There is a wide-reaching effect on employees, board members, owners and customers when a company decides to go bankrupt. Declaring bankruptcy shakes a consumer's confidence in a product. From a fiscal perspective, it forces business owners to completely reorganize their business. And for employees of a bankrupt company, it can destroy years of financial planning and investing.

The well-documented bankruptcy of Kodak has spawned a lot of anger and dismay from the company's employees. Most of them have invested heavily in their 401(k) retirement plans for many years, and one of the ways employees invested was through stock in the company.

Kodak's stock - worth $31 per share within the last decade - now sits at 35 cents per share, and one employee is taking legal action against the company, claiming a failure to protect the retirement plans of its workers.

The employee seeks personal compensation for the losses suffered as a result of the stock's sharp decline, and is also requesting that any profits garnered by Kodak due to the decline of these retirement plans be refunded into a trust which would be equally shared by any people involved in the company's retirement plan.

Whether the lawsuit is successful or not remains to be seen, but there is a natural reaction on the part of employees to be upset with management following a declaration of bankruptcy. Sometimes this anger manifests itself in legal action as the employees place blame on those in charge - and as managers, they handle the decisions that may have created the bankruptcy in the first place.

In this story, many people's lives have been permanently changed with their hard-earned savings dissipating because of Kodak's bankruptcy. Some may reach a point in the near future where they have to declare personal bankruptcy. While that is a difficult decision to make, it is important to remember that personal bankruptcy is not a failure - merely, it is an opportunity to turn your life around.

If you choose to go this route, remember to discuss things with a reputable lawyer with experience in personal bankruptcy. Having a determined legal professional on your side while making such an important financial decision can spare you unneeded stress and get you on track to fully recover.

Source: Democrat and Chronicle, "Lawsuit takes aim at Kodak," Matthew Daneman, Jan. 31, 2012