Bank Holiday weekend musings, Part 3
I've decided this little managerial exchange — which I first reported four years ago — might just (in hindsight) mark the start of my downward career spiral. It was 'twixt me and one of the 22 (or so) first-line managers I had found myself blessed with during my 25-and-a-bit years in IBM Hursley:
The story of an IBM meeting
Five years into my IBM "career" I was writing a CICS brochure for the new version. We had a meeting 'twixt planner, artist, self, and virtual manager (early 40s, single, 18-year IBMer, new to management) to discuss progress, agree on rough visual format, and see how to get a draft out as soon as possible.
This meeting was at 10:00 and the committee promptly started rewriting and redesigning on the fly. Meeting dissolved somewhat acrimoniously at about noon and manager decided to reconvene at 13:00 that day. And she imposed her company on me at lunch thus constraining the release of some of my pent-up head of steam! Walking back to her office I remarked that I was a little miffed at the afternoon meeting because I had a badminton game booked for 13:20 and I'd had to cancel.
The ensuing dialogue:
Manager: "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that."
Me: Yes, well you see, I'd been hoping to work off some of my frustrations on the court, too.
Manager: (laughs) "Well, you'll just have to take it out of your wife when you get home tonight then, won't you?"
Me: Actually, I never take work home.
Manager: "Oh, how incredibly self-disciplined of you."
[Pause]
Manager: "But it's not really that bad here, is it? Don't you think of IBM as your second home? A sort of family?"
Me: (thinks: merciful Allah, what kind of lunatic1 is this??) If I really thought that, I think I'd go insane.
The subsequent, shocked silence lasted until we'd walked the rest of the way to her office!