June 25, 2005

My last days in Purgatory

My internment in Purgatory has ended! However, not without a warning from former boss that if they needed me they would call me. I informed my prison guard that I'll be in and out of training for the first few weeks, but that I would definitely return her calls as soon as I returned to the office (READ: NOT!!!!)

Her response: if she couldn't get me at the office she would call me at home. (Heh, I have caller ID Lady!) Under normal circumstances I'd cooperate and make the new person's transition smoother, but knowing that the new person was extended an offer before I even returned to work or found another position pissed me off.

What made me angrier? Knowing my replacement is getting less resposibilities, no projects and $15K more than I did. So for the week I smiled, I endured, and complied with her demands, being that she's the #4 woman in a global company of 60,000. For the remainder of the week I worked my old schedule of 13 to 18 hr days while enduring the meanest, most passive/aggressive behavior from some of my immediate coworkers. As far as I'm concerned, my loyalty ended when I left last night.

Since I believe in Karmic retribution I already know that she and the others will pay for how awfully I was treated these past 2 weeks. To start with I found out that not only is her secretary leaving at the end of next week, the person she hired to replace her Secy (and who'll absorb a few of my duties) doesn't now the Microsoft Outlook/Exchange Server programs. The person she hired to replace me has not used a PC in 5 years as she's been teaching art to little kids and using a Mac during that time. I know she's not prepared for the cutthroat, fast paced, demanding, "market-driven" pace of investment banking.

I can see the crashing and burning way into the future. The smoldering fires of what's to come when research has to be done on when, who and what were the last terms of a bifurcated swap. I would love to be a fly on the wall for that moment. If either woman lasts more than 3 months it will be a miracle. I did get an insult of an offer (as it would mean a demotion) if I wanted to stay; but as far as I'm concerned it's a little too little, and it comes way too late in the game. I had a football analogy of a 3rd down... but I'll spare you.

As for me, things started turning way around when I called a friend and spent over an hour lauging my head off and when I activated my new beloved Treo650. As of this morning, life has finally and definitely turned the corner!

Mellower, happier posts are soon to come.


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June 14, 2005

Hell, First Circle

Earlier today when I called a collegue to vent over having to deal with an extremely difficult temp (who took over my old job) and who was interfering with what I needed to do, she listened attentively and was amazed at my tale. Two hours later I received the following email.

Michele,
Wouldn't it be great if you could hire a professional limited liability service company that provides a professional smacker?

Imagine an ad for a company like that called.... Smacker, Wallop & Whacker, LLC. They are highly recommended, totally confidential and professional in all their wallops. All you have to do is tell them the location, person, and pay the smacker, and SMACK they go.

When they leave you have no liability, 'cause they'll never know what hit 'em.

Even though that came at 4:15pm it really made my day!!!

(Humor courtesy of blogless Oz)

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June 10, 2005

I'm so excited and I just can't hide it!!!!

Day 2 was even more exciting than the first. Darn, I wish I could write about the breakfast meeting. Had lots more training today on protocols and procedures. By 11:30am I was a bit tired and hungry and my attention span at a very low point so off I went to a farewell lunch w/my soon to be former collegue, who I'm replacing! I'm really going to miss her!

After returning to work I kept going non-stop absorbing, learning, reading, listening, contributing ideas until it was 3:00pm. Then my boss said: "you've done more than enough for one day, why don't you go out and have some fun." So I went to the bank to make a deposit and picked up a nice ice cold lemonade drink on my way back.

When I returned 15 min. later I wondered where everybody had gone. So I sat down to read some more briefings, when I was asked what I was still doing there. I must have had a look of confusion on my face, so a colleague pointed out that I was free leave. I tried playing it off by saying "Oh, he meant THAT kind of fun." That's when I was told that on Friday's in the summer, the staff usually starts leaving around 3:00pm.

Although I smiled and chatted for awhile, internally I was doing an incredible happy dance. So I got home early, picked up my son and spent extra playtime with him. I LOVE THIS JOB!

Posted by: Michele at 09:23 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Day 1

Started the new job today. It was interesting; especially getting the White House, Sentate, and House briefings faxed to me. Something I have to read on a daily basis. Woohoo! Also exciting was a last minute crisis before a legislative vote. Notice I'm not writing which state, there's a reason for that and that's the bad part.

The bad part of this job, (and believe me, I can live with it!) is that I'll have to be careful not to blog about certain items due to SEC, NASDAQ, European Union, and WTO Charter Agreements (just to name a few).

My first challenge today, which I'm still researching, is what personal information absolutely cannot be retained in our corporate files. In some states and countries, a spouse's name and identifying data, along with their personal affiliations and investments must be part of our permanent records, whereas in others, it's absolutely prohibited. So today I had to do some digging on this, that was the fun part. Once I find the answer, I have to communicate that in several directions before I can modify our policies and database.

Not bad for a first day's work! !

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June 04, 2005

Taming of the Beast

I've had to mediate my leavetaking and separation between two warring factions: my new [Zoe] and old employer [Belzebub]. I think it would be easier if they didn't know each other socially and in business, but at their level the circle is so small that everyone knows everyone else in NY.

So, the past 2 days have been spent with me going in for meetings to wrap things up, pass the baton, finalize reports, and to help my former boss manage her anger and anxiety. Anger w/me for leaving, anger with HR for letting me get away (so she says), anger w/the dept. OM for not managing things better, the list goes on. So after many phone calls between HR, Zoe and Belzebub, I decided to take over the mediation process from HR, as they were getting know where and instead I was being drawn into the fray as it descended into a playground scene of "she's mine".

more...

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