I just just heard an astounding item of news on the radio. It’s so gobsmacking, I had to stop to express my thoughts for a blog entry.

The person concerned has worked in the aeronautical engineering industry for 50 years. At the present moment he is/was working for Jetstar.

Jetstar along with Qantas is downsizing its workforce. This gentleman received a message of a phone in and called the number.

He was greeted by 2 1/2 minute message which had been pre-recorded. It let him know that after 50 years his services were no longer required; he was being dismissed along with a good number of other people.

No ‘by your leave; , ‘I beg your pardon’ or anything else – just a pre-recorded, impersonal message giving him the flick.

As a person who worked for over 40 years with people in another context, I could not but think “how rude, how callous, and just how bloody awful.”

How was it possible that a person who is given half a century to an industry can be so offhandedly dismissed! Where is the world heading when faithful service rendered for so long, counts for so little!

What is the world coming to when such impersonality and indifference dominates in the manner a company leaders contact employees in such a dismissive manner.