|
Tyche
|
read my profile
sign my guestbook
Name: Tyche
Country: United States
Gender: Female
Interests: Reading, writing, and searching for the next great adventure
Expertise: Engineering, procrastination and how not to make decisions
Occupation: Engineering
Industry: Manufacturing
Message: message meEmail: email me
Member Since:
10/16/2002
 True  Lifetime
|
|
SubscriptionsSites I Read
|
|
|
|
| People management 202Today was one of the most difficult days I've had in my career. To think I was supposed to be telecommuting.
I generally telecommute on Thursday. I do this for a number of reasons, mostly because I like to break the week up a bit and I don't want to give anyone the impression I'm taking any kind of a long weekend. I thought the timing was particularly fortuitous this week because of all the news that came out yesterday (everyone was calling it "Black Wednesday").
As I mentioned, three of my team members were not extended offers to remain with the organization. I think two of them are okay with the situation (to "encourage" people, WCC announced changes in retiree benefits for those who retire after 1/1/09, so there were some folks who were ready to take the offered severance package) - they didn't volunteer to leave, but having their jobs eliminated wasn't the horrible terrible news it would be to others. The other one isn't. Her name is Kay.
My boss, Cedric, was the one who delivered the news to everyone in our group, including Kay.
At around 9:30 this morning, my phone rang (remember, I was telecommuting). It was my boss.
"Tyche," Cedric started. "I stopped by Kay's office this morning. She seemed very.....angry. I'm a bit worried about her. Could you come in to talk to her, or at least give her a call?"
Of course, I called Kay right away. She sounded very subdued, not angry, when I talked to her. I told her that I was calling to see how she was doing, and that I would be in the area (a complete lie, but I'm sure it's forgivable) and wanted to know if she'd like to go for lunch. No, she said, today wasn't a good day. Her voice was quiet. I could hear tears.
I took a deep breath. I told her that I was worried about her and I wanted her to be able to talk to someone and that I would help her in any way that I could.
There was a long pause. "Thank you," she said.
I took another deep breath and told her that I knew she was having a difficult time, that I wanted to be sensitive to what she wanted, and most importantly, I wanted her to take care of herself during this time. Was she sure she didn't want to go for lunch.
There was another long pause. Then there was a click.
I called Cedric, told him what had happened and told him I was on my way in.
Half an hour later, I was in the office. Kay had disappeared, though I knew she hadn't left since her computer was still on. Her neighbours told me she'd been slamming things around her office, refusing any help and not wanting to talk to anyone, so they'd steered well clear of her.
Half an hour later, she tried to sneak back into her cubicle quietly. Fortunately, Kay is taller than the cubicle walls so I knew she was coming. She was sitting at her computer. Most cubicles have an extra chair to sit on, and Kay had a box sitting on hers. The message was unmistakable. (Of course, that's never been known to stop me.)
"Hey," I said, coming in, moving the box and sitting down, "the only other person who has ever hung up on me is my ex-husband. I didn't care when he did it, but I do with you. How are you doing?"
Kay looked at me, her eyes brimming. "I didn't want to talk to you because I knew I'd do this." she said.
"You know," I told her, "that's okay. It's perfectly normal to feel that way, and it's perfectly fine to show emotion. I personally feel that this is truly WCC's loss. You are too bright and too smart and too innovative not to have something good come out of this for you."
She handed me a tissue. "I just keep wondering what I did wrong, or what I shouldn't have done."
"Kay, you know it's not anything like that. You have done some marvellous work for the company. Look at the projects you've worked on and the value you've brought to WCC."
"But it wasn't good enough," said Kay.
"Kay, there are a lot of people thinking that same thing right now. You know that you have done exemplary work. Quite frankly, this sucks." (And there, Tyche shows her management prowess. That must be why they're sending me back to school.)
"You're right." Kay said. "It does. It hurts to feel you're not wanted."
And so it went on. I let Kay talk, let the pauses be as long as they needed to be. I told her to go home. She told me she had some tasks to do. I told her there were no tasks so important that they couldn't wait until Monday. She told me her husband had not spoken a single word since after work yesterday. She talked about her fears about "starting over again". She talked about her worries that her husband would lose his job, too (he also works for WCC). She talked about not being good enough, about not wanting to write another resume, about starting over. Each time I'd re-iterate her skill set, the help that was available, that there were opportunities out there.
