Saying No to the Culture of Death

My latest assignment finished last week with a mutual agreement to disagree. There is nothing worse than being a contractor in the workplace and being made to feel as though one is not a part of the corporate culture. The international company where I was working is very well known around the world for its photographic equipment as well as peripherals for the computer. When I went into the workplace I realized immediately that some very unreal expectations had been set and the targets that one was expected to achieve were not within reach. However, I did my level best to meet these unrealistic expectations. I was personally dissatisfied because I constantly felt that I was not able to give what was required. However, there is a lot more to the story and my growing dissatisfaction than my own failure to meet the goals set by the management of the company.

 Temporary contract staff are expected not to get involved in office politics, and technically, that is precisely what happened during my stay at this company. It happened because I offered to help another young woman who was left without transport in getting to and from work. This woman lives very close to myself and it was not a hassle to take her since I was not going out of my way to help. On that first evening when we took off together, I learned that we had a lot in common. At the same time she also told me her story and what was happening within her own team. This young woman was the victim of workplace harrassment, and as usual the perpetrator was another woman. In the end this woman was fired on the same day that I departed the company. I personally felt a lot of distress over the treatment that had been dished out, as it served as a reminder of situations that I had faced in other workplaces in the past. Her sacking was the catalyst of my own decision to leave the company. This was a decision that was spurred by a different series of events.

The two stories here are more or less interwoven, for I was not subjected to workplace harrassment this time around. There is a common denominator since the male who played a major role in my friend's final demise was also responsible for some very underhanded behaviour where my own circumstances were concerned. This particular man in my mind was nothing more than a very sleazy male who was always looking for an opportunity to crack onto the women in the workplace. From my own personal point of view, I never did like this particular male. There was something about him that I did not trust. However, he was the darling of the team because he was considered to be very good with his job. Never mind that he used to spend a lot of time walking around and sticking his nose into the conversations of others. There is also another player, a woman that I first met in another workplace. This woman was also the darling of the workplace, and was seen as an "expert", when in reality she should not have been trusted with reconciliation work. She was one who was in the habit of allocating payments without taking full attention to the wishes of the customer. She had a habit of covering up her errors in that regard. I will have a lot more to say about this woman's behaviour and the way in which she cheated me, and then stabbed me in the back.

My young friend's story began to unfold as a tale where she was being harrassed on a daily basis by most of the women in her team - a group who were very vindictive and nasty towards any newcomers to their team. What was really amazing is that the one who laid most of the complaints made a lot of her own errors, yet again she was seen as being the darling of the workplace and an expert in what she was doing. Quite frankly, I could not understand most of what she had written down regarding her uploads and why there were variances. I was directed to use a reconciliation that had been started by the other woman who turned out to be a backstabber, and I found that she had not completed the task but had put information in the spreadsheet - great, because that lack in doing the work contributed to the horrendous situation that had been generated and was causing angst amongst the company's customers. Yet she was regarded as an excellent reconciler and an expert - balderdash is what I say about such a belief. The women in the admin team had a reputation of being lazy and not getting the work done as requested. I had personal experience with this laziness, and yes it impacted upon my own output.

This is a very long story, for Julie's story was unfolding as my own was unfolding. I had trouble with an Indian woman by the name of Goldie. She drove me nuts because she used to listen into the conversation of others, whilst they were talking in Hindi. In fact I used to see her deliberately cocking her head as she was listening in to personal conversation. In other words, not only did Goldie cheat me, but she was guilty of a double standard. I will explain this unfolding story and why I reacted by telling my supervisor that I preferred to leave rather than staying and abiding by the request that had been made.

Julie's story had sparked off something within me that caused me a lot of distress, and the situation was not helped with Goldie serving as a reminder of one of my blackest work experiences in Sydney. The two things combined brought the unwanted memories to the surface. I tried to offer Julie advice and comfort over what she was experiencing, whilst at the same time I continued to struggle with my own frustration at having to work so close with such an incompetent and untrustworthy woman like Goldie. What is worse I had to keep quiet whilst she was busy taking it upon herself to instruct the two males in the room. They did not need her instruction, especially when she was giving them "duff gen".  She was constantly telling them to short pay the invoices, and other information that was not correct. It was so bloody annoying to have to sit and listen to her doing all of those things. Also, as soon as the supervisor was out of the room, Goldie was on the telephone, either talking to car dealers or to her doctor, or ringing her dentist trying to get an appointment. It would be a double standard if I did not state that yes, I made a few calls, but they were few and far between. I am not in the habit of ringing family or making other personal calls at work, but there are times when I needed to make a call.

(to be continued)