Day 12: Hello – Write a story or a poem that starts with the word ‘hello’
“Hello, is this Conny?”
“Yes, it is,” I said.
“It’s Robert Chatham and I would like to welcome you to my firm.”
“I got the job?” I asked.
“You got the job” Robert Chatham confirmed. “See you on Monday. You start at nine o’clock.”
When the call was disconnected, I wondered why I didn’t feel happier. I had been looking for a job for a long time. I had seen Chatham for an interview the week before. I finally got a job, in a great location for a generous salary. So why did I feel like a dark cloud had just moved over my head?
When I arrived at the firm the following Monday, I was shown not to a cubicle but to an office, a private office with a view over the building’s private courtyard. Sunlight streamed through a floor to ceiling window, bouncing off a blond oak L-shaped desk and credenza. This was just getting better and better.
When Robert Chatham walked in at 9:15, the six men and women who had been chatting in the kitchen scattered to their desks like mice who’d smelled a cat.
Minutes later Chatham walked into my office. “Let me give you the tour,” he said.
Behind glass fronted windows, the other employees seemed hard at work, not looking up when Chatham and I walked past. “I’m not going to introduce you to anyone,” he said, “as you won’t have contact with these people and I don’t encourage socializing. You are all here to work, not to chat.” I thought this a little harsh, but okay.
When we arrived at the copy room Chatham instructed that I was to pick up his printing and bring it to his office every 20 minutes. “Not every 19 minutes, not every 21 minutes,” he emphasized, “every 20 minutes.”
In the kitchen, he pointed out the dishwasher and percolator. “This will be your job too,” Chatham said. “When you come in in the morning, you make coffee. When you see me come in you make me a cup of tea. You let the tea bag in the cup exactly 35 seconds. Not 34 seconds, not 36 seconds, but 35 seconds and add three-quarters of a packet of sugar.”
Was this guy for real? I couldn’t believe this was the same men I met during my interview.
Over the next two weeks what I heard and witnessed bordered on the unbelievable. Grown men and women were reduced to tears after being yelled at, screamed at, and called every derogatory name under the sun. Now I also understood why everyone had a private office ... the employees were not allowed to talk to each other, not even in the kitchen or mailroom and no paired visits to the bathroom were allowed. This man ruled his staff like a dictator.
To cut a long story short … I quit after the second week. I put up with difficult managers and directors in the past, but this one took the cake. I put up with his yelling and screaming and calling me names, but when it looked like he was about to strike me, I had enough.
The reason ... he screamed that there were no water bottles in the meeting room. I pointed out that water bottles are better kept in the fridge, so when someone wants something to drink the bottle is cold. It was the middle of summer, who wants lukewarm water on a hot day? The result ... Chatham's face lost all color, he started shaking and the next moment he screamed and screamed how I dared to talk to him that way.
The following Monday I contacted a lawyer and related my experiences. “Do you have proof of this abuse?” the lawyer asked. I said that I didn’t. “Then you have a problem,” he said. “If you can’t prove that the lawyer screamed and used abusive language, you don’t have a leg to stand on. I will contact him if you like, but my guess is he will deny everything.”
“The others can't lie when under oath,” I pointed out. “They will have to tell the truth.”
“You want to take this to court?” the lawyer asked. “Before you say yes or no, let me point something out to you. I will need a $1,500 retainer, I charge $300 an hour and a case like this could take two years before it goes to court. Do you have the financial means to see this through?”
I didn’t. I didn’t have proof and I didn’t have money for a court case. So Robert Chatham got away with it.
This experience started with 'hello' and ended with 'goodbye' and everything in-between was another lesson learned.
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