I
don't know what to talk about first.
I
am sitting on a plane traveling from Trinidad back to the U.S., so I figured I
would try to catch up and blog a little bit.
I am in a middle seat sandwiched between two guys who are sitting with
their legs open and their arms crossed.
I am typing with my elbows literally glued to my sides and it's mad
uncomfortable, but I'll just suck it up and make it happen.
There
has been a lot happening and if I wrote about it all at once the post would be
too long. That means I have to pick a subject so I guess I'll just begin with things with work. I swore that I
would never blog about work, but it's at the forefront of everything right now
so f*ck it. Last November things came tumbling down at the job and it
has caused so much confusion in my brain.
I gained about ten pounds as a result and now I am so disgusted with
myself that I can't stand it anymore.
It
all started when I didn't get an annual raise in November. I was an assistant to two managers and then a
third got hired which meant more work for me.
I was silent about it because I was waiting to see what my raise would
be, but when I confirmed that I was not getting a raise I sent an email to my
manager asking him about it.
And
you know what? He didn't respond. At all.
Then
I sent another email to him a few days later. He didn't respond to that
either. After this second diss I was really buggin out and my mind was all f*cked up. It was not a cool feeling.
And of course I tried to explain it away by saying that he
didn't get the chance to read the emails, but when I sent other emails to him
the same day on work matters he responded to those without delay. So clearly he was avoiding answering the
question about the raise, and I just couldn't understand why. He was saying hello to me every morning and
straight dissin' me on my question about money over email.
The whole experience was agonizing! Why was this man not responding to me? It wasn't like him to do this. Not at all. I thought and thought about it until my head hurt, and then it finally
dawned on me why he wasn't responding to me....
I must be getting fired. And if this was the case I already knew why.
I
had this new manager that I had been supporting for about a year, and to be honest he and I
never really clicked. Let's call him
"The Mitch", because in my mind
he truly is a male bitch from where I sit.
The Mitch is one of those middle-aged 30 somethings who has moved up very fast
and has been very successful in his short career. Whatever formula he has been using has
elevated him to partner status at my company and he isn't even 40 years old yet. So it's no surprise that he is totally full of himself.
He is also one of those managers who drives
that formula into the ground by bringing his cronies from the old job with him wherever he goes. You
know what I mean....he makes the company hire the people who he was comfortable with because he had groomed them in the manner
that he wanted them to work. And they licked his azz the way he wanted it to be
licked. The guys he brought to the
company acted like mindless wet seals to me because whenever this manager opened his
mouth for something they practically went ape shyt handling his requests. They were hyper and so was he. He built the perfect set up to make him feel like he was king.
And then there was me....
From the start I smelled his hyper ways and I
can't stand being around people like that.
I try my best not to feed into their hyper personalities, and just do my best to manage their expectations as best I can. With The Mitch, everything is a fluckin' fire and I refused to
"perform" in the way those other guys did. I made it a point to calmly handle his requests, while managing the
requests from the two other managers I supported. In short...The Mitch had to get in line. Now of course I didn't TRY to make him feel that way, but he always seemed to want me to drop
everything I was doing to tend to him first.
Nope. Not happening. Especially when I had two other managers to deal with too. It wasn't
going down like that because I knew that once you start prioritizing one person
over everyone else you will never get off that damn rollercoaster with
them. Everything becomes urgent. Everything is hot. Everything is right now. And word up, you have to nip that shyt in the bud as best
and as quickly as you can. I guess tried to do that with The Mitch but this time I was outnumbered, and it looks like it cost me my job that I had been at for almost 7 years.
So when
I figured that I was on the termination list, I prepared myself for the worst
and walked in the office of the lead manager who had been dissin' me.
"Am
I getting terminated?"
He
repeated my question as he thought about his reply, "Are you getting
terminated? Hmmmm."
He
searched the ceiling as if the answer was written up there. I just sat there and stared in disbelief that he actually was pausing to answer my questoin. I wanted to say, "Spill it dammit and
cut out all of the dramatics. It was a
point blank question that needs a point blank answer. You have been avoiding me long enough. "
Then
he repeated my question again, "Are you getting terminated?" Another pause. More dramatics.
He finally answers, "Well
I don't want to terminate you, but The Mitch does."
As he spoke to me I wanted to puke. I couldn't believe what I was hearing, and I couldn't believe his attitude either. The manager that I had known for six years had morphed into a Mitch Groupie. I'll
best try to summarize the list of issues that he ran down to me:
1.
"You don't
make The Mitch feel like he's number one."
2.
"The Mitch thinks
you have another job."
3.
"The Mitch thinks that going to
the gym at lunch time is more of a priority to you than he should be."
4.
"Your
LinkedIn profile says 'entrepreneur' and that appears that you are interested
in doing other things."
Let's start with Number One. Um, I'm
not his f*ckin' wife and that's her job to make him feel like he is number one. Ain't nothing else I really got to say on that right there. He can suck my azz.
As
for me having another job, I do have two side hustles...but neither of them interfere with
work like that. I thought working a side hustle was a good thing in most circles anyway? But nooooo, not at my job. When I tried to tell my
manager that I bartended only twice a month on the weekend, he just kept cutting me
off saying he didn't want to know what I did or details about it. Say what?
