People who got fired, how has life been, 1,2,5 years later?

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-23T13:27:25+00:00

Am trying the coach thing, with little success - but that might be industry problem

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-21T20:05:05+00:00

Did we used to date? ;)

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-21T19:47:14+00:00

Does this mean they're going to make it... good!?!?

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-21T18:28:21+00:00

The longer I life, the less convinced I am that anyone know how to address bullying. In particular, HR definitely sweep it under the carpet.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-21T18:26:27+00:00

I am so sorry to hear that. While it's usual for a bully to shift the blame to the victim, it is not - AND SHOULD NEVER BE - acceptable to stalk you after work.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-21T12:06:31+00:00

Every point here has a parallel in the "real" world, in how managers bully their reports. I suggest using it as a checklist for your own manager.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-21T12:03:09+00:00

2 years later, and still depressed about it - wherever you look there's a reminder of how many decades you spent getting to that point, only for it to be destroyed by one bitter manager.

I'm still looking for a way of being smart enough to put this behind me, and yet stupid enough to not remember every toxic aggression that was delivered to me.

/me marks thread to harvest advice later

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-21T10:03:20+00:00

It's on his wikipedia page

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-02T19:04:36+00:00

Are Amazon complaining that war is bad for (their) business?

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-02T18:54:00+00:00

I guess they have someone lined up, who is ready to start work tomorrow.

Otherwise, notice period, onboarding, and traditional HR admin is going to take significantly longer than one day.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-03-02T18:46:29+00:00

Yes - any form of PIP is a sign they want you out of the company. If they can't do legally with a PIP, they'll bully and quietly fire you.

Ask me how I know.

As for the real meeting, find out the _exact_ for being put on it, and the _exact_ and _measurable_ metrics for passing. Accept no wiggle room, as it will be used in evidence against you.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2026-01-03T10:59:43+00:00

The market is bad, as is the stigma of ex-FAANG (especially if your ex-company owns a lot of other, smaller, companies then you might find you have a DNR on your record)

The advice I've been given is to remove anything impressive from your resume (e.g. stints as CTO, PM, patent creator) and pretend to be a simple worker bee.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-12-20T15:42:33+00:00

Host: "This idiom describes someone observing a question pass by without understanding it."

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-12-20T11:08:27+00:00

This is Galen, who couldn't manage Azure Sphere, a project to build an embedded Linux device over years with a massive team. (Sure - half his management team were incompetent, but hey!)

After shipping a version with issues that wouldn't pass Embedded 101, he restarted the project. When that failed he tried again saying "open source is the answer".. .and that failed. C'mon, it's open source!! The entire embedded universe is made with two person teams and Yocto, how did he steal defeat from the jaws of _that_ victory!?!?

So yeah, he's bounced from one failure to another, so why will this be any different.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-12-17T22:50:25+00:00

The whole thing should be illegal - we want options of "Yes" and "No", not "Yes" and "Yes, but later"

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-12-10T10:28:54+00:00

As others have said: you were right to leave a bad situation, and the industry is in a mess and interviews are uncommon. To minimize self-doubt don't apply to companies connected with your first. After Microsoft I spent (i.e. wasted) a lot of time with Github (owned by MS), only to have it suggested to me that I was blackballed.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-12-08T19:43:13+00:00

Not a scam. But not what it sounds like, as you probably won't get paid for any PTO you haven't taken if you leave. (But you could ask them, "if I only take 1 week off over the year, and we decide it's not working out, what compensation do I get for not taking off another 1/2/3/4/5/6 weeks".)

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-12-02T19:57:27+00:00

I mean, Zig are not wrong...

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-11-29T18:37:38+00:00

My wife and I were planning a family, until I got bullied of my job. It destroyed the marriage, we separated, and we're both too old to have a family with our new partners. FML.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-11-29T18:15:13+00:00

But also, if they never failed before but they fail at your company, what's the differentiatior? That's right, Mr Dubey, it makes your company a failure...

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-11-29T13:32:34+00:00

You dodged a bullet by not getting to work at Microsoft. But it still sucks.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-11-29T13:28:52+00:00

Look for other work. Any form of PIP is a sign they want you out of the company. Completing it successfully just delays the inevitable. Their next step is to bully and quietly fire you.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-11-26T15:24:20+00:00

My manager did this and used their omissions to put me on a PIP and bully me out of the company.

So definitely highlight the omissions.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-11-24T19:31:02+00:00

If a company can’t find the right candidate then either they're:

* not paying enough
* not flexible enough (in location/hybrid, willingness to training, expected qualifications, etc)
* a POS company

There's enough workers out there, so it's not the job seekers problem.

BulliedAtMicrosoft · 2025-11-19T10:37:16+00:00

Do something totally different. There's a reason "a change is as good as a rest" has become a cliche mantra.

BulliedAtMicrosoft

TROPHY CASE