It’s
been a minute since I quit a job. The
last two jobs I had, I was fired from.
(But don’t tell anyone who’s recently read my resume. My parting from Stuff, Installed has been
downgraded to “an amicable parting based on a mutual disagreement.” Yeah, I thought I was employed, and NBM
disagreed. And it was amicable in that he was happy I was gone and I did a
little gleeful dance out the door.)
Anyway, my point is, the last job I actually QUIT was back when I worked
for Horrible Bossman (remember him?) back in 2011. So it’s been more than a decade since I
actually, you know, gave notice and went through that whole deal.
Matty
from Stuff, Recovered (the new job) assumed that Stuff, Empowered wouldn’t make
me work out a two week notice. This
assumption was backed up by Peaches, Skippy, Hubby, and even Gretal, Skippy’s
g-friend. No one thought I was going to
have to actually work those last two weeks at Stuff, Empowered.
Well,
except for Stuff, Empowered.
I took
the coward’s way out. I typically do,
but remember, I really, really do like the people I worked with at Stuff,
Empowered. I hate the whole disappointed
thing. I can deal with every human emotion directed at me except
disappointment. (Maybe that’s why I skip
out on choir practice so often. I’m a disappointing
singer.) So, being the coward I am, I
sent an email with a resignation letter that took me several hours to put
together. I’m a writer, I like all the words to hang together in a poetic
manner.
Plus, I
sent it on a Sunday night so everyone would have the news before I got there on
Monday.
What I
didn’t count on was Stuff Empowered’s really hard-core spam filter.
When I
got there on Monday, I realized that no one, not one person, had gotten my
email because it was deemed spam by the system.
Which meant I had to fish the thing out of my spam box and resend it.
Which delayed the reaction from the managerial team by a couple hours.
The
reactions ranged from HR sending me half a dozen emails informing me that my
benefits were going to end to Red, who walked up to my cubicle and gave me a
big hug. I honestly thought they’d be angry at me. Anyway, the others on the team sent me an
email wishing me well.
Not one
person said I could leave early. No one sent the security guy “Ryan” to my
desk. I had this great vision of Ryan coming to my desk and handing me a
banker’s box and then watching me while I packed up before escorting me to the
door. None of that happened.
It was
mostly business as usual, except that once news got around, everyone stopped at
Tucker’s cubicle and gave him grief for driving yet another person away.
Oh, and
N.E.W. (New Elsie W) was all broken up because she was CONVINCED we were going
to be BFFs. Meanwhile, Red wasn’t
entirely sure NEW was going to last longer than I did.
Fun
fact, a couple of days after I gave notice, Molly also gave notice. Not a
surprise to me, mostly because she’d confided that working in a cubicle wasn’t
also not her bliss, but once again, Poor Tucker took a beating from the other people in the department for driving yet another person away. (Also, Poor, Tucker…alone in a pod with
N.E.W.)
So, I
worked the first week, business as usual.
Then I got a call from Matty who asked if I could start a little
early. I was a tiny bit annoyed. I knew this gaggle of geniuses was going to
need an office mom to handle things, but the whole interview process lasted a
week longer than it needed too. See,
Matty thought maybe I should meet the Wizard before I got hired. The Wizard
really didn’t want to be bothered. Had Matty pulled the trigger the day I interviewed;
I would have started the exact day he wanted me to. However, since they
collectively dragged their feet, I had committed to a full two weeks’
notice. Matty couldn’t believe they were
holding me to it.
No one
could. Bigger surprise, I was actually putting quite a lot of effort into my
last days.
I asked
HR if I could leave two days early. The response was: “We can’t make you stay.”
Cool
beans.
Now,
the last three days of my employment at Stuff, Empowered, were kind of
interesting. It seems that this giant company believes in FUN. Like, lots of FUN. (Well, except during working hours on days
ending in Y.) They deemed that week the Customer Experience Appreciation Week.
No one
was quite sure what that meant. Are we appreciating our customers? Are we appreciating the Customer Experience
department? Are we just appreciating the
entirety of the customer experience? (Which,
since I was in Order Tracking and Order Payment, was NOT a great experience for
customers or me.)
The way
this giant company appreciated whatever it was they were appreciating was to
have what can only be described as a high school spirit week. I’m not making
that up. Monday was crazy hat day.
Tuesday was sports jersey day. Wednesday
was generations day (They should have called it “misinterpretation of 80’s day”
and been done with it.) Thursday was “Stuff
Empowered spirit wear…I mean, logo clothing. Friday was, and I’m not making
this up: Flannel shirt day, so we can show everyone how cozy we are at work.
