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Jul. 15th, 2008 09:27 pmI am being transfered to another office. Right now I work in the residential office, and they need me to fill in at the commercial office for a few weeks until they get someone else trained. Where I'm at now? It's huge. There are something like 160 agents in one building, and besides me there's one other receptionist/switchboard operator, a listing secretary, a sales secretary, an IT guy, a "workplace engineer" (which as far I can tell mean's he's pretty much just everyone's dogsbody), and the office manager. Of course there are plenty of privately hired assistents who aren't on the company's payroll, but we all still work together.
Where I'm going? Itty bitty. I will be the entire office staff. And from what I've heard via the grapevine, the commercial agents are by and large a bunch of horse's asses who don't know how to treat the people who work for them. Until now I wasn't particularly sanguine about the venture, but after what happened today I think I'll actually be relieved to be more or less by myself. Specifics aren't necessary and will probably only bore you. But let's just say that whatever you may have heard about an office full of women being full of strife? All true. At first it wasn't readily apparent. I was lulled into thinking that hey, we can all actually get along! But I've been there long enough now that I can see the tensions that were brewing long before I came along. They've come to a head twice since then, the second time being today's incident.
What happened in a nutshell is: The sales secretary is techinally our boss when the office manager is gone, and this afternoon, she was. The secretary had a problem with the other receptionist. But instead of talking to her and explaining what was going on, she called the IT guy (who sort of serves as the manager's second in command, and no, I don't quite understand that, myself) and he took it upon himself to discipline the other receptionist. But instead of him quietly approaching her in private, and explaining the problem, he stormed into the front office and made a huge unnecessary scene. He was alost yelling at her, "Look! You Need To Stop Doing This. It's Becoming A Problem." His tone of voice didn't quite warrant all caps. But very nearly. And anyway, I don't see how it was a problem, since what she was doing was going out of her way to help a customer. You heard me. She went out of her way to help a customer. And the other secretaries in the back just didn't want to be bothered, and complained to the IT guy. What it was, more than anything, was a conflict of personality. Now, sometimes this particular woman can get on my nerves, too, which is bound to happen if you have to sit next to the same person for eight stupid hours everyday. But she's a good person, essentially, and she's good at her job. She certainly has a hell of a lot more experience than any of the rest of us. And I was perfectly okay with her leaving me at the desk by myself while she went to help this man, because truthfully I had no idea what to do for him, but she did. As far as I'm concerned, if I didn't have a problem, then there was no need for any of this to go down, since it's none of the other girl's fucking business and they should just do their own jobs, but whatever.
It seems so minor, written out like this. But there is a whooole lotta backstory that is way too complicated to try and explain. At any rate, the situation was poorly handled. I mean for crying out loud, if you're going to discipline somebody, do it in the privacy of an office, not in front of the entire building! I almost wish that one of the brokers had been nearby, and given the IT guy his comeuppance (which I feel is long overdue. I understand that he's one guy working for a large group of people, and he can't get to everything right away, but there are plenty of things we have been asking him to do that he just will not do.) And anyway, where does he get off telling her she's being unprofessional? That's the pot calling the kettle black if I ever heard it. Only a few hours after this incident, he's back at the front office, cutting up with the other secretaries, making a lot of noise. And guess who the brokers talk to when the front office gets too noisy? The receptionists. And what are we supposed to do? Tell our two "bosses" to shut the hell up, they're going to get us in trouble?
August 7 really cannot come soon enough.
Where I'm going? Itty bitty. I will be the entire office staff. And from what I've heard via the grapevine, the commercial agents are by and large a bunch of horse's asses who don't know how to treat the people who work for them. Until now I wasn't particularly sanguine about the venture, but after what happened today I think I'll actually be relieved to be more or less by myself. Specifics aren't necessary and will probably only bore you. But let's just say that whatever you may have heard about an office full of women being full of strife? All true. At first it wasn't readily apparent. I was lulled into thinking that hey, we can all actually get along! But I've been there long enough now that I can see the tensions that were brewing long before I came along. They've come to a head twice since then, the second time being today's incident.
What happened in a nutshell is: The sales secretary is techinally our boss when the office manager is gone, and this afternoon, she was. The secretary had a problem with the other receptionist. But instead of talking to her and explaining what was going on, she called the IT guy (who sort of serves as the manager's second in command, and no, I don't quite understand that, myself) and he took it upon himself to discipline the other receptionist. But instead of him quietly approaching her in private, and explaining the problem, he stormed into the front office and made a huge unnecessary scene. He was alost yelling at her, "Look! You Need To Stop Doing This. It's Becoming A Problem." His tone of voice didn't quite warrant all caps. But very nearly. And anyway, I don't see how it was a problem, since what she was doing was going out of her way to help a customer. You heard me. She went out of her way to help a customer. And the other secretaries in the back just didn't want to be bothered, and complained to the IT guy. What it was, more than anything, was a conflict of personality. Now, sometimes this particular woman can get on my nerves, too, which is bound to happen if you have to sit next to the same person for eight stupid hours everyday. But she's a good person, essentially, and she's good at her job. She certainly has a hell of a lot more experience than any of the rest of us. And I was perfectly okay with her leaving me at the desk by myself while she went to help this man, because truthfully I had no idea what to do for him, but she did. As far as I'm concerned, if I didn't have a problem, then there was no need for any of this to go down, since it's none of the other girl's fucking business and they should just do their own jobs, but whatever.
It seems so minor, written out like this. But there is a whooole lotta backstory that is way too complicated to try and explain. At any rate, the situation was poorly handled. I mean for crying out loud, if you're going to discipline somebody, do it in the privacy of an office, not in front of the entire building! I almost wish that one of the brokers had been nearby, and given the IT guy his comeuppance (which I feel is long overdue. I understand that he's one guy working for a large group of people, and he can't get to everything right away, but there are plenty of things we have been asking him to do that he just will not do.) And anyway, where does he get off telling her she's being unprofessional? That's the pot calling the kettle black if I ever heard it. Only a few hours after this incident, he's back at the front office, cutting up with the other secretaries, making a lot of noise. And guess who the brokers talk to when the front office gets too noisy? The receptionists. And what are we supposed to do? Tell our two "bosses" to shut the hell up, they're going to get us in trouble?
August 7 really cannot come soon enough.
