Backstory: Since the first few weeks of employment here (you know where!), the newly-hired employees noticed a subtle division of the status of our team's workforce. Simply, the caste was divided among the "old crew" and the "newbies". Oh yes, management voiced sound-bites attesting to how we were all "one team" and no "clique" behavior would be tolerated, but that was soon proven by the facts to be a sham.
When our "team" was formed, it comprised veterans who had been "displaced" by a transition of duties. "Their" jobs were moved to a newly-formed team in Springfield, Oregon, but they were able to stay with the company, if they chose, to fill positions won for them by their manager (Kemmy, according to her telling of the tale) creating a new team of customer care reps....and THIS team's formation thus replaced a disassembled pre-existing team doing that very duty in Milpitas, California.
It was obviously arranged ahead of the formation of the team that those who chose to transition from the old job specifications to the new (yet less desirable since it involved, ugh!, "call center style" interaction with potentially angry and impetous customers...much more "stressful" than the lax-paced data entry work of their OSG duties)
that they would be "awarded" positions of status which would eventually allow them to stay off the phones a majority of their worktime. Stacy Cashwell divulged a bit of this before she left since she admitted that she thought that she would be "off the phones" a majority of the time from the get go. But, of course, this couldn't happen right away.
Kemmy had to build up the numbers of new-hires so they could take the brunt of the calls, thus allowing the OSG people to shift into "cruise control" without a diminishment in the "stats" (abandon rate, hold time...the usual call center stuff). Once that was achieved (and it became very noticible that that had been achieved about 2 months ago), then the "old crew", based on an elobaratetly displayed format would be able to work primarily on "cases" (email customer concerns). The problem for the "behind the curtain" persons trying to create the illusion of the "Great and Powerful Oz", was simply that there weren't enough cases to justify that much "unavailable" time.
Marshall left for Arizona before this trend began so we didn't get to remark on in, but I'm sure he and I would have pinged each other non-stop about the "goings-on" since, he, like me was oh too familiar with the weird shenanigans that go on in the world of "bad management".
But another buddy (and fellow temp) Nancy K. noticed this trend and we were quick to pick up on it and comment on it virtually every day via IM (rarely verbal, since in the thin-walled world of the cube farm, everything can be overheard). Nancy, like Marshall, could very well see through the phonies in the office like Cheryl and we were constantly in awe of firstly, how really stupid and obnoxious she was but secondly, how she never seemed to get flack for all the blatant errors she did EVERYDAY! It was apparent then that the "coordinators"(former OSG-folk), CSRs with no company-official title above CSR, but with Kemmy-approved status...and that status meant they were (are) "untouchable", they can be as incompetent as shit, but they won't be on any "counseling" for it...it will simply be ignored and/or tolerated.
I noticed today around noon that Nancy had logged off her system (we all have "a worldview" of the on-line status of our other "teammates" which is why, BTW, we can see that the coordinators are abusing the positions since their status of "unavailable" is visible by all).
Hours later she hadn't returned. I though "Great, she went home sick and now I have to walk home after work..." (Nancy, like Marshall before here had become my de facto chauffeur in the evenings each workday for a nominal "gas-money" fee.)
Around 2:00 though, Jill sent out an email to the team...
"EXIT....Nancy K(full name withheld for this blog) is no longer with [the company]." (You can figure out company name by researching this blog but I'm not just blurting it out! :)
Man, I freaked! She and I had IM'd so many rebellious messages and been so negative about the division of the office "society", I thought I might be next on the chopping block.
I pinged Jill and asked her what happened and she suggested I come to her office. We met for half an hor and she was all like..."well, Nancy was using call-avoidance techniques (which I knew about and more discreetly practiced myself...I mean the system is so easy to dupe, people!) and she was inappropriate to a customer (who, in this biz isn't at one point or another...Nancy's style wasn't confrontation, per se, as much as faking ignorance...but she did use the "mute" button often to self-vocalize juicy comments on occassion, something I almost never do since I know the "cube walls have ears").
So she was asked to meet with Jill, and knowing her personality, probably started breaking down (crying) when confronted. She was asked if she wanted to go home for the day and she agreed. Then, Jill talked with Kemmy about the incident and the decision was made to fire her.
Jill told me in my meeting that I had nothing to worry about and that noone would be "let go" without a prior warning of what "performance" needed "improvement". (But, methinks, for us temps, if infact there is any prior "warning", it is only one time)
So now, as suddenly as a Central Florida rain shower, my bud Nancy is gone. The idiots that were "vested" remain, and I am shaken yet again...reminded of the iCare times, as I mentioned in a post many months ago, and put "on guard".
No more will I "stare condescendingly" at morons like Cheryl and Andrew as they spew from their mouth such vile and hilarious crap...No more will I mumble "Attica!...Attica!...Attica!", as I did a while back when Cheryl "called out" my fellow temp Nina...No more will I IM anyone about how this office is a circus, run by asylum inmates and so stupid as to not know the impression it is surely making in the company...
