  But his finan cial situation (which I have
> always been convinced I could have turned around) was
> so poor that he simply couldn't h i r e me.
>
> He and I went through several serious negotiations
> over the years, trying to figure out how to get me
> "aboard."  The last of these was in 2004.  Later that
> year, he died!  I thought that was the end of all
> possibility for me to get into this field!  This, and
> other downturns in my life, pushed me into therapy for
> the next year.
>
> But around the middle of 2007, I was discussing the
> field of my interest with Andy, who'd just got his
> MBA.  IIRC, I was trying to encourage Andy into going
> into business, and presented several ideas for
> business to him.
>
> For some reason, this field just clicked with him.  He
> saw the growth potential I did, and saw what needed to
> be done to achieve it the same way I did.  Over the
> next month or so, we started drawing up business plans
> and doing market research.
>
> In the course of this we quickly stumbled onto a group
> in another state that was doing the exact same thing!
> We met them, and practically found ourselves ending
> each others' sentences, our ideas meshed so well.
> What followed was the negotiations culminating in my
> writing my own employment agreement (!).
>
> The big catch?  No salary.  I will be paid when there
> is money to pay me.  In fact, this has cost money so
> far, as I've paid an attorney and a CPA and purchased
> stock.  But my confidence in the field, in this
> company, and in myself is such that I don't consider
> this an excessive risk.   (This is helped by the fact
> that I have determined I've been earning at least
> twice what I've been spending for the past few years.
> My retirment accounts are well nourished, so I can
> spend some of my savings on living expenses without
> fear of where my next meal will come from.)
>
> Last Friday I walked into my boss's office, handed him
> my resig nation letter, extended my hand and told him,
> "You can be the first to congratulate me on my
> retirement."  Despite my differences with him and the
> manager, I wasn't curt or rude ONCE!  (The temptation
> to say, "Take this  j o b  and  s h o v e  it." or "F
> u c k you very much." was certainly present.  I'm
> proud of myself for surpressing it.  I don't think
> I'll regret the missed opportunity TOO much! ;^)
>
> I spent much of the rest of the day saying goodbye to
> people, some of whom I've know nearly 20 years.  I
> spent the whole day smiling.  THAT was no effort at
> all!  The goodbyes I received were very warm and
> heart-felt.  I got hugs from three of the ladies!
> Perhaps the most moving goodbye was from a collegue of
> foreign birth with whom I'd worked for a year on a
> difficult, challenging assignment.  He was obviously
> upset I was leaving, probably because I'd taught him
> some tricks of the trade and had been of some support
> to him with the boss(es) when there were problems.  I
> told him (and only him) that he could phone me at home
> (my new "office") any time  he needed help or advice.
>
> The truly amazing thing was how screwed up HR was
> through all this.  Thursday, I requested a 'retirement
> package' as instructed to do on the website.  They had
> no clue what I was talking about.  (Turns out that the
> folks who man the phone know it only by several names,
> like "pension package" and "401k package".)  I'd
> printed off a procedure I'd found on line for handling
> the resignation of an employee, and my boss and the HR
> man were working from a xerox of MY copy of this for
> the entire day!  I still haven't got all the
> information I need, and I'll have to follow up with HR
> on Monday.
>
> With 20-20 hindsight, I see I should have done this
> years ago, risk be damned.  I'd have been a hell of a
> lot happier!
>
> Aside from being a shareholder, Andy has not yet
> officially joined the company.  Once this becomes
> profitable, I expect he'll be joining me (unless he
> comes across something else he'd rather do) in running
> this firm out of New Jersey. There's going to be a LOT
> of work to do.
>
> Thanks for listening.
>
> Bruce
> NJ
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> 
> ____________________________________________________________________________________
> Get easy, one-click access to your favorites.
> Make Yahoo! your homepage.
> http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs
> _______________________________________________
> Manage membership or unsubscribe at:
> http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/theforge
> theforge mail list group photo site is
> http://www.photoaccess.com
> Login:  blacksmithblacksmith at hotmail.com
> password:  anvil
> ___________
>
>
> 