Then why bring up that I have another job then? Why you don't wanna hear my response instead of "guessing" that I have another gig. It all was just dumb to me.
Now
bringing up the gym...that's some bullshyt.
I go to the gym on the lunch hour that I am granted by the company. What I do on my lunch hour is my business so
I don't even know why that would be an issue.
I told my manager plainly that the gym was a priority to me, and he
shook his head in disagreement. Wow. According to him, when the Mitch needed me
during a certain time I was never at my desk.
Firstly, The Mitch works remotely and comes in like 1-2 times per
month.
I repeat...he comes in 1 or 2 times a F*CKIN" MONTH!!!!!!!! If The Mitch wanted me to do
something on those rare appearances and skip my lunch break, all he had to do was say so and I would have
gone to the gym after work. But nooooo,
instead he chose to complain about it to my manager who in turn never said
anything to me either. So instead they just let
the situation escalate to a point where folks were getting annoyed. Communicate people!!!! This is how shyt gets f*cked up at work when managers do not communicate their expectations! I never stood there and said that I MUST GO TO
THE GYM AT LUNCH every day. And what
kills me about them bringing up the gym is that the company keeps pushing this work-life balance thing and
getting healthy stuff. But yet this dude gets salty because I go work out???? On my lunch hour? My unpaid lunch hour? Unbelievable.
But what really had me trippin' was that LinkedIn thing. My manager was telling me about the profile like he had busted me doing a crime or something.
"Soooooo...what
about your LinkedIn profile?"
I
answered, confused. "What LinkedIn
profile?"
"The
one that you have that says 'entrepreneur'?"
Still
not remembering the profile I said, "Well I don't remember the profile being up
but I like to think of myself as having an entrepreneurial spirit."
My
manager shook his head in disapproval.
Apparently one of the wet seals saw my profile and reported back to The
Mitch. I guess to them it appeared that
my first love was not working as a bum azz Executive Assistant, and that I
really had my eyes on working for myself.
That folks, was the CRIME that I had been busted doing. My jaw dropped. I couldn't believe that I was hearing this
about a generic f*ckin' profile I had up since maybe 2007. A profile that had a measly 14
connections of which half were my damn family members. It was a profile that I completely forgotten
about, and I only put it up when I was trying to reconnect with an old
boyfriend. I Googled his name and saw
that he was on LinkedIn, and I threw up a quick profile just to send him a
message. I put up the word
"Entrepreneur" because I didn't want him to know that I had
backtracked and was working as Executive Assistant aka "Secretary." Of course I didn't tell my manager that was
the reason that I put up a different title, but I did defend myself by saying
that using a generic word "entrepreneur" to describe myself was not a
sin. I told him that they weren't making
any sense and were making a big deal out of a profile that really wasn't much of anything!!! And I was even more mad because I didn't even recall it being up. It wasn't like I put up "Pole Dancer" or "Nude Model" on my
profile...so again I didn't understand what the issue was??? More dumb shit.
Honestly
I think they were just trying to build a case against me, and was grasping at anything
by bringing up that LinkedIn profile. How dare I think big???! How dare I...the Executive Assistant....have entrepreneurial aspirations???? I should be beheaded!!! They were acting like I
was working for the competition or the mafia or some shyt.
The whole conversation was starting to make my head hurt. I was mad at them because everything that he
brought up to me could have been communicated to me before things had gotten
that point. Communication is key!!! Secondly I was mad at myself because
no matter where I go, I seem to f*ck up something by being late or making
mistakes. Now the reason was that I didn't
lick somebody's azz well enough to fuel his ego trip, and I also committed the
cardinal sin by being an entrepreneur and working out at the gym!!!! They were killing me. I have no raise; I was working for the three
managers when every other Assistant in the company had one or two; and you want to complaaaaaaiiiiiiin about me working out during my unpaid lunch break?
I was spent. The
conversation basically ended by my manager stating that he wasn't going to fire
me, but instead he was going to give me time to look for another job.
"I
think we all need a change."
That's what he said. Emotionless and looking like he didn't give a f*ck anymore.
As
I walked out of his office I said, "Well I'll consider that as you giving
me my walking papers then."
And
that was the end of that convo.
That
was six months ago. I handed in my
resignation letter last week.
I'm surprised I made it this long. It is
just time to go. Things have been pretty
low key the past few months, and there haven't been any flare ups...but I don't
like the feeling of being around a situation that doesn't want me. It's the worst feeling.
Six
months...and all this time I have been looking. I have been sending out resumes
and interviewing for shyt that I don't want to do, or in some cases do want to
do and not getting chosen for whatever reason.
It's been so crazy that I decided
to write another blog about the adventures I have had in job searching. More details to come.
I do have a couple of offers. Unfortunately, the only permanent offer I have on the table is another Executive Assistant position for a CEO and I'm not sure if I'm built to do this job again. A Professional Ass Licker I am not!!! The other job is a cut in pay and is only a temporary position, but it might get my foot in the door in an investigative field that I have been working on the side for the past six years. I'm actually more excited about that one and don't care if it pays a little less if it gets me the bucks in the future.
I was so confused that I
accepted both positions. LOL. Of course I can't do both, but I have to
choose one soon.
That's enough for now. More later. Plane is landing. I'm back from Trinidad and it's been literally 14 hours since starting my journey back home. I can see New York in the distance.
Good to be home.
