Several incidents worth of my precious writing time have occurred at work these days.
Yesterday, the new boss arrived and gave us an entrance speech. He also introduced me in front of everyone and apologized for making the speech in Portuguese despite me not speaking any. The other manager, again in front of everyone, said that I do speak, and that I speak better than the Canadian manager there that arrived a year ago.. Canadian laughed it off, but I am sure he was not happy with the public humiliation in front of 40 other people. I am starting to make enemies already 🙂
The new boss gave the standard “I am so proud to be here with such wonderful people, in this great company” speech. Then he said that he used to work for McKinsey and had already worked with all the big consulting companies and that even the junior people here are better than the ones at the consulting companies, so don’t think that your job is not good, blah blah. He was basically building on the assumption that everyone wants to work for the top consulting and thinks those companies are gods. I was really forcing myself to surpass my urge to burst out laughing.. had to hide my face behind my notepad. Sorry, my dear consultant friends. I love you, but I don’t think you are better than me…
I also tried to get a file cabinet to put under my desk and was told that I can request one and that perhaps next year, when the person who is in charge of procurement makes an order of furniture, I might get a new one. This reminded me of a story another person from the company told me about how he was waiting for 4 months to replace his broken computer chair.
I did get a work badge this week.. so looking at the brighter side of things!! Also helped a co-worker with his MBA essays. What a productive day!
And finally, today I found out that my job involves corporate strategy and I will actually be doing sort of consulting project and not financial analysis, which I originally thought my responsibility would be.. good to know.. time to dig out those MBA materials..
Grobetrotter 