Finally, the new GM, Bunny, arrived to our location. He was a former Marine who had a thing for petite short women just like Wesley who had a thing for heavy set women. Bunny came from Connecticut with his wife and kids to take over our location. While I didn’t know anything about his credentials, I figured this just might work since he was a former Semper Fi Marine. So I gave a benefit of doubt without even seeing this guy in action.
Then, a Hispanic senior manager, Nica, came after Bunny to our location for the second round. She was a senior manager who originally came from Sac town. She had a son who also worked in the same company. Our first interaction was a funny one. She felt some type of way because she thought I was accusing her of stealing in the beginning.
When we were opening the location, she had to receive some packages from all over the places. She signed her name for some high value packages and those went missing. It was my job at that time to track and find those packages. So I had to hound and neg her for answers to locate these packages since she was the one who just might knew where to look. And I guess she didn’t like the way I approach the situation and my interrogation style to locate those high value packages.
If I knew at that time that I didn’t have to do my job and just talk to others about how I shave my hairy balls in the office, I definitely wouldn’t have asked her about those high value packages. Why would I think a senior manager who worked in early mornings day in and out for 15+ years and flew or drove across the country for a promotion steal some stuffs she could afford with her paychecks from the company? Never say never. However, I highly doubted that she stole those packages. She had no answers to my questions regarding whereabouts of those packages since she had a bigger fish to fry. Eventually, we were able to locate those high value items and everything was good.
Nica was also a heavy set woman except she was polar opposites of Fat Princess. This woman actually gave a f**k about her job and the business unlike many other managers who were just counting their retirement days and not giving a f**k about 10, 20, 30 years down the road. It is also important to mention that it would’ve been impossible to reach those numbers that the corporate HQ loves to see without Nica during that NY expansion.
She was like a mother figure who had an unique talent of dealing with subpar employees whose heads were not all there. It was very lucky for this company to hire her because she could’ve been a multi millionaire in her own right by starting and operating an empire babysitting and dealing with kids with down syndrome across America.
I could tell that she was frustrated in many occasions while she was in my location. Due to her position, corporate trainings and job security, she had to hold her tongue and couldn’t express how she truly felt in front of others at work. She maintained herself pretty well , but I could see that she was not a fan of being in that place. I hope she understands one day that holding her tongue is not good for her health and it could lead her to an emergency room.
Regardless of how I thought about the situation, my mind was pretty much made up about transferring to another location. While I was looking for other locations, Nica approached me for a pep talk one night.
“A change is coming.”
That was the main message to her pep talk. It sounded like she was telling me to hold tight and stay. Though my heart and brain told me that it was impossible regardless of who the GM was under the set of circumstances we were in, I gave her a benefit of doubt initially and decided to see where this was going.
With addition of more new hires and Bunny’s leadership, I gave some time to see if things were going to improve. With more manpower, I thought that my job would get easier and less stressful. Unfortunately, that was not the case and it was pretty much the same shit as before more or less. If anything, it was even worse than before since they hired more people and it was still the same shit.
I had no choice but to talk about what I was seeing and experiencing to Nica. I said,
“I can’t go on like this. This place and minions of Fat Prince, my new supervisor and others are affecting how I interact with customers due to my hit and run injury and everything else. We got one Kobe in this place and the rest of them are bench players. Plus, I’m not even getting Kobe money. I cannot compete and win against other locations.”
“We can’t just have all Kobes and no bench players in the team. We need bench players too,” She replied.
I laughed inside. She did her best to sell me some shit she probably didn’t even believe herself for the sake of the location and her numbers. She was trying her best to keep things together while juggling many challenges. I understood what she was trying to do, but I also had to live my life and be happy.
The Polish manager from NJ and I would say that there had to be something in the water. That had to be the only way to explain what I was experiencing at work. He tried to somewhat convince me to stay at that location, but at that point, there was nothing left to look forward to other than my next transfer. Unless my coworkers in my department paid me $5/hr from their paychecks, there was no way I was going to stay after everything I’ve been through and what I did everyday.
One quiet night, I helped a woman just like any other. After answering her questions and helping her out, she offered me a part time job on the spot. I didn’t think I was going to be transfered easily to another location. So I took her offer in order to make more money just in case I had to quit or resign from the company as a last resort. It was a good gig and it didn’t interfere with my main job and life.