We talked. Or rather, I let her talk. We shared more tears. By the end, she was talking about places she might talk to for a position, the tears had dried, colouring was back to normal. I made sure she packed up her purse and headed out the door.
I stopped by Cedric's office, and let him know how things went. I told him about Kay's reaction that she hadn't been good enough. "But I told her that her work had been good and added great value," Cedric said.
Men.
Somehow, I'm thinking saying "that sucks" isn't quite in the management handbook. I'm hoping I'll learn something better in MBA class.
| | |
| The verdict is inI could go into a great narrative, but I don't have the inclination.
I still have a job. I made the cut. In the new organization, my responsibilities will change (drastically, by all accounts - we don't have details yet). I'll get a formal offer letter in the next couple weeks. I don't think I'll be managing people any more. I'll miss that.
There were six people who report directly to me. Three of them still have jobs. Three of them don't. One of them is gone in two weeks, another in six, and another a month after that.
More on this to come.
In a very interesting coincidence, today was the "Summer Books BBQ" for my EMBA class. It was the first official activity for my class.
The BBQ was catered. They had fancy pasta and other salads and a chef grilling burgers, hot dogs and veggie burgers. They had a dessert bar with brownies and cookies and scones. They had iced tea and lemonade on ice with servers there to clear all your paper plates as soon as you were done with them.
The main purpose for the gathering was to pick up our books for the summer workshops being held over the summer. They're offering math and Excel workshops to the class so that "those of us" who need some brushing up on their skills have time to do so before classes start. The workshops start at the end of July and are twice a week for five weeks. Everyone is invited but only some people are "encouraged" to attend, depending on your GMAT score. "If you haven't been already told you should go, then your score was high enough," they said. I haven't heard anything, so I'm guess I'm saving six hours a week for five weeks.
That being said, we all got five books today. The first four:
- Algebra: The Easy Way
- Principles of Economics: Microeconomics
- New Perspectives of MS Excel 2007
- Forgotten Calculus
The last one amuses me the most. I took four semesters of calculus my first time around. I don't think I'll ever forget it.
There was a fifth book, with an accompanying letter from our instructor for Financial Reporting and Analysis. He very helpfully told us in the letter that "the world of accounting can be a bit bizarre". To help those of us with "little to no accounting experience", he very helpfully has provided us a textbook, "Essentials of Accounting", that we should work through prior to our Back to School session in mid-August. At that time, he also said, we will be given at least three more assignments that need to be completed before classes start in mid-September.
I'm disliking finance already.
| | |
| What were they thinking?Your SIL is a stripper?
Yes, yes she is. Or more accurately, I should say, Rick and I think she is. She lives in Vegas. She works (as she tells us) in the "entertainment industry". We know she's not a hooker, but we also know that she's able to put her son (and his girlfriend!) through school to the tune of $4000 a month. We also know she's able to make money at will, and her work hours are late evening hours (i.e. starting at 9). Besides, it tickles me to say "my sister-in-law the stripper".
Can you Xanga from the blackberry?
My work Blackberry blocks Xanga as well - however, my personal one doesn't! It's how I've been reading my subscriptions during the day for the last few days. However, it's a pain to use for commenting, and I haven't even tried an entry with it. I remember once upon a time you used to be able to write a Xanga entry by e-mail. I should check to see if that really works.
Yesterday, Rick and I drove to Ctown to take care of some errands. It was the last time we'll see Kelly before she heads off to Colombia on the 24th for the next two years. I have more to write about that on protected sometime.
On the way down there, we saw this:
In case it isn't clear, that's someone riding a motorcycle with golf clubs strapped to his back.
In other "What were they thinking?" pictures, I took these at the Boston and Styx concert that we went to last week.
I've seen mullets, but I've never seen a two tone one before. His hair is salt and pepper in the front and an auburn colour in the back. And then, in the audience, we saw this:
 Don't you outgrow rat tails once you hit 15? Or am I just out of it?
As I mentioned, we did go to the Boston and Styx concert. We had great seats - in the 13th row great. Most of these pictures I didn't need the zoom on the camera. Styx went on first.
See the guy in the green t-shirt? That was one of the few times all night that he sat down. I mean, he stood up even when everyone else was sitting down. He was constantly trying to get closer to the stage until security escorted him out of there.
