Hello. I have a question for anyone in hiring or HR at a US company. I am depressed and scared. Long post, but the story is therapeutic to tell. The HR questions are at the end. The rest is my story.
I left a job in January 2019, gave two weeks’ notice after finishing a large project. The job was bad I needed time to recover. I am an applications person in an IT department. I have a computer science degree with 20+ years’ experience.
In the fall of 2015, we got a new Vice president. He proceeded to remove all our direct reports and changed our entire department. He pushed my old boss out of the department and gave us new management. They proceeded to target employees one at a time, creating impossible situations until they quit or failed at the impossible tasks and were fired. I saw this happening but was frozen with anxiety. Some of the people targeted were the nicest and best people I have ever worked with. It was insane, hurt the company and increased my anxiety.
I was already on Sertraline and seeing a therapist due to personal issues with a divorce, issues selling my old house and shutting my IT business down several years before in 2011. I was hired at this company in 2012. They continued doing this to our department, I felt like I should run, but there was so much change in my life since 2011 that I felt frozen with fear. Almost like I cannot interview because their abusive words and actions made me feel like I was worthless, and who would want me.
The management and VP are frauds. Using IT Jargon and nomenclature to fool upper management into trusting them, then making large dollar purchases that were wrong for our company. They would not listen to us Senior people about technical facts. They just said we had attitude issues. These were facts, not conjecture or opinion. For example, when a project went bad, they targeted a junior person. He had nothing to do with this 600k project and had only been in IT for a little over 2 years. It was all upper management.
In February of 2018 it was my turn. They tried to fire me on an attitude issue: I told my new boss "at least I had a working relationship with my old boss" when I was trying to tell him that a system was down and I had to work on it instead of the other low priority thing he told me to work on.
He said to me "does anybody even use that application". I told him that I had 30 helpdesk tickets and two people stopped by my desk. He said, "how can I be aware of all the helpdesk tickets". I told him "I am telling you now…" and then proceeded to say the above comment about my old boss out of frustration. There were others around, so he was embarrassed and started the proceedings to discipline me.
This anecdote is an example of how conversations go around and around with him. This is the first time I said something out of irritation. This was what he was waiting for. He proceeded to take me to a conference room and tell me I did not belong in an IT department. Also, that I was no good at my job and other hurtful untrue things. I told him I did not trust him and mentioned how he targeted others in my department. He dismissed that and wrote me up. He told me I had a meeting with HR for the next day, he then sent me home.
In the HR meeting we were around a small round table, my VP on my right (douche-bag), the VP of HR on my left (I have known her for 6 years since she was a director when I was first hired) and my boss across from me.
My boss started with his song and dance and then went into how I did not trust him. I agreed. I mentioned the same issues I told him the day prior as to how he treated the past employees and how he avoids prioritizing issues.
He looked at me with surprise that I would be that candid about the issue, I think he was expecting me to deny it. No way, I stood behind everything I said, and still do.
He proceeded to jump across the table at me with his hands on the table feet from me and yelled "I'm going to make you love me!". The VP of HR jumped in her seat, my VP sat there stone cold and did not say anything. I started getting dizzy and could not believe this was happening. I had a bit of a panic attack and just sat breathing deeply until I felt better.
When the VP of HR recovered from the shock, she kicked them out, and asked me for my side of the story. I told her that this hostility she witnessed was the tip of the iceberg and I explained the things I have been experiencing and what was going on with our department. She told me I was going to make it through this.
I did, I had to go to a corporate therapist and write two papers on communication in the workplace. I jumped through the hoops required of me. The corporate therapist was confused why I was there, and when he found out I was already in therapy he asked for my therapist’s name and called him. He then signed off that I did not have to come in again.
So, I did not get fired. If I would have, I would not have had severance. Other people said that I could sue the company, and "Imagine if you were a woman sitting there with this man jumping at you saying that." I just wanted my job; I did not want to sue or anything. I was paid well and liked the challenging work, despite the terrible management.
When a junior employee was targeted a few months after me, the same HR VP suggested they fire him so he would get severance. He was lucky, he got out with extra money and got a new job a month later. He told me later that she took him aside and explained this to him.
My boss then started cranking up my workload. I was doing my normal job plus writing new code for a manufacturing project with our overseas automotive division. Stress was high. I was held accountable for all things, with no assistance. My boss avoided me and would not let anyone help me. This new project was worth 200 million in revenue for the company and I had no help from my department. I had a good relationship with the engineers on the project, just no support from my management.
The project was going live in January of 2019. I had to go to China in the fall of 2018 and balance my workload while overseas, still responsible for my normal job. As we got closer to the project go live in January, I was working all day in the office, and supporting China at night.
They were screwing with my security access to building areas and the servers as well, claiming I was accidentally removed from access lists. This made it harder to do my job and added to stress. I got my rights returned: but message received. When things like this happened, it was always an "accident" that only affected me.
My parents were worried for me, I was starting to come apart, and was not acting like myself. At thanksgiving they saw me and worried and called often to see if I was OK. After Christmas they called me almost daily.
My other coworkers were going through their own personal hell. A senior coworker left around thanksgiving since they were threatening to outsource his job as a senior DBA.
The junior coworker blamed for the $600k project quit around Christmas before the blame was fully rested on him. I finished the project in China and got a thumbs up from the engineers when the software was proven in early January. I gave my two weeks’ notice.
I continued to assist, train and gratefully shared all knowledge of the systems in the company. I did not have a new job but being single and not having a family I had the money to be unemployed for a while.
When I left, I spent 3 weeks on the couch sleeping and relaxing. I started to feel better. 3 months into it I felt even better. I got off Sertraline and rode my motorcycles daily when the weather warmed up, caught up on home repairs and felt better than I had in 10 years.
In the interim while I was gone, the other junior employee and senior infrastructure employee left. The only original employee still working in IT at this company is an older director close to retirement. He is there just for someone to blame in case something goes wrong.
So, here is the HR question:
I started looking for a job. I sent out resumes. Not one interview. I kept it up and I got no call backs. Nothing. Just dead air. I re-wrote my resume over and over still nothing. Even recruiters that approached me blew me off.
In July of 2019 I started a business and called old customers. Some needed help but not all. They have existing service providers or hired internal IT staff.
I am paying the bills barely, but this will not be sustainable as is. Luckily, I have lived beneath my means for years, so I do not have debt or high expenses. The business climate is different, so I am adjusting and hoping that things take off. Healthcare is getting expensive; I am worrying about that too.
I started sending resumes now in the month of September and I am getting the same lack of response. It worries me that I am not getting any interviews phone or in person.
Is there something I am missing? It is one thing not to get a job, but to not get any response is terrifying. It is like I do not exist.
I am 45 years old, I have two college degrees, 20+ years of experience. I’m in the Computer field. I have never had this issue. I normally have recruiters beating down the door.
Is it the gap in the resume? I try to explain in cover letters without going into anything about my old job. I just talk about needing time off and having the resources to do so. Do they think I was in Jail, or took a job and got fired and I am not reporting it?
What can I do? How do I overcome this? I have 20+ years to go and I feel like my career is over. I feel like I am over. Through all the crap life has put me through, I always had a job. I have been employed since I had a paper route, and sometimes I had more than one job when I was younger.
Thanks for listening.
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i need to vent about something 
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