What I got was not what I expected.
As soon as I logged into the Zoom room, the host, Maxine Ellis, was loudly complaining about and sounding very irritated by people coming into the room and not having their full name displayed. She instructed everyone that if their full name wasn't indicated under their Zoom avatar box, they needed to write it in chat. When some people either took a few seconds too long to do so, or, on the flip side, typed their full name when their avatar box already had it, she nastily pointed out "You see the PowerPoint I have on the screen, it says who should type their name in chat and who doesn't. You know, when we made this slide we thought it would make it easier, but I guess not!"
I'm not shittin' you. This was our grand welcome into the Disney "family." The presentation was titled "Magical Beginning!" This chick was anything but "magical."
I was so shocked, I actually pulled up my voice recorder app and started recording. I'm playing it back now, hours later, to be sure I hadn't just "misunderstood" the situation. I hadn't. She started out bad and got even worse.
Here's a little time line of events by the number of minutes elapsed:
2:07 Maxine, in as deadpan a voice ever, "welcomed" us and introduced us to her. She says she's serviced the Disney program for 17 years now. (I'm thinking, yeah, all on the phones...there's no way she'd make it as a castmember on property. Multiple decades of customer service will harden you like this. She is likely, going by her video image captured by her webcam, 60 going on 70. Yea, another old lady.)
2:38 "Give me just a moment everyone 'cause someone just came into the room..." (which we could hear because she's got her Zoom dashboard audio cranked up so we heard the ding.) "...and they're labeled as Google Pixel 6A. Now I know we don't have ANYBODY in our class named Google Pixel 6a." (Again, I am not shitting you. She is being negative to people just coming in because they hadn't followed her "naming rule." Now mind you, we weren't told in the email invite about Zoom naming conventions or anything so how would this person know?) "So whoever came in the room as Google Pixel 6a you'll need to type your name in the chat box or I will need to remove you."
3:36 Someone who's Zoom name was showing as "Paterinsky John" raised his hand. Maxine said "Patinsky you have a question?" (Now I knew exactly what she was doing. She was playing more passive-aggressive games: She damned well knew it was displaying his last name first but because she had instructed people to correct their avatar box name in chat, and he hadn't, she was going to call him by his last name as if it was his first name. Either that or she really is super-duper stupid.)
4:02 "And whoever is labeled as Google Pixel 6a, I still need you to type your name in the chat...I see your hand up but I need you to type that in first." (I was muted thankfully since I literally burst out at this point exclaiming "Oh My God!" Anyone who has attended any Zoom meetings knows that some people log in using their phone, either out of preference or necessity. This early on, even before the first day of certification, people come to class complaining of technical issues with their computer. I get it, some people only like to use their computers to service or some may not yet have serviced so they don't have the systems up and running yet. These tech issues are usually ironed out after the first day. This "meeting" was touted to be a casual introduction. Now, Maxine is berating this person, and the person is likely raising their hand to say that they can't type it in for whatever reason. Maxine is acting like she's told this person five or more times and Google Pixel 6a is just ignoring her.)
4:38 While I'm chatting to myself on the voice recorder, amazed at this instructor's pettiness, rudeness and insensitivity, she apologizes to Google Pixel 6a that unfortunately she has to drop her/him and proceeds to do so.
4:50 "I do apologize guys, I'm not sure what's happening, but I just had somebody just come in as 051358!" (She then instructs this person, incredulously, to type their name in the chat)
5:35 051358 hadn't done so yet since being told 40 seconds ago so Maxine repeats her instruction super-slowly and acid-filled. I really wish I could upload the audio so you could hear this. As I re-listen to it, all my initial interpretations are confirmed. Either Miss Maxine was having a REAL BAD DAY, or she's just an A-Level Bitch. I had heard in the support room chats on Facebook about a super rude Arise instructor, I wonder if she's that person?
7:07 After complaining about the number of attendees in the room on mobile phones and on laptops/desktops via Wi-Fi she warned us about our SOW requirements to be hardwired or we would be booted off the program. If we are logging in form another country, Arise will catch you and you'll be kicked off the Arise platform. If you miss two days of certification, you're out. If you miss the first day, you're out (and billed $20). On and on she went through all the ways we could screw the pooch. Negative after negative after negative.
10:07 And we're back to the name thing. "Patinsky" as Maxine calls him (though I think it's spelled Paterinsky) raised his hand to complain that he couldn't type in chat. She said "everyone else could so not sure why you can't" and she asked why he wanted to type in chat and he said to put his name and she snarkily said "Your name is showing so you don't have to type your name." (But he did, I screamed out, he wants to comply with your rule that he should put his first and last name, in that order, in chat if it wasn't already displayed as such.)
11:10 "We just had a certification that ended yesterday, 15 people didn't certify, you know why? It's 'cause they chose not complete their self-paced coursework."
The rest of this orientation to depression dragged on to fill the whole hour and not much was about the excitement of working for the Evil Rat at all. If this is a taste of what's to come, it brings me back to my experience with Chase's Disney department and the infamous Laura Hupfel. Is this the slavedom I've heard tales of regarding working for Disney? Or is this just Maxine?
Can't wait for Monday morning...I wonder if Google Pixel 6a will be there?