Patricia

Patricia, 54, was forced to train her Indian replacement before she was laid off from her job in data consulting. It took her almost a year to find a new job, and she had to take a 10 percent pay cut to do the same work as before. Pat knows that her current job could be outsourced as well and no longer feels her future is secure.

My Story
When most people think of outsourcing, they assume that jobs have been sent overseas or across the border. However, when I was laid off by Siemens, Tata Consulting Services of India brought my replacement to the United States with a L1 visa. The visa-holders that replaced me sit at my old desk, answer my old phone, and work on the same systems and programs I did…but for one-third the cost.

This was the most humiliating experience of my life. We lost our jobs, and we were forced to train our replacements. One individual only had one week of basic programmer training prior to arriving in the United States.

I’ve been told to update my skills to become more marketable, yet I hold a master’s degree and have the highest certification possible for my programming specialty. My job still exists, but my salary does not. No training class can help me find a job when the bottom line is cheap labor.

After a year, I began working again. I’ve taken a pay cut and a benefit reduction to do the same work at another company. I drive farther to my new job. I know that I could go through the ordeal again at any time. I’ve become very cautious since my job was outsourced.

The jobs that we lost at Siemens are not what President Bush calls “jobs nobody wants.” No American should be forced to train their foreign replacement one day and file for unemployment the next.