The Cake is a lie…
So I officially finish my job of 2 years and 2 months this Friday and I leave with nothing but a bitter taste in my mouth for the foundation of lies I have been fed over that time. Having accepted the role on the grounds of delicious cake instead of actual fiscal reward, I leave with only one statement. The cake was a lie.
It would be fair to say for the most part my employment now feels like a waste of 2 years of my life. And like an abused spouse, looking back I wish I’d have escaped my tormentor earlier and can now see it for the twisted, one sided relationship it’s been.
Sure, I’ve actually learnt a lot in this role, but nothing of any substance I wouldn’t have got in a proper development role. I’ve even had to pay for my own MCTS exams (another false promise) once I’d gained the relevant skills (again, rather than the courses the company promised to send me on so a 2 week training course has taken 2 years of hacking and giving me dribs and drabs to achieve).
I was also promised frequent bonuses once I was working full time in Software Development. The only one I have received is tainted with lies and deceit involving me working 80 hours outside of my contractual employment to ensure a clients booking system would be live for the New Year.
Having gone to extra lengths to ensure Amy was supported at home with Ethan and call in a few favours from relatives, I pulled out a weeks worth of all nighters and a weekend of working my arse off for the promise of £1000 cash. I delivered my part yet thanks to a mixture of terrible client management and idiotic bumbling from an overpaid, under qualified Senior Engineer, they ensured the system wasn’t able to be handed over to the client (although finished) and the company tried to weasel out of my bonus on a technicality. They eventually did pay up, but not without general douchebaggery of finalising at paying 75% of the bonus ‘gross’. I ended up after taxes, National Insurance and a massive student loan overpayment thanks to the ridiculous way they calculate what you pay, with a cash value of around £350. Well below minimum wage for the extra hours I put in and a complete slap in the face for my efforts.
My Little Big Boss said through gritted teeth whilst handing over the cheque, “we’re paying you this to put a line underneath it so we can all move on”. In other words we know we’ve fucked you over and because we never agreed anything in writing, there’s nothing you can do about it. More fool me, perhaps, but my business relationship still had a little smidgin of trust at this point…
After this meeting I told the company I would never work above and beyond my 40 hours a week and the relationship has been tainted ever since. To add insult to injury, months later when the project did go live, I had to do nothing to when we flicked the switch, proving categorically everything I’d said was correct. We even got a massive amount of praise for the system after the client saw an increase in conversions and took over £50k online in just over 10 days, something they’ve never done even in peak season.
Idiotically this wasn’t the final straw for me; having worked for the most part of the two weeks I had booked off whilst Mike and the guys were over from Canada (again, the company abusing the informal verbal agreements I’d had), I battled on, believing yet more lies of change and a better future.
The last two straws were simultaneous; one positive, one negative. After getting wind of some cheap MCTS exams from a good buddy of mine, I decided to give them a shot one way or another. I presented it to the company that they should be footing the bill and my requests were fobbed off, then ignored. I was told I would be asked to come in for a chat the following week and it never materialised
Ironically, upon passing the first exam and swanning around the office somewhat pleased with my own achievement, I was asked in for a chat and the apologies started. “I thought we were going to have a chat about these…” yadda, yadda, yadda. I said I couldn’t wait and paid for them myself. No offer of retribution, reimbursement or future planning for ones I might want to take in the future, just a well done and an awkward glance of a man knowing I was now in a position to demand more money. The cake was another lie.
In the similar period it was announced that we had a new Operations Manager. Something positive? No. Not at all. Rather than take the best engineer we had for the job and promote them, we transformed the job of a part time, non technical account manager give them the role instead. Still part time. Utterly clueless when it comes to scheduling the work and you know, being an all round Operations Manager.
Operations management is an area of business concerned with the production of goods and services, and involves the responsibility of ensuring that business operations are efficient in terms of using as little resource as needed, and effective in terms of meeting customer requirements. It is concerned with managing the process that converts inputs (in the forms of materials, labour and energy) into outputs (in the form of goods and services).
How can an Operations Manager do this job without a fundamental understanding of the resources they are trying to minimise the use of? I’ll tell you how…
You tell the OM a time-scale you need to complete a project, baring in mind the engineers here are already overworked and under compensated, then they multiple the figure by a factor of less that one depending on how little the actually understand the task you are going to be doing. The higher the complexity, the more likely you are to end up with a lower number.
Having watched this happen first hand and seen the utter, utter despair in the engineers eyes when his on site server rebuild and system role out was changed from 3 days to 2, plus the travel and preparation being allocated to his own time, the penny finally dropped. There was no delicious cake. It was all just a series of lies intended to keep us all hungry, but with the baking close enough to smell so you believe one day it could be true.
Maybe it is callow of me to think otherwise, but if this is business, it can go fuck itself… I’d rather be unemployed!
