Before I begin to tell this story, I would like to set the record straight. During the course of this story, it is possible for you to ask who am I to talk or criticize somebody when I was just a low hourly employee who was never a part of the management. This is why I’m going to explain who I was while working for this Fortune 100 behemoth.
Without exaggerating, I was an employee who was willing to put money and the job on the line to challenge or compete other employees including managers to see who could do better when it came to my job/work. Out of 100s or 1000s of employees I have seen and worked with in the past from this corporation, I only met one person who could do better than me in one part of the operation. He was a Polish kid from NJ who was blessed with good DNA from his parents. Other than that, I can’t really remember anyone who came close to what I did consistently on a daily basis.
With that out of the way, there is another point needs to be made. When I first began my journey in this corporation, I started in a region which is highly respected by the corporate HQ based on high volumes and sales. My job at that time was not an easy job due to the volumes of my workload compared to others. However, it was not a tough job compared to my time in the US Navy. The only problem was that there were not enough hours for me to sustain financially and pay my bills. Also, I needed 5 years of full time hours to reach the top pay scale based on my rough calculation.
Once I found out that there were employees who worked part time hours for more than a decade, I had to change my plan immediately because my savings were being depleted in order to accommodate working for this company. I even had to get rid of my car insurance and rode a bike after relocating closer to the work. Then, there was a seniority protocol along nepotism when it came to promotion to full time hours position. It didn’t take a long time to figure out what I had to do. It was simple. I had to transfer and relocate to a new location within the corporation.
Once I set the motion to transfer to other locations, the bullshit started to begin with a write up about nothing. These managers were trying to make me look bad on my record. They all loved me in the beginning, but that changed swiftly once they realized there was a very good chance that I could be transferred to another location. It made no sense to me since they were not giving me enough hours to pay my bills. So how was I suppose to stay there? I guess they never heard Jay-Z’s concept of “What you eat don’t make me sh!t.”
Then I found out something very interesting after making a phone call to the corporate HQ. The HR department of my location intentionally didn’t send my transfer request to another new location opening in a small town of next neighboring state. Once I caught their play, I sent my transfer requests directly to the corporate HQ. Not long after that, my transfer was approved for a full time position in another location thanks to the general manager of that new location. He understood and knew why I was being written up and my transfer request was being intentionally withheld.
Once these managers who tried to stop me found out that I was being transferred to another location. They were somewhat surprised to see me becasue they knew then that I found out what they did to my transfer request. They couldn’t do much at that point since I was getting out of there in due time. So I waited with a big smile and counted the day I was moving to another state with a new full time position not knowing a terrible event was about to happen before the move.
A few months before the day to move, I was involved in a hit and run while I was riding my bike. This whole hit and run saga is whole another story in itself, so I will skip that part for the volume 2 of Hustlenometry. I basically ended up with f**ked up neck/shoulder and leg. To make things worse, there was a thunderstorm while I was in excruciating pain and I couldn’t go to sleep at all for awhile. All I thought about was finding this hit and run driver and bashing his face and leg with an aluminum baseball bat.
After some sessions of my physio and rehab, I wasn’t fully healed. I didn’t think I was ever going to be fully healed. When the time came to move to another location to open, I just hoped for the best and drove 5 hours in a rental van with my belongings. Once I moved and settled into a new apartment, I realized that I made a mistake by renting an apartment above a semi club bar. Every weekend was filled with loud noises from the crowd, fights and speakers. It was tough to sleep to say the least, but I was happy and excited to start working for this new location opening up soon.
Before the grand opening of this new location, I visited an office rented out by the company to introduce myself to the general manager. We had a nice small talk and I initially thought it was going to be great working at this new location. Then there was an orientation for groups of employees before the grand opening. During this orientation, a corporate auditor approached me and told me that my job was like being a right hand man to the general manager. Later I found out that GM’s bonus money was heavily depended on how well I did my job. I didn’t really know what to expect exactly, but I was ready to do my part.
The day before the grand opening when everyone was running around trying to clean things up and get things right, my injured leg from hit and run gave up out of nowhere. There was no strength on that leg. I couldn’t stand up with my two feet for a period of time. I had to lean on a counter to stand up and I was worried if this was going to be a serious issue. After somehow I regained my strength to the leg, I continued with my work. Even before the grand opening, I caught a mistake by a supervisor and potentially saved the company and the general manager about a few $1000s of dollars in the hole.
