This reminds me of an encounter with our department's director recently at an "all hands" meeting at my current gig. My company has been under financial pressur

This reminds me of an encounter with our department's director recently at an "all hands" meeting at my current gig. My company has been under financial pressure for the past few years, and there have been reorgs, layoffs, fewer promotions, and weaker merit raises. To answer complaints about all of this, particularly in the case of those who didn't get promotions they felt they deserved, he said, bluntly: "You are responsible for your own careers." To paraphrase Lone Watie from The Outlaw Josey Wales, I thought about his words. "You are responsible." And when I had thought about them enough, I decided to find a new job.