5/18/2008

Making Decisions And Feeling A Weight Lifted

Hello,
As a few of you might be aware I've had the threat of impending redundancy hanging over me since January of this year. My employer has being doing their best to make my life a misery since then an in fact for some time before that thinking back. Anyway for ages this has been a huge weight on my shoulders on the one hand I love my job and see lots of potential to develop it but on the other I resent witnessing the bullying of good staff, the over promotion of incompetents and the air of downright nastiness that pervades the place.

The final straw for me was when I was asked this week to train a lower paid and sub standard member of staff to replace me. My describing him in such scathing terms is not sour grapes or motivated by my dislike of him. No one in the office will allow him near their projects if they can help it because he wreaks havoc. Until now I had enjoyed more success than most, in that I had against all the odds, managed to keep him away from my clients and doing statistics, 'research' and administration. However the powers that be would now like him to do all of the above plus all my tasks which includes interviewing clients and managing their caseloads as well as all the other bits and bobs I get up to and pick up extra tasks from other staff as required.

I'm trying to focus on the fact that he is willing to do my job for £7 per hour (come to think of it he'd do it for £7 p/a) and that my merry band of immigrants are regarded by management as more trouble than they're worth). The immigrants annoy my boss by undermining her assertion that there is no hope for anyone living on a council scheme. They will go offering us their teenage children as free interpreters, working hard, learning new skills and starting businesses. A success story for my boss is getting Mr Chan on to disability benefits he neither wants nor needs, for me it is helping Mr Chan get a job then once he's saved a bit helping him start a business. Honestly they drive me insane in that place. You tell them some Turkish fellow is making two grand a week in the shop you helped him start and they think it's a tragedy because he's no longer entitled to housing benefit.

I am by no means the perfect employee. Give me six months in a job and I've got a report as long as your arm with the aim of expanding my role or making improvements. I think that's an affliction left over from running my own show. On the plus side I'm rarely absent or late and I am a grafter. I was told when I took on my current role my aim was to 'empower the refugee and migrant worker communities' which I think I've done in that my aim has always been to show them them that in the long run they don't need me. These are by and large fit, healthy, intelligent people they don't need spoon fed just a listening ear and pointed in the right direction.

My replacement on the other hand cannot see a world beyond benefits. I allowed him to advise a client this week and was horrified as he advised him that under no circumstances should he take a job that pays more than the minimum wage and offers more than 15 hours work per week. I got involved and explained to the chap that if he took the job he was considering he'd be £35 a week better off even after paying his rent and council tax.

Anyway it may be that my boss is right and I really am encouraging folk to pursue a 'right wing agenda' by doing their best to support themselves. Maybe I do deserve to be made redundant, though I don't think I do. I simply don't care anymore. I have set up a special email address for my clients to contact me once I've left. I've also arranged my own surgery where they can come for advice, all off my own back and I may I add without a penny of funding -any volunteers who wish to help me out are more than welcome but if it comes to it I'll manage myself.

On top of that I have decided that if I'm not made redundant by the end of next month I will put my notice in at the end of August (for reasons of holidays etc). Prior to which I'll start my business(es) . As I'll be able to conduct all my business over the phone and internet I can live anywhere in the world I like so if I don't make much I'll just move somewhere cheap to live.

Ultimately I have my aims my employers have theirs but they don't pay me anything like enough to allow myself to be treated poorly. There are two things I need to tell you all in case I am killed in the morning. Lack of money is no excuse for grovelling and it takes creditors about six months of non payment to take you to court.

11 comments:

BenefitScroungingScum said...

That sounds like a dreadful work environment and ethos, explains alot tho! I'm sorry to hear things are tough atm, but I hope you'll look back in a few years with your businesses booming and at least feel better about things. BG

Anonymous said...

Yes, start your own business - it sounds like you've got the necessary attitude. Aim to make 20 grand a week. And when the whole nonsense that you describe meets its inevitable end you can enjoy offering jobs to the Mr Chans of this world instead of to your old boss.

iLL Man said...

One would almost think they didn't want these people to stay in the country..............

Or is it simply blind dogmatism and laziness?

On another subject completely, Port Logan or North Berwick?

Anonymous said...

Good luck and you're well out of it!

Katy Newton said...

Anyway it may be that my boss is right and I really am encouraging folk to pursue a 'right wing agenda' by doing their best to support themselves.

Karl Marx would kick your boss's ass if he heard him coming out with that sort of rubbish.

Clairwil said...

Benefits,
It's pretty horrible but I have a very black sense of humour which get's me through the day.

David,
I've got a list of folk I want to offer jobs to that includes a former colleague, two current colleagues and four clients. I'm falling over folk in the wrong place throughout my work life.

Illman,
They want them in the country but they want them to fit with their ideas about what immigrants should be. In other words they like them helpless and get a bit narked when they breeze off to £3.00 an hour cash in hand employment, live on fresh air for a year, save up, then open a cafe or a shop. I don't hold with low wages myself but when the boss paying three pounds an hour is invariably the person that sorts them out with finance when they're ready to open they're business I can't see the harm in it.

David,
Wise words as (almost) ever.

Katy,
Marx would be at the back of a very long queue. I know one is supposed to think he's Satan these days and in fairness he was a pretty unpleasant fellow but I really don't believe he realised the world would make such bad use of his ideas.

Clairwil said...

Illman,
On the unrelated question see above.

eeore said...

plus if you keep on the move the creditors have a hard time finding you:)

good luck with the business.

Mike Smith said...

Resigning might be a plan, Clair. You might consider claiming constructive dismissal i.e. you were forced to resign. Having to train someome to replace you would give you a pretty strong case in my view - should you take your employer to a tribunal.

Good luck anyway!

Clairwil said...

Cheers Mike,
I will be consulting an employment lawyer before I do anything.

Web Marketing said...

Hi there

I just wanted to wish you all the luck in the world with your new business. :) You definitely seem wasted where you are. Is it internet marketing you are going to be doing? I have been marketing online for several years now and would never go back.

Best wishes.

Steven