Patience: A Lesson In Joy: work

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Shippin Up To Boston (Part II)

Friday was just as interesting, conference wise. I’m learning that this information is on the cutting edge of “how we continue learning medical knowledge,” but I’m slightly concerned that being at the tip of the paradigm shift is not going to go over real well back at home. Thank goodness I’ve got an outspoken, enthusiastic educator for a boss.

I didn’t spend as much time walking around the city as I had done the night before. The temperatures were in the 30’s, and while I brought gloves, a hat and a scarf, it still wasn’t as enjoyable, partially due to the blister on my pinkie toe. So I asked the concierge for a recommendation for dinner instead of exploring the town on my own. Given that we are so close to Chinatown, and as I walked around the last two days I keep getting delicious wafting Chinese food smells; I was craving good Chinese!

He directed me to a little place called East Ocean City. Right inside the door, you are greeted with tanks full of live crab, lobster and other sea creatures. There is also a decorative tank for Nemo fish to contrast the dull look of impending doom (but what a depressing, sociopathic thing to do). You’d think that having 6 or 8 large fish tanks as you walk into the door would be unappetizing, but the mouth-watering smell of Chinese spices and sauces overwhelm any negative scents that might be emanating from the death tanks.

I ate alone, all by myself, at a two person table next to the window. I was immediately brought tea (unsweetened tea), and there was no sugar or sugar substitute on the table. Ah, to be back in the North! (The last time I ordered Chinese takeout in Wilmington we got a free side of sweet tea.) I wanted to branch out, but as typical, there were no dish descriptions, so I ended up going with something I’d heard of before, but hadn’t tried. My spring rolls came immediately.

While waiting for the rest of my food, I people watched. It is awkward to eat alone, but I was determined not to feel uneasy. The restaurant was almost full, with at least half, and closer to two-thirds of the clientele were Asian, speaking an Asian language (I have absolutely no ability to determine which languages were being spoken, but I imagine that at a Chinese restaurant in Chinatown, Chinese was a contender). I figured that had to be a sign of good Chinese food. Outside, there were a disproportionate number of Asian people walking by, mostly women. I watched two people parallel park, both Asian women. The first was perfect and talented; backed in and forward and done. The other needed her passenger to get out of the car to direct her into the spot. Oh well.

The food arrived, delectable and spicy, just as good as I hoped. I refreshed my memory on using nice, solid chopsticks by watching the lady at the next table; parallel is the key! Halfway through my meal, I realized the pork had been supplemented with tofu. I was neither pleased nor displeased with this knowledge. I hadn’t realized sooner, which indicated that it did not affect the taste. The prices were extremely reasonable, so I didn’t feel duped or ripped off. I was mostly curious; I never had tofu before (that I can recall).

I walked back the hotel and stayed in for the rest of the night. A little after midnight I realized, “Oh yeah, it’s my birthday.” I’ve had to keep reminding myself, since this is unlike any birthday I’ve ever had. Alas.

Shippin Up To Boston I

I’ve never flown out of Wilmington. The airport is tiny, perhaps not microscopic. One terminal, six gates. All the departing flights fit on a single screen. The first flight out was a small plane, the type you walk out to on the runway. The flight was acceptable, though I was one row forward of the exit row and the Exit sign jutted into the head space I would typically lean into. No naps. But the flight was empty-ish and I got the row to myself. We either had to wait in the air to land or the pilot enjoyed drastic mid-air turns, because we tipped side to side until I thought I might be motion sick.

The next flight out was packed. The Philly airport lacked outlets, so I wasn’t able to connect to the world via my computer. Oh how I wish my laptop had longer than a 20 minute charge. The flight was snug, but cold and I still couldn’t rest. However, I saw a small feat of innovation that surprised me, if only because the airline industry is not known for a) making things easier and b) doing something clever.

In place of the old light up symbol telling us not to smoke in the aircraft (how obsolete is that?!), they now have an indicator of whether electronic devices are allowed to be used. When I was younger, I generally had to ask the flight attended when I could use my Walkman, because the thought of making that obvious was beyond the industry at that time. This is the first time I’ve seen this on a plane, though it may just be that I don’t fly as often as I used to. Well, I say that… I’ve flown 4 round trips in the last year, and in a month, I’ll be doing it again. That’ll change after Harper turns 2 – he stops being free.

