Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Things to make you go MMMMM

Today was so hot here in NI that I have been walking around my Apartment in Whitefred square in nothing but my underpants all night!! Christ!! What a vision that has conjured up for you all!! Fred in his crackers!!

I had such a lovely lunch today in ZEN restaurant with SMITHY and I think I succeeded in boring him rigid for an hour or so. My boss let me have an extended lunch hour, so I made the most of it. Smithy had Sushi and I had something sweet and bland as I always do in Asian restaurants washed down with a few Gins - it was really very pleasant.

That pleasantness juxtaposes well with the unpleasantness I have been facing in work recently. Some of you already know that I was made redundant a few weeks ago and will finish the current role I have been working at by the end of July. In fact there were about 15 of us made redundant - an entire segment of workers. The high value customers managed here in Northern Ireland that our little unit looked after will now be looked after by a "Relationship Centre" in England.

There is a turn-up for the books! Imagine that - the supposition that England would somehow do a better job with our customers in our area than we would here on our own home turf. Lucky I'm not political or I might be drawing a few parallels at this point to historic Northern Ireland!!

I'm probably going to be OK - I've interviewed for a few roles and am hoping to get redeployed into another role. Don't worry about me at all - I'm honestly gonna be fine. Don't get me wrong - all these guys will all be fine in a few months but they are all really going through the shit right now - having to interview for roles (lesser roles than their own) so that they can be "redeployed", polishing up CV's filling out forms etc. It's hard to watch.

However imagine if you will a previously happy little team all sitting around trying valiantly to get through this situation STILL DEALING WITH CUSTOMERS when their heart is really not in it. It has caught my breath a few times to hear my colleagues continuing to show dedication and loyalty in the face of being shafted royally by their employer.

I say shafted and let me clarify. I am sure that someone somewhere has sat down and ploughed through the decision with many different factors in front of them - costs probably being the main one. That's not being shafted - shit happens.

Where I feel we are being shafted is not THE FACT that the decision was taken. The feeling of rectal intrusion stems solely from the fact that both the reasons for this decision, and the person / people responsible for taking the decision will NEVER EVER BE KNOWN by us here in Northern Ireland. Imagine that!!

Not only that, but our team of people are so loyal to the company that none of them have forced the issue or demanded any explanation or even asked who was behind it - they have all just accepted it like "civilised people" and are smiling through it (like idiots or like saints?) - so much so that one of the senior people who gave us the news actually THANKED us for being so understanding and taking it so well - what did he think we were going to do I wonder? Is it possible that this hench man is used to putting up more of a fight in the centres in England?

So I have come to the conclusion that it's the little people in life, the most gracious, the pacifiers who don't create a fuss or conflict - the people who accept their fate and get on with life. The nice ones. These are the people that oil the little wheels of our world and allow it to revolve freely.

The decision makers in the big cars behind the dark glass who can change people's lives but whose faces you don't have to see - they are the ones whose actions can jam the gears for society and THEY can only exist in partnership with the wheel oilers otherwise the system will all break down - correct? I really think that this situation is an analogy for what happens in the world between developing countries and the west. Our complacancy WILL come back to haunt us it's just a question of when.

Anyway sorry to get all depressing on y'all - just a little hiccup. Let's all get back to the internet, and television, and cinema, and the World Cup, and Big Brother, and having a relationship, and shopping, and having imaginary relationships on the side, and celebrity chefs, and buying a new house, and play stations, and having imaginary relationships on the side with celebrity chefs, and Cristiano Ronaldo and shopping on the internet for a relationship - Lets get back to all these things that distract us from grim realities of life - why not!! I will be tomorrow so I can't preach!!!

One thing has changed though - I'm not going to respect "bigger higher up" any more. I'm going to protest.

Perhaps I'll burn my Calvin Clein pants....

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posted by Freddy @ Wednesday, July 05, 2006 Comments: 2

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