In the 30 months I've worked here, 31 people have left the company; of those, only 14 were actual firings. People get very intimidated by Boss' behaviour, and get rattled enough to quit. There are also others that have been under the crosshairs who have refused to quit; they've managed to survive and are still with us. There have been at least 3 people that were fired and then rehired; 2 out of that 3 were rehired several times before getting the final boot! So it cheers me somewhat to think the odds are probably good that if I just hang in here and refuse to quit, then this steady paycheque just may continue.
I suspect I was fired once, and brought back, all in the space of an hour; it was hard to be sure, as I was out of the room for the pivotal part. It happened as part of a huge office kerfluffle, which derived from (as they usually do) a long, unspoken, simmering-under-the-skin argument between Boss and one of Boss's Progeny... an argument which one might say is really a life-long state of affairs.
There was a point at which Boss and Progeny were sort of time-sharing the office; Progeny would come early in the morning and then leave just before Boss would arrive at noon to begin the workday with lunch. When Boss left on a business trip, Progeny started to make a few changes in the way things were done -- changes for the good, as Progeny is quite a reasonable person, as are all of Boss' progeny.
Happy though I was to comply with the new & improved world order, I also knew that upon Boss' return the reaction to this would fall between three extremes: either Boss would not notice any changes at all (unlikely); Boss would notice, burst into a berserker's rage at being usurped, and change everything back (more likely); or, Boss would not notice the changes on a conscious level, but, reacting to some sixth sense, would scythe through the office like a Fury run amuck and wreak vengeance for faults deliberately found where none existed, making random changes to everything (which is in fact what happened).
Ultimately, I do admit fault in that I obeyed a lesser VP in the absence of the CEO, knowing full well that the CEO demands utter and abject fealty; and then I made the ethical and tactical error of trying to pretend it didn't happen. Because VP Progeny backed me up, Boss was not able to nail me on the facts; but I was raked over the coals over nonexistent mistakes.
Have you ever had someone tear strips off you, up one side and down the other, using a perfectly innocent piece of paper that they claim contains greivous errors? At the end of my flaying, I was told to "go home, get out of my sight, I don't want to see you for the rest of the day." It was a dismissal, ostensibly temporary; but I didn't fancy my chances of being able to return again, and started clearing my desk of personal items.
And just before I was about to leave, I was summoned back to Boss. I was told the new process for doing things, and I was made to do it over and over again, until it was perceived to be right. In a most farcical bit of business, Boss manually counted entries that had been automatically numbered by the computer, claiming I had mis-numbered them... counting with a finger on each entry, out loud, over and over, and, somehow -- quite beyond my ability to understand and quite seriously challenging my ability to suspend disbelief -- counting wrong, every time.
To Boss' credit, it was eventually acknowleged that I hadn't made a mistake; I was smiled at, and told "Sorry. But you know how I am. I'm tempermental." To which I honestly replied, "yes, and we wouldn't have you any other way." Though a fearsome thing to behold, the sheer force of Boss' personality is truly awe-inspiring ...though usually in a natural disaster sort of way... my fascination for understanding it must be akin to the same thrill tornado chasers seek.
Having recently re-read Robertson Davies' Fifth Business, I'd like to beleive this qualifies me for being Twice-Born. ;) Give it a read, tell me what you think.
Posted by edgar at January 23, 2003 10:08 AM