I have seen what can happen to my fellow slave.
I will NOT admit that in my heart I am a proud Kunta Kinte!
I am sufficiently whipped!
My name be TOBY.
When our "team" was formed, it comprised veterans who had been "displaced" by a transition of duties. "Their" jobs were moved to a newly-formed team in Springfield, Oregon, but they were able to stay with the company, if they chose, to fill positions won for them by their manager (Kemmy, according to her telling of the tale) creating a new team of customer care reps....and THIS team's formation thus replaced a disassembled pre-existing team doing that very duty in Milpitas, California.
It was obviously arranged ahead of the formation of the team that those who chose to transition from the old job specifications to the new (yet less desirable since it involved, ugh!, "call center style" interaction with potentially angry and impetous customers...much more "stressful" than the lax-paced data entry work of their OSG duties)
that they would be "awarded" positions of status which would eventually allow them to stay off the phones a majority of their worktime. Stacy Cashwell divulged a bit of this before she left since she admitted that she thought that she would be "off the phones" a majority of the time from the get go. But, of course, this couldn't happen right away.
Kemmy had to build up the numbers of new-hires so they could take the brunt of the calls, thus allowing the OSG people to shift into "cruise control" without a diminishment in the "stats" (abandon rate, hold time...the usual call center stuff). Once that was achieved (and it became very noticible that that had been achieved about 2 months ago), then the "old crew", based on an elobaratetly displayed format would be able to work primarily on "cases" (email customer concerns). The problem for the "behind the curtain" persons trying to create the illusion of the "Great and Powerful Oz", was simply that there weren't enough cases to justify that much "unavailable" time.
Marshall left for Arizona before this trend began so we didn't get to remark on in, but I'm sure he and I would have pinged each other non-stop about the "goings-on" since, he, like me was oh too familiar with the weird shenanigans that go on in the world of "bad management".
But another buddy (and fellow temp) Nancy K. noticed this trend and we were quick to pick up on it and comment on it virtually every day via IM (rarely verbal, since in the thin-walled world of the cube farm, everything can be overheard). Nancy, like Marshall, could very well see through the phonies in the office like Cheryl and we were constantly in awe of firstly, how really stupid and obnoxious she was but secondly, how she never seemed to get flack for all the blatant errors she did EVERYDAY! It was apparent then that the "coordinators"(former OSG-folk), CSRs with no company-official title above CSR, but with Kemmy-approved status...and that status meant they were (are) "untouchable", they can be as incompetent as shit, but they won't be on any "counseling" for it...it will simply be ignored and/or tolerated.
I noticed today around noon that Nancy had logged off her system (we all have "a worldview" of the on-line status of our other "teammates" which is why, BTW, we can see that the coordinators are abusing the positions since their status of "unavailable" is visible by all).
Hours later she hadn't returned. I though "Great, she went home sick and now I have to walk home after work..." (Nancy, like Marshall before here had become my de facto chauffeur in the evenings each workday for a nominal "gas-money" fee.)
Around 2:00 though, Jill sent out an email to the team...
"EXIT....Nancy K(full name withheld for this blog) is no longer with [the company]." (You can figure out company name by researching this blog but I'm not just blurting it out! :)
Man, I freaked! She and I had IM'd so many rebellious messages and been so negative about the division of the office "society", I thought I might be next on the chopping block.
I pinged Jill and asked her what happened and she suggested I come to her office. We met for half an hor and she was all like..."well, Nancy was using call-avoidance techniques (which I knew about and more discreetly practiced myself...I mean the system is so easy to dupe, people!) and she was inappropriate to a customer (who, in this biz isn't at one point or another...Nancy's style wasn't confrontation, per se, as much as faking ignorance...but she did use the "mute" button often to self-vocalize juicy comments on occassion, something I almost never do since I know the "cube walls have ears").
So she was asked to meet with Jill, and knowing her personality, probably started breaking down (crying) when confronted. She was asked if she wanted to go home for the day and she agreed. Then, Jill talked with Kemmy about the incident and the decision was made to fire her.
Jill told me in my meeting that I had nothing to worry about and that noone would be "let go" without a prior warning of what "performance" needed "improvement". (But, methinks, for us temps, if infact there is any prior "warning", it is only one time)
So now, as suddenly as a Central Florida rain shower, my bud Nancy is gone. The idiots that were "vested" remain, and I am shaken yet again...reminded of the iCare times, as I mentioned in a post many months ago, and put "on guard".
No more will I "stare condescendingly" at morons like Cheryl and Andrew as they spew from their mouth such vile and hilarious crap...No more will I mumble "Attica!...Attica!...Attica!", as I did a while back when Cheryl "called out" my fellow temp Nina...No more will I IM anyone about how this office is a circus, run by asylum inmates and so stupid as to not know the impression it is surely making in the company...
I have seen what can happen to my fellow slave.
I will NOT admit that in my heart I am a proud Kunta Kinte!
I am sufficiently whipped!
My name be TOBY.