A story of privilege

[fbhjr]

Back in 1990 I took a job at a telecom company as a mechanical engineer. As what we made was primarily electronic, there weren’t a lot of us mechanical engineers there.
That boss and I didn’t get along very well, so I started bringing in a Danish every morning and leaving it by the department coffee pot.

I quickly learned what was his favorite and always got that one if I could.

This continued for my first 3 years at the company. I got excellent reviews from that boss that would say I was a great engineer, an asset to the company and well respected.
The fourth year the company wasn’t doing well and declared a wage freeze. No one would get raises for the year.

I stopped bringing in Danish.

“What happened to the Danish?” that boss asked me after a few days.
“Well, my rent went up. The price of gas went up. The price of food went up. But, my pay didn’t,” I explained. “$2 a day on Danish adds up to about $500 a year. If I’m not getting a raise, but my cost of living goes up, I need that $500 for other things.”
“But, I like that Danish!”
“The company has a cafeteria. They have breakfast food there. Including Danish…”

That year I got an awful review. The worst I’ve ever had. I only agreed to sign it after I got to add a written rebuttal to it.
It said I was a terrible engineer, made all kinds of mistakes, started fights between other departments and missed all my goals.
I had excellent documentation showing otherwise, which ended up in my rebuttal, but it didn’t matter.

“According to this, you have never once liked the work I do,” I said to him. “Despite 3 years of good reviews you now say it was all bad.”
“Correct.”
“Why 3 years of good reviews if you didn’t like the work I was doing?”
“I didn’t want to hurt your career financially. But, now that there is a wage freeze I can let you know what I really think and it won’t impact your pay.”
I got a new job soon after and have never regretted that.

I’m not saying this was totally over the Danish.
He and I didn’t get along about a great many things.
But, he had come to expect me to buy him Danish every day. And, I stopped doing that.

I was not a pastry chef. Delivering pastry was not in any way part of my job description.
He certainly had no right to expect his subordinate to buy him pastry every day.
But, when it went away, he was not happy about it.
It didn’t matter that he was my boss, made more money than me, and certainly could have bought his own Danish.

He had it. It went away and he got mad.

I look at a lot of news about reverse discrimination and war on Christmas and think about the Danish…

Comments

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

I actually said 'holy crap' out loud about this. So many boggling things! Not just the bad review in the end, but the price of a good review was a daily danish? Talk about being cheaply bought...

[brickhousewench.livejournal.com]

Talk about being cheaply bought...

My thoughts exactly.

[cissa.livejournal.com]

Not that cheap! $500/year is serious money!

But way crazy entitlement.

[brickhousewench.livejournal.com]

For a bribe it's pretty cheap. At least judging by Hollywood standards, where bribes usually consist of suitcases full of money. ;-)