Wait, Wah?
Shield your delightful children, Meg, for herein I curse.
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OK, so updates are in order. I'd like to give you a nice, succinct account of what happened, but unfortunately, I'm still rather confused about it my own damn self. I got ready for Thursday's meeting totally prepared to be the only employee left standing, going to all said meetings myself and generally just bunkering down for nuclear war. I wore my best "white woman means business" outfit. The look had somehow frizzed out by the time I got to the bar to meet JP and Batmite! and tie one on. Thanks, by the way, JP, for paying.
I get to work and at least D/B has shown up and dressed up. I was very convinced I'd come in to find an answering machine message that she'd quit and fuck it all if she cared. She'd sent an email to a board member saying basically that, and since she'd bothered to put it in writing, I figured that was the next step. So at least when she showed up for work, that was one step ahead. I packed for the event, because I figured the state people would be there along with the two spineless jellyfish bitches that run the program. They're the kind that love to take in the gossip and spread it around, but be damned if they'll make a firm decision on anything truly important. I packed five copies of Stinky Moochy Hippy's personnel report. (Later, JP, Batmite! and I perused them over beers. Unethical? You betcha.) I packed all of the copies of emails we'd sent to her. With highlighted portions showing where we'd tried to remedy the problem and failed miserably. And plenty that seemed to say "WTF???" in business tone. There were probably 150 of them. I also packed her actual file.
I came loaded for bear. Stinky bear.
To make a long and painful story bearably short (see the pun I made there?), we got to the meeting, and I was immediately ejected. Mainly because it simply wouldn't do to have a rational person in the mix. It would be much better to put two spineless jellyfish bitches and two highly emotional and angry people in the same room together. Doesn't that make much more sense? You'll notice I didn't mention any state people. We-ell, that's because they weren't there. Said spineless jellyfishes cancelled their appointment with the state because it makes their management look bad. I had already pointed out that they had more to lose than we did, which seemed to bolster D/B's confidence a tad. So this problem was "solved" internally. There are quotes around that word for a reason.
The "resolution" to the problem came something like this:
SJB (Spineless Jellyfish Bitches): OK, so we want you to take Stinky Girl back and just pretend nothing happened.
Us: Um. No. Actually, we don't want her back. What's Plan B?
SJB: Well, if you don't take her back, we'll not fund that position again for your agency for the next two years (evil cackles).
Us: Fine by us. With workers like that, who needs them anyway? Fuck that noise.
SJB: (Shock) --------
Us: Are we done here?
SJB: So we are in agreement that you'll be taking her back.
Us: No. We don't want her back. She sucks.
SJB: I'm glad we've found a compromise.
Us: ??? We don't want her.
SJB: We reject your reality and substitute our own. Thanks for taking her back.
Us: We don't want her back. She stinks. And she's a crappy worker.
SJB: I'm glad we see eye to eye. So, she'll be back next week.
Us: Wait? Wha???
So, yes, Stinky Hippie was back on the job today. Funny how you can claim to be so miserable at a place and still want to come back to it. She's not the masochistic type. Things were very uncomfortable at the office. We had a simple task list for her to complete waiting on her--basically fixing her fuck-ups. She tried to engage me in conversation. I did my best to keep it to three words or less. I know it's petty, but she's pissed me off and I don't think there is any way for her to fix it with me. She'd have to want to give my son a kidney. And he'd have to need one.
And she still stinks. D/B moved her into our (tiny) office to put the supervisory omnipresence on her. That just means we're now working elbow to elbow and the room smells like burnt hippy. It's disgusting. I'm pretty aggravated on all fronts right about now. D/B needs to go to some fucking management classes and grown ass women need to grow the fuck up and do their damned work. And use deodorant.
-- Virgil, proud user of deodorant
posted by contemplator at Tuesday, March 25, 2008
10 Comments:
wha...?!
That's unbelievable. Can't you complain about her to someone else? Or just fire her the minute she puts a foot wrong (after giving her lots of warnings and having it all down in writing that you did it by the book)?
Mighty fine questions, Kitush. In fact, if certain supervisory persons had listened to Wise Virgil when we first began this process, this would never have happened. Since the SBJs run the program, they're technically the "hiring and firing" people as well. We merely function as the site supervisor. When I brought this up as a legitimate concern, D/B pranced around all fluffy-chested saying, "I can run somebody off if I want to!!"
Well, as I predicted, turns out ya can't!
She can fuck up from here until her term is up, and all we can do is document it.
Which explains why D/B's new policy is to make her so miserable through passive agressive action that she quits on her own.
Sigh.
Lovely management skills all the way around.
You have no idea how aggravated I am right now at setting other people's fuck ups right. I would like to be the one to go batshit insane at some point. But then who would make sure everything else got done??
Your story is just one reason among many why I prefer the private sector.
We are part of the private sector. Being tax exempt doesn't make us a governmental entity. We're not government funded. Neither is the organization that is in charge of this program in our county.
It's no different than another company pulling rank on supervisory authority during a collaboration. It happens all the time. Private or public has nothing to do with it.
Oh, ok. But why do those two middle managers 'jellyfish' not only tolerate mediocrity (or worse), but actively enforce it?
You got me. It seems to be a trait of middle management. People don't like confrontation and they don't know how to do it well. So they would rather avoid a problem and hope it goes away rather than address it head on. That's all I can figure. Plus, if the coordinator at the state level gets wind of this, it makes them look *really* bad, particularly as we have several emails documenting where we asked them to help/intervene and they blew it off. I keep telling D/B that we're the ones in the position of power here, and we should press our advantage. But since I'm not the one in a position of power here, the best I can do is suggest things. She makes the decisions, and we all suffer by them. Management is the same all over.
That's absolutely ridiculous. How much longer until her term is over?
Have you started spraying the room during the day to get rid of the smell? That might help hasten her retreat. :-)
I think the jellyfish people tolerate mediocrity because they are mediocre themselves. That is what they know. That is what they are comfortable with. SUCKS!!
D/B does have the power and control and needs to learn how to use it. Higher ups should definitely be made aware of it. By any chance, do you have policies outlining how to handle a situation if the immediate supervisor does not handle something sufficiently? I understand chain-of-command, but usually there is a procedure to go out of that chain if things aren't handled the way they're supposed to be. Just a thought.
Kari:
She has seven more freaking months here. And actually, I have been spraying the room. :D
We should have a policy about this kind of thing. We're lacking many policies right now, even the standard ones about sexual harrassment, etc. because for a long time there weren't any other staff for it to matter. There only other "higher ups" are the board members, but they're fairly ineffectual. Some of them are very competent, but to involve them right now would probably only bring problems on me. But we don't have a policy for what happens when a higher up fucks up. We need to. But that higher up is the one who approves policy, so..... :)
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