That
one made me laugh. Flannel shirts were
definitely not within the dress code guidelines. Also, “cozy” wasn’t the first
thing one thought of spending time in that building. Not even my hot flashes
could stave off the cold. I had a small
blanket (which I used the first couple days and then realized I looked like an
old woman in a nursing home, so I took that home and brough a sweater.) And
who, exactly, was going witness this coziness?
Customers rarely came to the building and never to the third floor.
On my
last Friday at Stuff, Empowered, the pod was abuzz with what kind of hat to
wear. Well, okay, Molly and I were. Tucker, honestly, was going to do whatever we
told him to, and N.E.W. insisted she didn’t have a hat. Not one hat.
“But
you live in Wisconsin. You don’t have any kind of hat?”
“I
don’t like hats.”
I don’t
like hats either, but come on, in my house, there are at least a couple pieces
of headgear that are “mine.” And Hubby and Skippy have dozens of hats. I find it difficult that believe that anyone,
really, ANYONE, doesn’t have access to a hat.
(Okay, maybe the kids hubby and I sponsor through Christian kids charity
whatever don’t. I mean, they don’t have
food or houses, we’re told, so they probably don’t have hats.) but N.E.W. swore up and down she didn’t have
a hat. And then she looked at me with pitiful hobbit eyes.
And I
did not take the bait. Ten years ago,
working with Elsie W., I would have brought a hat for her to wear and she’d
return it months later, covered in food and bent in four different ways. Nope, this time I didn’t offer to lend N.E.W.
a hat. I call that growth.
Or
something.
So hat
day came and this is what I looked like:
Hats
didn’t last long for our pod. The
headsets were bulky.
The
next day was sports teams’ day. I figured everyone would wear Packers and
Brewers, so I went with my other favorite team: Detroit Redwings. So that was fun.
Day
three of spirit week…I mean Customer Experience Appreciation, we could send
appreciation notes to each other. Seriously. Remember when you could send secret messages
to people during spirit week? The girls
from the pep club set up a card table and sold carnations of different colors
and you could attach a message to the carnation and someone from the pep club
would deliver it to your beloved/BFF/secret admiree. It was like that, except no carnations, and
no pep club. I sent a couple notes, to
Red and Molly. And I got a couple, from
Red and Molly. So there’s that.
Anyway,
Day three of spirit week was Generations Day. Like I said, it should have been
named, “1980’s misconception day.” I
managed to cobble together a legit 80’s outfit from my wardrobe. Apparently, my
taste in clothes hasn’t changed much since 1986. I even had proper high tops. I was missing
the leg warmers, but I had tall, heavy socks which served the purpose of making
my lower legs look bulky. (Why was that
a thing?)
Things
were kind of drab in my cubicle. I’d
taken home everything already, so I had nothing to distract me from the
job. Except for my chunky looking calves
(like they need help) and my sweaty feet. At 4:30 my department manager came by
and took my badge. At 5:00 I waved to
everyone and left the third floor one last time.
Bye,
Bye, Stuff, Empowered.
Hello
Stuff, Recovered.
Now,
Stuff, Recovered is a tiny little business that recovers data from dead hard
drives, phones, video camera, lap tops, and the like. I know even less about what this company does
that what I did with Stuff, Installed or Stuff, Empowered. I can’t even fake any kind of knowledge.
What I
can do, however, is be a great gatekeeper and coffeemaker. Plus, I can clean an office quickly. These
are all things this places needs big time.
I’ve now been here almost two weeks.
I’ve learned the following:
Matty,
a former tool and die shop manager, should not talk to people in a customer
service capacity, like, ever.
Computer
geniuses don’t know how to dust, vacuum, or clean a mirror.
The
Wizard of Oz doesn’t like it when I go to his office if he’s in it. If I must take a package upstairs, he’d
prefer it if I did it when he’s not there.
In fact, if I could just teleport packages up there with my brain, that
would be the best.
Both
the Wizard and the Tech have the same first name. So, one’s Jackson. The other one’s
“him.” Take a guess which one is “him.”
Training
for this job was not at all intense or detailed. Matty isn’t completely sure what he’s doing
or how he’s doing it. So…now that I’m on
my own, I’m reteaching myself how to manage the duties they’ve given me. All of which take about 18 minutes in any
given work day. The rest of the time…
Well,
the rest of the time I get to write, blog, and be in my own head. And, once my brain has healed from the tumult
of this summer, maybe I’ll learn something about the basic tasks of the
business. Who knows? Maybe I’m a computer wizard, and I just don’t
know it!
No comments:
Post a Comment