I should have known when I had a tornado warning during BOTH interviews for this place, the universe was saying GURL, RUN!

After I signed the offer letter, they wanted three references, or they were taking the offer back. I already didn’t like the sound of that.

Then I didn’t hear from them for two weeks. Did they hate my references?

Then my computer arrived, so I guess I appeased them. I set it up, and it showed an error message.

I talked to IT, and they asked me to turn the computer off and on again (the classic!), but then it turned out that my computer had the wrong software installed. On my first day, everyone had computer issues, so I thought it was safe to agree. I was wrong. My manager said “maybe your internet isn’t good enough,” and I already had a feeling this was going to be used against me (it was). In my defense, it’s been awhile since I worked in corporate, so I forgot how much you’re supposed to lie. But strangely, this lady was also a pushover, and a lot of her responses sounded like “uh, well, maybe, if you, like, want to…” (foreshadowing).

Then HR wanted me to give them a short list of places I was willing to go at my own expense in the event my electricity or internet went out. Again, I thought that was an insane request.

The training was just me watching the ladies work on Teams, but they were working at their normal pace, and would often take their dogs out, make their kids a snack, change a diaper, etc. I felt like these ladies REALLY didn’t want to train a new person. I realize the job wasn’t difficult, but I really would have preferred training that was from a person who actually had time to show me the job properly, and not answer my questions with “you’ll figure it out“.

After a few days of that, they were ready for me to work by myself, but I didn’t have access to the system yet. It took almost two weeks to get me access. After watching me work on one file myself, they were done watching me. Any questions I had were supposed to go to a group chat, but with everyone talking in there, I felt like there was a lot of waiting for someone to see my question, and they would leave for the day without checking on me. And these ladies did not agree on anything. I still had no idea if I was doing something right. It would also take me an hour every morning to get my computer up and running, and they would continue to blame my WiFi. I have worked remotely for 10 years, and The Old Man is a nut about the internet. I know it isn’t the WiFi.

I also was in a meeting with IT, and someone mentioned that the problem is at least department wide (if not company wide), and started six months ago!

This place managed to make an easy job so chaotic, but the final straw was during a meeting. Their system is ridiculously slow, but I was having an even harder time getting in than usual. I finally get in, and there’s a meeting. The meeting was supposed to be about using one of the systems, so I thought we were just watching someone share their screen (like I have been doing the entire time). Suddenly I get multiple messages from the ladies in my department (but NOT my manager) complaining that I’m not on camera, and it’s company policy that I have to be on camera. We have not been on camera a single time since I started there. Why is everything a secret at this place? I wasn’t even there to talk, but to watch a presentation. I had my screen set up so I didn’t even see anyone else, but somehow in a group of 50+ people, they caught right away I wasn’t on camera.

I really would have appreciated a heads up that the meeting was going to be on camera. I still would have been frustrated, but please let me know so I can try to look presentable! Any job I’ve ever had has always given a heads up when a certain meeting will be on camera. That probably sounds so silly, but I haven’t properly slept the whole time I’ve worked there, I feel so sick at night, and I have had two horrible black eyes every day. Give me a chance to put on concealer!

I closed my laptop and sobbed, then wrote my resignation email.

-Kay

Kay, every job I have had prepared the new employee like so:

-Training hours are assigned by the company to pay the new employee for learning before there is pressure to produce.

-A trainer is assigned from among active employees.

-The manager pockets the payroll towards his bonus.

-The trainer declines to show the new employee anything, to the point of encouraging mistakes and concealing company policy. I had one trainer tell me to throw out of dates in the trash, thinking I was new to the business, when this was a fireable offense.

-The new employee is blamed for all crew production shortfalls by the trainer, coworkers, shift lead and manager.

-The new employee is dismissed before the end of the training period.

The above system works in and out of union shops. In a union shop, the senior employees keep a non-union rung alive below them, a low seniority scapegoat. The union gets dues upfront and does not have to provide benefits for the terminated employee. The manager increases his payroll bonus. HR is rendered more important with high turnover. Of the four parties involved: Corporation, Union, Management [which has its own interests], New Hire, only the new hire has any incentive to advance the fiction of company performance, with stewards of the company itself vested in its own failure. Corporate action has thus always favored cannibalistic behavior. Companies were developed as fictions to shield criminal actors from wrong doing committed in public and private business.

Few of us realize that the Great Age of Piracy was a revolt against corporate graft, that sailors and soldiers were being starved to death so that government contractors could make higher profits by not delivering the services paid for by the investors. The great Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 was caused by the same endemic problem. Since that time corporations have advanced governments back into the public spotlight to take the blame for their large scale graft, while the companies cannibalize their own parts to enrich the corporate officers already planning to “jump ship.” Plantation America never died, but rather transmogrified.

Every friend I have known across half a century of life has related similar work experiences, citing patterns of behavior counterproductive to stated corporate interests.

Enjoy.