No, not at all and neither did my coworkers or supervisors. We were professionals, passionate about the work we did and proud of it, but that’s about it. People came, people left, promotions occurred and while there were by the end when I retired there were some old timers, but only a handful.

I remember in High School one of my classmates who was a cheerleader commenting about the cheerleader s from another school she met and how weird she thought they were because they took their roles seriously and cared about the football game. The other cheerleaders in our class agreed it was weird and some of the football players agreed it was the same with other schools players and coaches. Our school had a hard time filling out its roster as few wanted to play. Those that did generally played stoned as opposing players were typically bigger, stronger and faster. And why didn’t my classmates care about a sport they were involved with, why was it just a casual past time, because it didn’t mean anything, academics and college meant something, getting out and to someplace not dying and having a good life was what was important. My classmates were tough kids who didn’t put up with much of anything and even the dumb ones were smart enough to not buy into someone elses dreams.

My coworkers were the same way. If they got hired, a difficult process as we always had more applicants than they would hire because my employer paid better and had better benefits than competing employers, they had a full year as probationary employees and the work was demanding, so demanding people quit during training and during probation, but they also would up and quit because they couldn’t take their work any longer. I had a coworker who quit without a new job after 14 years. We also had a lot of employees die, so much that when we moved into a new building we asked about having a wall of remembrance and were told no, it would scare off new hires and hurt our retention. And why was it so hard, no overtime, work expectations which could not be met typically within 40 hours, no one covering one’s workload unless it was an Emergency and the barely doing so, limited Supervisory assistance, etc. They were a high quality employer, they hired competent people and worked them hard. People who didn’t put leave sometimes came back and it wasn’t unusual for their coworkers to not notice they were gone, sometimes for several years.

So, no loyalty to the organization. They paid us well, we worked hard. For some it was a stepping stone, for none a refuge, and it was common knowledge that if a person was willing to relocate to a different city or state and they could get a better job they would be gone after putting in their notice. As I said I knew a couple that came back after having relocated because the new employer didn’t pay well enough. And we had a lot of overqualified employees as well, at least one who had been a practicing attorney another with a Ph.D. and a long history of upper level management. Many had Masters degrees, including MBAs, To get new employees my employer partnered with a National University to have paid internships of some of their Masters level students; if they did well enough they would be offered positions, not all were. My employer also hired veterans, former cops, teachers and a variety of people with professional experience. And never anyone without at least a year experience in the field and preferably more, plus written professional references were required.

Basically my employer hired smart capable people who had never been significantly unemployed in their lives and who instead could and did pick and chose where they worked and who they worked for.