Work Part 2

So it has been a month now at the new job. It's weird, no one has ever left me in charge of anything before. On top of that I finally found out why they hired me. It seems that my predecessor was both a criminal and a thug. ( Harvard business school, defining the American work place for generations. Even the mafia is afraid.) Sweet! Seems my reputation for being a calming influence got me the job. That and my willingness to work for short money. That, that, and my ability to take serious body shots and remain upright. That, that, that, and the fact that other workers are willing to follow me to a new place because they think " If the fat man works there the place must be on the up and up."( It's the moving business, got to stock up on help for the summer, help that will be cast off like a used kleenex in the fall. My honor for a paycheck. Seems fair.) Sort of true, definitely true, proudly true, not true. So now my mission is to team build, control costs, and do my own work too. Sweet!

I promised them no motivational posters.

Now as I said I work at a moving company so everyone on the yard side of the wall is male, and everyone on the office side off the wall is female. Well actually there are also sales people, gender neutral creatures that are controllable  as long as they get exactly their own way, or are distracted by frequent flyer miles and golf. Fortunately there is a sales manager so they are only tangentially my problem.  I figured I'd tackle the male/yard side of the equation first.

Men are easy. They will kill each other over shiny stones, do not like to be told what to do, will not listen to what you tell them, will do exactly as you order as long as what you order is exactly what they want to do, and will club you over the head then consume your still beating heart if they think it will gain them some advantage in their race to die with the most things in their possession. Piece of cake.

It is a little known fact in management circles that if you have good people they will manage themselves. If you have bad people you should fire them and hire good people. After a week I gathered the team together, told them that I knew they were good at their jobs (probably not completely true, but the summer is coming so firing and rehiring will have to wait), explained what needed to be accomplished, "Hey guys, its the transportation business. Transport stuff." and turned them loose. What could go wrong?

I was pretty sure that we wouldn't end up in a shooting war with the VFW across the street so I turned my attention to the office. Now anyone that knows me knows I am clueless about woman. I always want to go in with the "We are all just people here" approach. They know what they are doing, let them do it. So I tried the same approach as with the guys " You know what work has to be done, officey things right? so just do it." Stunned silence.

"... but what should we do?"
"I'm an operations guy. You know finance, customer service, and office procedures better than I do. Just get the work done."
"... but what should we do?"
"Well... what you have been doing right along only better. I know you can do it."
"... but what should we do?"
"There's a ton of talent here, I've been watching for days now. Show the other branches that we have skills."
"... but what should we do?"

It went  that way for a week. Stalemate. I finally blinked. Wasting one of my precious  Saturdays, I reviewed all the computer programs, outlined a flow chart mapping the job paperwork from booking to payment, then divided up the work in a way that seemed to keep everyone in the same position while consolidating chores. I unveiled my master-work on a Monday afternoon to stunned silence.

"... does___ have to do the calls? That's not going to work."
"I thought it would eliminate a step."
"... well we can do that but then ___ won't have the ___"
"Fine, let's just switch it back."
" We can give it a try..."
"No, no that's alright. Is there anything else?"
"... well..."

It took 2 days but all my ideas (and work) were sacked. Turns out they had a pretty good idea on how to run the office. So my office team-building took a total of 3 weeks to get going at the end of which we were doing everything exactly the same way as before only better. At least that's what my boss told me me Friday. I tried to take no credit for this as it was a complete accident, but the boss seemed to think otherwise. The best part is every once and awhile I'll hear one of the ladies giggle about,  "Would I like to shake everything up again."I guess I'm an adorable dunderhead, hey whatever works right? It's like being in a marriage only with no sex. Actually it's just like being in a marriage.

Meanwhile out in the yard the boys had built a fleet of hydrogen powered zeppelins out of tarps and the wood from overseas crates. Sweet. When I suggested to them that zeppelins were an inefficient way to move furniture they told me I was wrong and could they at least try to move things in zeppelins. After all, "You told us to fix things so we fixed them." I told them "No zeppelins", but they insisted on using them. Initially it sort of worked, but then we lost 3 of them from the hydrogen igniting when one of them lit  up a cigarette in front of a shippers house. They were finally willing to go back to using trucks after all their lunches floated away because the mailbox they were tethered to pulled out of the ground. Try filling out the paperwork for that.

This all actually happened except for the Zeppelins.

So, the work place. It's men doing man things. It's women doing women things. It's me taking a lot of aspirin and drinking well into the night. Maybe I should become a sales person?