20 Days of Chill 2020 - Sign it in Ink

Photo Credit: Mövenpick Ice Cream

Welcome back to 20 Days of Chill. Today's prompt is 

Sign it in Ink

Today I'm sharing a bit of my personal / career history.

The same year I left Switzerland and sort of settled down in California, 9/11 happened. I was this close to having a job when everything litterally blew up. 

I packed up my things and went home.

The job market of course had taken a huge hit hit Europe, too. I was lucky to find a rewarding temp position, and in early 2002 an opportunity came up to join Mövenpick, Switzerland's most popular ice cream brand, and manage the people who developed, produced and sold the yummy ice cream varieties. 

The press had been rumoring about Nestlé wanting to acquire Mövenpick. 

During my second (and last) interview with the CEO and CFO I looked them in the eye and asked about it.

They were laughing. "Of course Nestlé is interested in us. We're the leader in the premium market, and they'd love nothing better than to have us in their portfolio. But nope."

I had been part of the Landis & Gyr / Siemens merger back in 1997/98, and it wasn't pleasant. That's why I wanted to know. I was looking for a stable, thriving environment to work in.

So, it was spring 2002, I started my new job with the ice cream company and loved it. 

Nice people, a good spirit and free ice cream all day long. The organisation was growing, meaning I got to create new jobs and recruit people to fill the positions - it's what I like doing, and I like to believe that it's also what I do best.

The speculations in the newspapers didn't stop, but at some point I wasn't worried anymore. I was too busy anyway, racing back and forth between our headquarters in the German speaking part and the R&D and production site in the French part of Switzerland.  

Plus who invests in additional headcount if you're facing a takeover?

I learned so much about focus groups, food tastings, ingredient sourcing and the actual ice cream making. In fall of 2002 my coworkers prepared for summer 2003, which was going to turn out to be the longest and hottest summer in decades, and we were going to run out of limited editions, which was a shame because my husband loved banana / kiwi, but I digress.

It was January 2003 when the CEO came to my office and closed the door. He usually had his assistant summon me to his suite, so I was surprised. Did I do something he didn't like? He could be quite intimidating.

"So, listen, there's something I've gotta talk to you about" he began. He didn't look me properly in the eyes, and I sort of knew.

It was happening. The deal was about to be sealed. Nestlé's purchase offer was too good to decline. We were going to be sold and integrated into the multi-corporate enterprise we all loved to hate. 

Damn!

Nestlé's main affiliate that produced frozen food is in the Eastern part of Switzerland, pretty much at the Austrian border. No-one of our production workers was going to relocate there!!! 

It's a Röstigraben thing. Röstigraben is the name for the language / cultural gap between the French and the German speaking parts of Switzerland.

The CEO agreed. 

"So you're going to have to let go a large portion of our staff, and when you're done, I'm sorry to be blunt, but you'll have to fire yourself, too, sort of." He chuckled. 

Damn!

Of course I thought about chucking the whole business. After all he had been lying to me from the beginning, and now he wanted me to terminate the people I hired and made friends with?

Well, if they have to be let go, I want to make sure it's done with integrity, and I want to make sure they all have jobs before I'm leaving myself. 

That's what I told myself after I had slept on it for a few days. 

There was also a bit of good news. As the company was now stinking rich, they were throwing in some money to pay for transitioning costs, consulting, training, outplacement, you name it. Key people like myself also got paid generously for staying on board until closing the door and switching off the light, so to say.

I did two things that were going to be symbols of my mission:

1. I printed out pictures of all the people in the organization - as far as availalbe, otherwise I'd just create sort of a name tag.  When I had confirmation of a new employment, I would put the person's portrait in a binder. Week after week, and month after month, the binder was filling up.
2. I purchased a nice fountain pen. If I was going to sign termination letters, I was going to sign them in ink = in style. 

By the time I left in January 2004, a good 90% of the people had a permanent position in the food or retail sector, and the others were at least temping.

As for me, I became a coffee bean. The rest is history.

Photo by Nik MacMillan on Unsplash

PS: I still have my fountain pen. I do hope I get to sign nicer documents in the future. Also I'm still friends with a few of my ice cream coworkers.

Have you been part of a takeover? What was your experience like? Let me know in the comments below. 

Hope you'll be back tomorrow for 5 more days of chill! In the meantime why don't you visit my fellow bloggers' posts over here.

Thursday, January 2: A new decade

Friday, January 3: Beautiful places

Monday, January 6: Is that chicken?

Tuesday, January 7: Show me the way

Wednesday, January 8: Naps

Thursday, January 9: Snow

Friday, January 10: Fri-Yay

Monday, January 13: Social Media

Tuesday, January 14: Cheddar

Wednesday, January 15: Dream on

Thursday, January 16: Popcorn

Friday, January 17: Snapshot

Monday, January 20: Last Meal

Tuesday, January 21: Battle of the Phones

Wednesday, January 22: Sign it in ink

Thursday, January 23: Spam

Friday, January 24: May I take your order?

Monday, January 27: A cocktail, if you will

Tuesday, January 28: Bring me to you

Wednesday, January 29: Oh, thank goodness!