The irony is I don't even like carrots.

Dragging my ass into work today was a chore. I used to get up excited about what I was doing and proud of the company I was working for. Now my only motivation is the five figure carrot that is my severance package, that is still four months away.

Because the floor I work on is going to be closed I decided to look through some of my old files to see what's worth keeping when I have to move my office up to whatever temporary closet I'm going to be stuck in for my last three months. In the course of doing this I found an old marketing package that the old companies website was based on. Reading through it makes me angry for what has happened to this place.

Tell me what a company believes — and I'll tell you what kind of company you're working with.

We believe that achieving a long-term vision requires a leap of imagination, a willingness to take risks and freedom from the demands of short-term gain.

We believe in our people. We believe that a company can have a soul. We believe that relationships built on trust and respect are the foundation of success. At Lignum, we believe that profit should be a result — not a motivation.

In my opinion, it's the people and the culture that distinguish Lignum from other companies. The culture is to hire good people, empower them to do their jobs, then get out of their way and let them do what they were hired to do. This arrangement has a double-barreled effect. It enables us to retain our good people and it makes it easier to attract good people when new opportunites arise.

Now the good people are leaving as quickly as they can manage. Some people have quit without even lining up new job. The only motivation left is the money. No one is here for love of the company anymore. For this new company the path of least resistance to short-term gain is the only path. Everything is steeped in bureaucracy and I cannot do what I was hired to do. Everything that was great about the place I used to work is gone. And when I get up in the morning now it is with a feeling of dread. Where I used to imagine what I could build and felt pride in what I did, I now consider what is the minimum I need to do while killing another day as I wait for my carrot.

This is what ordinary is. This is typical mediocrity. Whenever I have brushed up against the ordinary and mediocre, by choice or by accident, it has always gone badly. I can't do it. I don't know how I'm going to keep my head together for the next four months.