Then there was Boston. I wasn't familiar with much of their music, but I soon learned that most of their songs sound pretty much alike.
In other adventures, we took the dogs for a hike today. We had views like this.
It was a roughly four mile hike, plus we had time to let the dogs wander into the river. They were rather tired when we got home.
They've been there for the last three hours.
| | |
| Miss me?I have things to write about, I really do. I have a great story about Western Union and Rick's stripper sister. I have pictures to post from recent hikes. Rick and I went to a concert and I have pictures from that too, including getting a picture of the coolest two-tone mullet ever.
But then there's WCC.
The cutbacks are coming. The "interest discussions" have been held. They've conducted interviews for the admin staff, but for no other positions. We were told that we might have a new org chart this week.
Instead, yesterday afternoon and this morning all of us received meeting notices. We're all meeting with our respective supervisors for 15 minutes next Wednesday or Thursday. My meeting is Wednesday at 1:30.
Not surprisingly, there's little to no work being done right now. What's the point, when you don't know that the work that's being done is really necessary? So there are a lot of side conversations going on. People are talking about resumes and job hunting. I heard two of my team members today talk about the merits of monster.com as opposed to going to careerbuilder or other job buildings sites.
In the meantime, I have a greater challenge - trying to figure out how to look like I'm working until Wednesday at 1:30. Especially since WCC has blocked Xanga. What else am I supposed to do?
| | |
| InventoryWhy did he cut the cord to it?
If I knew the answer to that, I
would probably understand Dan more than I do right now. I know we used
it a couple times, then it disappeared. I found it a couple years
later in our linen closet, sans cord and remote control.
I know you've all been curious about Dan's lack of clarity when it comes to dates for the move. I was, so I left him a voicemail asking for clarification. Not to mention his vacation is supposed to go from the 12th to the 20th, so it really didn't make sense. I also asked if there was anything he wanted to make sure was ready for the move.
I got a voicemail back yesterday afternoon telling me that of course it wasn't the 20th or the 21st, he'd left me a message telling me it was the 28th. The 28th. He enunciated every syllable very clearly for me. He said he just wanted to pick up everything that was "well, his" (that sounds like a "yes! I'll take the laser printer!" to me), and then tacked on the end of the message that if I could send him an inventory of everything, that would be great.
An inventory? Can you imagine? Rick was highly amused at that request.
But I came up with a better idea. Dan will be getting an e-mail with these pictures attached. This is his inventory:
I just want to make sure he's prepared and has set enough space for everything he needs to store. It would be a terrible thing if they had to come back for a second load. Of course, this is the movers' first stop of the day, so they should have plenty of room.
I'm also going to offer that if these pictures look okay, we'll just move everything out of the garage the day before so it'll be easy for the movers. That way Dan wouldn't even have to stop by the house. See, aren't I being nice?
Last month, I got a call from Shangri-la giving me Gran's progress report. I mentioned this before - she's doing great. However, when I asked if she needed anything, The care workiers told me that she could use some bras and some nightgowns.
So today, Rick and I went to JC Penney for bras and nightgowns. I'm going to offend some people here, but JC Penney was the best place I could think of for Gran clothes. Gran is petite and well-endowed - I challenge you to find a bra in a size 36DD that your 89 year old grandmother would wear in many other stores - but at JC Penney we found three relatively easily. And Gran would be proud - they were all on sale!
The greater challenge was finding nightgowns. They don't carry petite nightgowns, and many of the "small" gowns would be longer than full length for her (Gran is petite, well-endowed and five foot nothing). Finally we found a couple dusters, and we were good to go.
One thing I haven't mentioned is that Rick came with me on this expedition. He spent as much time sorting through the racks of bras and nightgowns as I did.
While we were checking out, Rick said, "Now you know I love you. I don't know many men who would come shopping for granny clothes."
"Anybody who hears this story - and by the way, you have guaranteed it's making the blog today - will think you're wonderful. Besides, you came with me to a bridal show and bridal dress shopping, not to mention coming with me to Victoria's Secret several times."
"That was nothing," Rick said. "Anyone hears I did shopping for granny clothes, my masculinity is going to take a severe hit."
Men. They're so funny. | | |
|
