fine whine

Well, for about two hours today I was in hell. A lower case 'h' hell, but a rather complicated one. Let's say it had at least three levels.

I was on the level devoted to people who had their worlds flipped inside out suddenly. Before I get to that, though, here's a little background.

The company hired some well known consultants not too long ago to streamline our business processes and whatnot; they'd be making us more efficient and all that. Of course we all knew the truth: they'd be eliminating needless work all right but with it, needless workers.

No amount of pussyfooting and issue-avoiding could soften the blow, and last thursday the hammer started to fall. We got an email telling us in very certain terms not to take this Monday and Tuesday off, that the big little project was coming to an end and we'd get all that information we'd been waiting to learn. We knew what that meant: axe time.

I'd tried to remain upbeat. I'd tried to stay positive. I'd tried to update my resume. I'd tried to get my job done. I'd tried to sleep well at night.

Well, I slept at least.

Monday came and almost everybody was on time for once. Tension mounted for the first hour or two until an email started circulating about a 12:30 meeting. Whatever work was being done ceased, and rumor-mongering, speculation and worrying began. Lunch yesterday was interesting, with everybody away from their desks and sitting in the cafeteria, joking and bantering about our impending doom. In those last minutes before the meeting, well, the minutes dragged even more slowly.

The meeting had three purposes: first, to tell us, yes, head count was being reduced; second, to confirm the rumors about which directors had been fired; third, to tell us that we'd not be told which of us underlings would be fired until today. Uhoh. We were supposed to return to our jobs as normal, business as usual as it were. This meant more paranoid water-cooler conversation and online job-surfing, I think. Any of us feeling "too distressed" could feel free to go home.

I left around 3pm, having sent out a pair of emails that I felt were important. Naturally I needed to explain exactly what the situation might be at work as per me and my continued employment. I remained an optimist, though, albeit a downcast one.

Tuesday comes, and once again everybody's pretty much on time, except for my boss. We'd been told that they'd be talking to us through the morning in small sessions, so we gradually watched fellow cubicle-dwellers leave, and some of them even came back without tears in their eyes.

The local higher-up dropped by my cube looking for my boss. She hadn't shown up yet, and before he left he told another neighbor to hold tight and be ready for a 1pm meeting.

Minutes passed like hours. The hours didn't pass at all.

My boss arrived, but before too long she got a phone call that meant she'd need to leave right away. No waiting for her. She tracked down the higher-ups and found out before they got around to finding her.

She found out that they'd eliminated her. Everybody started crying and then so did she. We cleaned up her desk and cleaned the tears off her face and took her stuff out to her car.

I think she'll be okay, and so does she. Nobody's been less happy to come into work lately, so more power to her.

Now as for me? Screw that optimism crap. I'm a wreck. Despite her assurances that I'd be fine I'm suddenly worrying that since she's gone the department's going to be gone, ergo I'd be gone.

I'd be gone.

This is not a prospect I wanted to face, no matter how well prepared I thought I'd been. I'd cleaned out my desk, after all, and had a stack of the few things left for me to take home next to me.

I was going through emails and I got a tap on my shoulder. The local higher-up told me, reassuredly, "Don't worry."

I worried.

At 1pm it was all over. All told well over a hundred positions were eliminated, and they started this meeting with having us all stand up and congratulate each other for not being fired.

Um, what the hell? A little respect for our departed, dearly or otherwise?

Through the course of the meeting we learned little other than to never, ever use tiny fonts in a powerpoint presentation and that we didn't have copies of the so-called org chart laying around because they were confidential. Go figure.

We also learned that our days of sitting in meetings (well, they felt like they lasted for days) were far from over. So much for our newfound efficiency.