New Job Angst

Today is my first day in my new job as operations manager for a national waste company. I caught a cab to the office as I was yet to pick up my company car. I had a meeting with the Branch manager Greg Barns at 8am. Sitting in reception I watched people coming and going in my own world, when a man walked into reception.

“Mark?” he asked looking at me.

“Yes.” I replied. I stood up and we shook hands.

Greg looked to be 50 year old he was going bald and the hair he had left was grey. I followed him through the main office area where six women sat at desks answering the phones. We walked into an office where plopped in the centre was a large desk and several chairs. Greg closed the door and walked around the desk and sat down.

“Pull up a chair mark” he said pointing to the chair sitting at the other side of the desk.

“I’ll get the receptionist to hold my calls.” Greg said as he pick up the phone.

Greg and I hadn’t met until now as I had been hired through the companies HR department. I noticed Greg had a file in front of him with my name on it. He opened the file and read the top page.

“You look good on paper, but there are a few things I have concerns about” Greg said. The first thing that concerns me is you don’t have any experience in the waste industry. It seems all of your past experience was in road transport and freight.” Greg shifted his gaze from the file to me, his eyes boring into me, waiting for my answer.

“Yes, this is true but the way I see it, carting general freight and waste is the same in as much as both require trucks and truck drivers. Both have running costs and maintenance costs, and both are affected by unions.” I responded. Good response I thought to myself.

Straight on the front foot Greg asked, “Do you have a problem with unions?”

“No dealing with the unions is part of the job.” I replied

Greg and I talked for fifteen minutes, and he said he was pretty satisfied I was the right person for the job. We walked around and he introduced me to the staff. He than took me down to the other end of the building and introduced me to the state manager, who’s, name was Wayne. Wayne looked to be forty and was six foot tall. The three of us spoke for ten minutes when Wayne s phone rang, he looked at the number showing for the incoming call and said we will catch up later as he needed to take the call. Greg finished showing me around the site and showed me to my office. After some formalities, he handed me the keys to my company car and the office door. On his way out he said, settle in and he will catch up with me at the end of the day and walked away.

 Sitting at my desk I looked at the mountain of paperwork sitting on it. As I glanced at this pile of paper one of the operations supervisors Bob, knocked on my door. Bob looked to be close to retiring age and didn’t look all that healthy. Bob and I sat talking for an hour where I gathered a lot of information. He informed me the drivers were all in the union and the union had a strong grip on them. Productivity was lousy and sick days were out of control. From talking with Bob I learned some interesting facts. The driver’s union delegate Mike was married to Greg’s sister Carol, which made him brother-in-law to Greg, the branch manager, and Carol was the state manager’s personal assistant plus good friends with his wife.  

One big happy family, I thought.

The man who previously held my job became disillusioned and finally quit.

It was already long day, and I was beginning to feel I had jumped into a hornet’s nest.

Tomorrow afternoon I was meeting with several of the drivers including their ringleader, Mike.

Arriving to work the next day at 7am there was only the operations supervisor in the office. His name was Harry. Bob started at 7.30 Harry filled me in. In the short time of being at work, two drivers had called in sick, and he had spread their work onto other runs. This would mean some customers would not get their waste picked up. I grabbed a cup of coffee and sat down at my desk and continued sorting through the pile of paper.

As the knock-on effect from this morning’s debacle cascaded, I took a couple of calls from angry customers who were getting sick of their waste not getting picked up and I was copping the brunt of their frustration. Day 2 of the job!  Lunch time came around and I couldn’t believe how quickly the time had gone. I grabbed another cup of coffee that would serve as lunch as the day was unravelling.

Base on how the morning went, I decided the best course of action was to get in front of chaos. After a couple of phone calls, I called in the two supervisors in to find out what had been happening in their day. I noticed that neither supervisor left the office and asked how often they were out on the road catching up with drivers and calling on customers. Their answers were alarming neither of them had been out on the road for several days, normally they would only go out on site if there was an issue. After listening to their stories, I told them this would change as of today. Harry was to hit the road when Bob arrived at work. I told him to spend this afternoon planning his day for tomorrow and to give me a copy.

I was told by HR when I was interviewed for the job that productivity was down costs were escalating and, overall profits were down. No wonder I thought.

