We periodically have e-mails sent out about how such-and-such a division did such a GREAT job on an event, or how there is a new staff member added to X office, or whatever. I always groan when I see one, because i know there will be 27 follow-up e-mails saying “Great job, Buffalo!” Or “Welcome aboard, Tiffany!”
it’s like - is it really that hard, if you must, to write that office or that person directly? It is quite obvious to me that you think you get extra points for being super-peppy and chipper and welcoming in front of everyone.
**Me: **Good afternoon, My Company.
**Moron on Phone: **Hi, I’m calling from the D.C. office of Some Company. I’m about to send a fax to Person X…
**Me: **There’s no one by that name in this office, so let me just pull up the directory–
**MoP: **Well the paper I have here says he works at the Milwaukee office of Ernst and Young.
**Me: **Oh, I’m sorry, this is My Company, not Ernst and Young.
**MoP: **Right, Ernst and Young.
**Me: **No, we’re My Company.
**MoP: **Ernst and Young?
**Me: **No, this is My Company. *Not *Ernst and Young. This. Is. My. Company.
MoP: Oh… Sorry.
I am literally *not exaggerating *the number of times I had to say the name of my company until he figured it out.
I am very glad. I left the safety and security of being another cog-in-the-wheel to becoming a supervisor, and having to learn almost everything from scratch. (I’m still a nurse, you have to BE a nurse to have my job, but the focus is very different than floor or even community nursing) I have no peers or equals at my job and there are twisted little games of manipulation and power brokering going on, plus an insane about of childish behavior from my direct reports. I am talking about grown women having tantrums at work and giving their co workers the silent treatment.
My boss is really why I stay. My boss and the fact I finally have a Monday to Friday job with steady 9-5 shifts. My boss and I have laughs every day and have similar senses of humour. So my complaint about taking vacation in the middle of february may or may not have been stealth/sneak bragging.
Oh and menopausal co workers… yah you get hot. Wear layers. Tiny girls who weigh 109 lbs? You get cold. Wear layers. I swear I have more conversations about the inside weather than the outside weather. Both are extremely tedious.
Well, that simply won’t do. A good admin can read minds. Everyone knows this. An admin who can’t read minds should rightfully be chastised, her intelligence insulted. If she were doing her job, she would be plugged in to her boss’s every need and schedule detail without being told. Duh.
Me Hello? Is this My Company? May I please speak with Shot From Guns? Ph answerer Dave’s not here, man… Me No. I don’t want to talk to Dave. Is this My Company? Is Shot From Guns working right now? Ph answerer Yes, this is Your Company. Shot From Whom? Me Um. With whom am I speaking? Ph answerer I cannot give you that kind of information, sir… Me Can I talk to your boss? Someone in charge? Ph answerer Can I say what this is regarding? What do you want? Me I want to talk to Shot From Guns. Ph answerer Dave’s not here, man… Me No, I don’t want to talk to anyone named Dave. I’d like to speak with Shot From Guns. Ph answerer We don’t employ anyone by that name, sir. Me ~hangs up the ph~
This just happened. Shot From Guns does not work for My Company.
Technically, even if my person didn’t tell the other admin her A/V needs, the admin should have asked. But I’d be *less *annoyed at her for not asking than I’d be at my person for not volunteering the information. But that’s because I’m used to the fact that if I don’t prompt people for every single relevant bit of information, I just won’t get it, and then they’ll be all confused that it wasn’t taken into account. Because people are fucking morons.
But also, Lord knows I’ve worked with enough assholes who punish you no matter what you do. If you ask then you’re a dumbass and wasting their time and don’t you know I’m a Very Important Person Who Shouldn’t Have to Deal with These Petty Details and shouldn’t you know this already?
I hate it when people beg me to get on a conference call with them to help them resolve what they refer to as a mission critical problem and then, when I drop what I’m doing to do just that, they end up wasting 90 minutes of my time and ignoring my multiple requests for information that could help me resolve the problem. It’s not like I have 22 other cases for other clients who need my help. I’m here to listen to you and your senior executives chit chat about absolutely nothing.
Fortunately, I don’t work with any of them here. Furthermore, my people all respect me as a subject-matter expert on the things it’s actually my job to know about, and I’ve only had to push back on one of them about that twice, ever. If I say, “It has to be done Way X,” 99.9% of the time that’s how it’s done, no discussion.
I know. And I’m saying that fortunately the people I work with aren’t like that, and are, in fact, pretty much a complete 180 from that attitude. Thus, if I’m asking them for information, they know it’s because it’s important; and if I tell them that something has to be done a certain way, they don’t try to argue with me about it, because they understand that it’s my job to know how those things are supposed to work.
Last week I had a woman asking for “compassionate leave” later this month for the 4th, 5th, and 6th day after her mother (able bodied, in her early 70s) has surgery (Elective, non life threatening surgery. Locally.) Crap was hitting the fan anyway,she deftly avoided my request to go help out in another section, leaving one staff and me to do it. (I am not supposed to do union work, nor am I really trained, I just have an understanding of how to hit the right buttons on the keyboard and check someone’s work) and we were short staffed so I delayed telling her the answer was a big fat NO until Friday. (I checked with HR and my boss and everything.)
She freaked out, ran to my bosses office, started screaming and thumping desks and crying and swearing. Threatened my boss with getting a doctors note to say “she needed to be with her mother.” Walked out of my bosses office, and what neither of us knew, was she LEFT WORK.
We were already down one staff, now we were down three. At the end of day, and Friday is the busiest, we have to send out samples (instead of sending them noon the next day like we do Mon-Thurs.) pack them, and a whole bunch of end of clinic things. The front reception staff were pumping clients in, including walk-ins. At two thirty, half an hour after we close, we still had people waiting for the second step of the process, never mind the 25 minute part at the end!
Well when my boss and I figured out what was happening we called HR and had a chat. There was supposed to be a big meeting on Tuesday with the walk-out woman (she is 50, not 19) union, HR, and my boss. Before I left I emailed the HR my notes from an encounter in December when she had to leave work to drive her 20 year old son to college for an exam. Walked out and left people hanging. Well, something interesting must have happened because there is now a big meeting scheduled for my first day back after this week off
So, its worth waiting for me to be back. Wonder what’s up. I am dying to know, but on the other hand, my boss told me to take a break from the Romper Room.
I hate, just fucking hate, two of of colleagues. And I can’t even build up a proper fit of rage, because we used to all get along quite well. But over about eighteen months the office culture has shifted from lighthearted and friendly (we wouldn’t meet up in the weekend, but often grabbed a quick drink after work, for example) to really hostile and petty. There’s only five people in full time, for fucks sake! And I can’t see how to fix it, so I’m gonna have to jump ship. If anyone will have me…
Not to sound trite, but this is where you’re going wrong. I also work in a hospital (not a lab but I do appreciate they work they do) and we’re also very short staffed at the moment. Not to mention working with a crap skill mix. We also do a damn good job of working short but we’re our own worst enemies. We cope - just - and ‘they’ know we do so they have no great interest in improving the situation.
Fingers crossed that neither of us gets so bloody exhausted that a mistake is made and someone dies as a result.
We’re 2 weeks from implementation and we still don’t understand what we’re delivering, have a working application, infrastructure or even (my particular favorite) documented and agreed to requirements and yet today’s status report shows green.
