Individual cost of politics, part 2
A little while ago I got a call from the CAD designer who had worked for me at the last company. He was very worried about his future and even though I had left the company and wasn’t his boss anymore, he called me for advice.
He is not native to the US and was here on a work visa for years. About 5 years ago, it ran out and he had to leave the country. What had been a simple renewal became much more complex under the previous administration. Originally we had been told it would take a few weeks. 4 years later, still not done.
As he was one of the best designers we had ever worked with, we wanted to keep him in our department and hired him as a consultant.
He moved between India, the UK and finally Canada trying to find a place he could work for us without too much hassle.
Our HR department hated it as it was outside of their normal procedures, which was fire him and move on, but couldn’t give us any other solution for how to keep a valuable employee working for us.
When my boss was fired in January, one of the first things his replacement tried to do was dump this guy. I made a plea to keep him, backed up by the head of systems engineering, saying how valuable he was and very much worth keeping, and got him at least a 6 month extension.
But, now that 6 months is running out.
He can find a job in Canada, but it pays 40% less than what he makes.
If the company won’t support his visa, he won’t be able to get back in to the US.
His daughter was born here, and is technically a citizen. But, she’s 5 and can’t really help out her parents.
And, folks from other lands who have kids here who are citizens is specifically something targeted by some folks as bad.
He was almost in tears as he asked me for advice. Risk a company that has shown callous indifference to him with all of the folks who had defended him in the past gone, or take a massive pay cut that will make his life much harder and very much negatively impact his family.
I recommended taking the pay cut for a job that was more certain than risking a company that had tried to fire him several times.
He agreed that was probably the safest thing to do.
I feel bad I can no longer defend him as he was one of my best employees. But, that company was planning on firing me anyhow so if I hadn’t jumped ship it would be the same mess for him and much worse for me.
So, I feel bad, but not guilty.
He’s an extremely talented designer.
He was a massive help to our whole department.
But, he wasn’t born here, and having a kid here now counts against him.
He’s tried to follow the rules and got screwed for it.
I hope it works out for him.