I was engrossed in a report I was reading when I heard a tap on the door. Looking, Bob and 3 drivers were standing in my doorway. My office was reasonably large and to one side sat a small round table and four chairs. I invited them in and asked Bob if he could crab another chair.

It was to, say the least, an eye opening meeting. Basically, I was told by Mike, the delegate, and the mouthpiece for the group how things were run, and that is the way it would stay. According to Mike the drivers were doing as much work as they could in a day, and if the company wanted them to do more, they would be causing drivers to speed and take, risks.

The meeting ended, and the drivers left. Bob closed the door and said he wanted to have a word.

“You see what we are dealing with. I have reported to four operations managers in the last two years, and they all resigned. They were consumed by the politics of this place. Trust me, it will do you no good looking for support from the managers above you, and I tell you this because I only have a year to go, I want to head to retirement with a bit of stability in my work life for that time. A word of advice, If you are anti-union you won’t last a month.”

I thanked Bob for his honesty and candour, assuring him I wasn’t anti- union and believed unions. Unions were a necessity, or the pendulum would swing too far in favour of the business world and there has to a compromise for it to work.

I went to see if Greg was in his office but he wasn’t so I walked up to see if I could see the State manager, Wayne. I was met at the door leading to Wayne office by Carol.

“Hello Mark, how can I help you?” Carol asked.

Carol was tall and thinly built she had blonde hair and green eyes she was attractive but at the same time she looked hard.

“I want a word with Wayne.” I replied.

“You don’t have an appointment that I’m aware of” Carol replied looking at Wayne's diary.

“No, I don’t, but I only need a minute.” I responded.

“Wait here and I will see what I can do.”

Carol disappeared for a minute and came back to the door.

“Wayne can give you ten minutes” she informed me, glaring at me

I thanked her and walked into Wayne ‘s office.

“How can I help Mark?” Wayne asked.

I told Wayne about the meeting I had with the drivers and what Mike had said.

Wayne listened to what I had to say and then said in dismissive tone “You need to discuss this with Greg, it is his branch, and he needs to ensure it runs smoothly. But also, you are the Operations Manager, and your job is to control the day-to-day operations. After all that is what you were hired to do.”

I knew at that moment Bob was right in what he told me. I’m on my own.

On the way back to my office I walked past Greg office and saw him sitting at his desk. I knocked on his door and asked if he had a minute. He waved me in. I told Greg about the meeting I had with the drivers. He started tapping his pen on the desk and he looked aggravated.

“So, what’s the problem? You’re the Operations manager, the drivers report to you. You deal with it!” Greg said.

“Fair enough then. I will be pushing for better productivity and clamping down on drivers taking sickies. “I replied coldly.

“I will say this, I will be holding you responsible if the drivers stop work. So negotiate well. We need a win, win.” Greg replied

The week went quickly and it was Friday morning. Today the CEO and financial controller would be here for the monthly management meeting. The meeting started and the CEO was reading the monthly report.

“Productivity is still down, and costs are up higher than they were last month. What is being done to rectify this?” The CEO asked the management team

“What are you doing to turn this around, Greg” Wayne asked.

“I have given Mark instructions to fix both the productivities to increase profits” Greg replied,

“What are you doing to fix productivity Mark?” Wayne turned to me.

Both managers throwing the new guy under the bus.

I couldn’t believe what had just happened.

I was going to fix the problem right now.

“Well, I will tell you what I have done, I had a meeting with the drivers and was alarmed at how strongly they are all affiliated with the union. They virtually told me how they would work, and if I tried to push them harder to get more productivity they would go on strike. I then went to you Wayne to discuss the problem and was told to talk to Greg. Clearly, you Greg weren’t interested in discussing the problem with me. So much for team work. Now I ask you, does your reluctance to get involved have anything to do with the fact that Mike, the drivers’ union delegate is your brother-in-law? And Greg and is married to your sister Carol, who is also your assistant Wayne.”

“That’s enough Mark” Wayne said, more like a command.

“Well, I will leave you all to it.” And politely, I picked up my things and headed back to my office and called a cab and headed home. That makes the 5^th Operations Manager to call it quits. I thought to myself. I wonder what they will do about it.

Several hours later I received a call from the CEO, surprisingly, he offered me the Branch managers role.