Arrived in Boston, waited for my luggage; I had packed light with only 2 barely full carry ons but when the whole flight does that, the overhead bins fill rather quickly. If you aren’t quick to hop on the plane, they check your second bag.

My hotel was oddly fancy, that is to say, fancy in a variety of different ways, but not in the obvious ways. I got a warm chocolate chip cookie at check in, yet this downtown business hotel did not have free wi-fi (I was able to sweet talk the front desk lady & get a comp code). The room was smaller than my bedroom at home, but I had a single to-go cup Wolfgang Puck coffee maker. But the bed is soft with many pillows and for me, the quality of sleep is really the key when choosing a hotel room.

My first professional conference was on the 5th floor of the Courtyard Marriot. The conference itself is only interesting to a select group of people, so I won’t go into the details, other than to say it was about teaching people how to sift through the hundreds, if not thousands of medical journals to find the best, highest quality medical evidence without spending every waking hour doing so. It sounds simple, but sadly it’s a) very complicated, b) not currently done, and c) the inability to do so actually causes harm to patients.

After the conferences first day, I napped. I know I should have been taking as much time to explore this huge wonderful city as possible, but I needed the nap so bad (much like I’ll need a nap when I get home this afternoon). After an hour or so, I got up and walked around the parts of the city surrounding my hotel. I found the shopping district, complete with a four story Borders. I didn’t go in, for fear I would never leave. I walked past pubs and restaurants, stopping at Rock Bottom Brewery for dinner. They had the most delicious Pumpkin Ale, with a cinnamon sugar rim. That’s a beer I could drink every day, and I’m debating whether to stop by tonight to give it another go before I leave it behind.

"Workplace Bullying: New York Bill Targets Abusive Bosses"

http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20100721/us_time/08599200535800

Some quotes from the article:

Worker abuse is a widespread problem - in a 2007 Zogby poll, 37% of American adults said they had been bullied at work - and most of it is perfectly legal. Workers who are abused based on their membership in a protected class - race, nationality or religion, among others - can sue under civil rights laws. But the law generally does not protect against plain old viciousness.

There are reasons workplace bullying may be getting worse now, including the bad economy. In good times, abused workers can simply walk out on a job if they are being mistreated. But with unemployment at around 9.5%, and five job seekers for every available job, many employees feel they have no choice but to stay put.

Not surprisingly, many employers oppose the bill. They argue that it would lead to frivolous lawsuits and put them at risk for nothing more than running a tight ship and expecting a lot from their workers. But supporters of the law point out that it is crafted to cover only the most offensive and deliberate abuse. The bill requires that wrongful conduct be done with "malice," and in most cases that it has to be repeated. It also provides affirmative defenses for companies that investigate promptly and address the problem in good faith.

This is the problem with living in a litigious society - lawsuits beget lawsuits. By creating laws to deal with our problems, we loose sight on how to do this ourselves. In an ideal world, an abusive boss could be confronted, then reported to HR or a Big Boss. But that doesn't happen anymore. HR is often concerned with making problems go away, and often it's easier to fire the "little guy making noise" then the "boss who somehow gets his way all the time." Additionally, much of this abuse is behind closed doors, and harder for HR or Big Boss to verify, meaning the higher level employee has the "experience" factor, which can create lawsuits in and of itself if abusive claims can't be verified.

A fear of lawsuits and need to resolve the problem quickly not only means that people no longer to the right thing, but laws are now necessary to prevent something that shouldn't be an issue to begin with. I understand the need to protect the "little guy," but I wish we didn't need bills and lawsuits to do it. It's a shame that not enough people do the right thing.

