In April of 2008, the owner of the company I worked for told me that he was, effectively, shutting down the company and that I needed to find a new job by June. I was not happy. Over the previous 3.5 years, I had been the entire tech department, I had built every piece of software the company had, and I was extremely emotionally invested in the company. I started looking at opportunities and chased several opportunities, but none panned out.
Ironically, the company I was leaving was an online job search company…
Finally, I contacted an old friend to see if his company had any opportunities. They did, and I interviewed with the team the following week. It was a *six hour interview*, during which my friend stayed out of it, to keep any personal bias from influencing the team. A few days later, they made an offer, which I accepted. Did I mention the *six hour interview*?
I’ve been with them for nearly a year and I can honestly say it’s the best fit in a job I’ve ever experienced. While I enjoyed working completely alone, as I had done for the previous 3.5 years, the team I have joined is the best, and smarted, I’ve ever seen.
Looking at it now, my previous company closing was really the best thing that could have happened to me.
Joey Gibson's Blog 
I have a somewhat similar story. I was at a very large, very stable company in Birmingham. I absolutely loved the job and the people but an opportunity came along to leave and help start an IT consulting firm. I made the decision to leave and go do it (made sure I left on VERY good terms though). I was there for 2.5 years and literally saw the company go from a couple of desks and a server sitting on a folding table to new offices and 3 full server racks. My employee number was 3. After the economic downturn came, our clients started cutting back then in December of 2008 I was laid-off and the company folded. That was 3pm on Monday, I signed my contract to go back to work at my old company at 9am on Tuesday. I got a lot of great experience where I was and still have many wonderful friendships with my old coworkers but it’s nice to be back at a stable company.