The planets spin...

...and the world goes 'round....and 'round....

First and foremost, I'm pretty freakin' sick right now. I've been fighting off a cold or chest infection or SOMETHING for the past few weeks and Friday night it finally won the war sending my temperature over 100, lovely aches that made me feel like I was being pummeled by rocks, and I could barely sleep. I kept telling myself that I was going to get over it and be able to help my friends out at Idiotarod as I had planned...

Not to be. About 2 in the morning, I realized that nothing was going to make me better in time to get up, get down to DUMBO, and take part. So, Liz and Lauren, my apologies for not making it to help you out. I was in bed until around 1 this afternoon and I'm not much better. At least the fever is down.

Okay...so let's talk about work.

The kid who tried to swipe two of my sales has one week left to seal any deals on his soon to be former clients before I shift them over to the new people that have bene hired.

Oh yes...the team of three that I had on January 8 when the whole shake up went down...yeah...only one of them is left. One basically disappeared (as he did prior to my taking over the sales management of the division) and we called and left messages and basically told him that he needed to call back or we would consider him to have resigned his position with the company. Well, he never called back that Thursday. He did call back on Monday and said something about being in the hospital and having papers and trying to leave his former boss a message (note.....he TRIED but DIDN'T)...blah blah blah...I called back, got his voicemail, and reiterated the fact that he didn't call back and even if he was in the hospital, he could have had someone - a nurse, doctor, friend, etc. - call and tell us where he was. Clearly he didn't want his job bad enough to make sure we knew where he was....

Then there's the other guy...not a bad guy...a little needy...but he had the possibility of being a really good salesperson. He seemed to get down on himself because he wasn't making sales even though we had told him that selling for his product wasn't a quick sell like other things....it takes time, it takes charm, it takes nurturing....AND THEN you get the big sell...well he didn't seem to accept that and was making frequent comments about his salary (and he had only been there for 2 weeks) and who knows what else....HOWEVER...the opportunity and possibility was there...

The one thing he did though that kinda bugged me a bit but not to the point where I was going to have to say something (yet) was that he would have discussions with the director of one of our other divisions (the man who originally hired him) that he should have been having with me since I was his boss. Well, Thursday he got a bug up his ass about something about the guy who sits behind him had done or said. Who knows? I wasn't there and I have no clue. Well, he went and told this director what happened and for some reason thought that it wouldn't be addressed with this employee.

Okay, let's just be realistic here. You're telling this guy's boss what he did that displeases you and you expect it to remain confidential and not addressed? Clearly he's not from this planet.

Anyway, this guy gets called in and politely told what he now knows is going down and to never do it again with no reference as to who fessed up. Mind you, he sits in an area that's very open and lots of people can hear what other people are doing and saying. Well this guy goes back and tells my employee that he should never repeat anything that he hears. This leads to an email from my employee to the other director telling him that he can't believe that he told this guy what he said and it was supposed to be in confidence and he's "leaving his job."

Well, I was on the phone with a client during all of this and since he didn't come to me (as he should have since I was his boss) I had no clue what went down. So I get told that this guy "may have" resigned his job. I get the low down on what happened and so I decide to see if he really did decide to walk out. The only way that I would know if he did was if the hideous picture of him doing a Joan Crawford/Mommie Dearest thing was still on his desk. If it's there...he didn't walk out. If it's gone...he did.

It was gone.

So the other director decided to call and leave a message with his mother to call when he got in. He called and he was invited to have his job back and he said he would think about it and call back in an hour.

Well, to be honest...I didn't want him back. Part of me was ticked off that he chose to not follow the proper chain of command and should have come to me first and part of me was ticked off that he didn't even give the company a chance to make things right in the situation. He just stormed off. On top of that, he had salary complaints again.

Dude, if the salary wasn't what you wanted and you didn't negotiate it before you agreed it to, then you knew what you were getting. GET OVER IT! We had offered him a chance at a draw on his commission after 90 days with the company and we were only at 2 weeks!

So when I got the scoop on the phone conversation that was had, I pretty much made it clear that I didn't want him back. If he comes back, will he be a loose cannon? Will he be able to sell? Will I have to hand hold him? Will he still bitch about his salary?

We decided to wait to see what he would say when he called back.

The hour passes. No call.

The second hour passes. No call.

The third hour passes. No call.

I pick up the phone and call.

Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring.

No answer. What the fuck?

He calls back about 2 minutes later. He sounded very down and I basically told him that I was surprised by what had happened and that he should have come to me with his concerns but, most of all, I was just disappointed in the whole thing.

Finally I told him that since he didn't call back in the hour, we have concluded that he has resigned his position with the company to which he agreed. I politely told him that we would send him his final check and if I found any personal belongings on his desk that we would make arrangements to send them to him.

I hung up the phone and uttered probably the most succinct thing I could come up with...

"Ass."

Seriously. You say you will call back in and hour. You should call back. Even if it's to say that you weren't coming back, you call back.

Thankfully, we found a great salesperson the next day with lots of experience who can afford a huge pay cut and willingly wants to work with the company to improve our brands. He starts on Monday and I have another sales guy starting on Friday so I will be back to a full team by the end of next week. I may not be able to do much in terms of sales for my own items, but at the very least I have a new start.

So much work to do and so little time.