I have a personal experience with this myself. I had an abusive boss. What she said and what she meant were two different things. She would have "weeks from hell" where nothing I did was right, regardless of doing it EXACTLY as she requested, and I was under constant threat of termination. In one particular instance, I my job was threatened and privledges revoked because I had not scheduled an intern orientation for four hours, but two. When I told her that I had the email where she confirmed the date and time frame of the orientation, she told me I should have known better, and scheduled it for four hours anyways. During the last four weeks of my pregnancy, we were creating a final report. She reviewed drafts of it at least twice a week, making small editing changes along the way. The day before it was due, she completely restructured it, changed the goals and purpose of the report, leaving me to piece together new chapters, paragraphs, and appendices with the original document. Then threatening my job because it wasn't done by the deadline the following day.

There were several instances where she outright lied to me to make herself look better. She told me tales of how she fought with HR to keep me because there were layoffs and they wanted to let me go, since I was the most recently hired in the department. She told me how other departments were territorial and how political they were, so I was not to interact with them or it could get me fired. I was told to send her emails with the lies she requested so that she could use them as further proof that she needed money or employees or other resources. She told me that doctors and residents wouldn't talk to me because I only had a Bachelor's degree.

Some of it was simply ignorance. At the first floor meeting in our brand new building, she announced to everyone that in case of a fire, the doors to the stairways would lock us on the floor and we had to stay in certain "rescue areas" for the fire department to save us. She would make changes to documents on the network, save the changes to her desktop, and chastize me for not having the most recent copy.

When my new boss (NB) became a new layer of management between Research & the CEO, the IT guy told her to talk with another employee whose daughter had worked in the research department for two weeks before quitting because she couldn't take it anymore. After talking to this man about his daughter, NB immediately removed me from under my old boss' (OB) supervision. What NB found out about OB and her managment style appalled her.

But to me, what was most appalling is that clearly, the man whose daughter had worked for OB knew how I was being treated - and never brought it up to the CEO (OB's direct boss). Not only that, but he had told IT guy about it, who also said nothing. After OB resigned, so many people came up to me to sympathize what I had to endure under her. They told me their tales of bizarre stories of difficult encounters - and these were people who did not have daily interaction with her. They all said they knew how hard it had to have been for me.

As a brand new employee, working for my first real organization that wasn't considered customer service, I had a lot working against me:

I was a newly hired employee in an economic downturn.
With all the political propaganda OB was feeding me, I didn't know who I could trust.
Having no experience in this type of work, I thought maybe I was just ignorant when OB asked me to do things I didn't understand.
4 days before my first day of work, I found out I was pregnant. I needed this job - and the health benefits.
Being OB's assistant, the distrust and disgust that others had of her rubbed off on me by association.
I had no one else in the department to discuss these issues with so that we could take them to HR together.

Biting my tongue, keeping to myself, and doing what I was told, regardless of what I thought was my only recourse. I couldn't stand up for myself or trust anyone - I needed the job too badly to risk it.

If only someone had stepped up and said - "Hey, you aren't being treated fairly. Let's go to HR." or "You know, that's not company policy. You get more privledges than that." Maybe, instead of everyone knowing what a horrible boss I had and doing nothing besides saying "Glad I'm not you," someone could have had helped the naive, fresh-out-of-college new girl.

But, in spite of all this, I am still grateful for OB. She hired me - of 10 other applicants (I know, my first job was to send them rejection emails). She was looking for a health science major and picked a math and stats major. I don't know why she chose me, but after dealing with her for over a year, she resigned.

Now, I have a job I love. I am self directed and efficient. I have found my coworkers to be lovely people, not organizationally political. I look forward to going to work and it's rewarding to be recognized for the work I contribute. I've gotten two raises. NB has encouraged my professional development and doesn't believe in micomanaging.

If it weren't for OB, I wouldn't be here today. God works in mysterious ways.

Commence Panic Mode?

Well, for those of you who are interested, my boss resigned and/or was fired today.

My head is spinning, but it might mean that I have the opportunity to focus solely on research. I know the Lord will take care of me, and I can only hope that this is what He has in mind for me. We'll see, but until then, I'd been lying if I said I wasn't terribly anxious.

Colorado

Colorado had a huge storm today.

I just ate lunch on the patio.

I love Wilmington.

And in other news, only partially applicable, is that it was a coworker's last day today. She has worked in our department for over three months. I suggested to my boss that we should do something for her and my boss decided she would take us out to lunch. She sent out an invite via Microsoft Outlook, and both my coworker and I accepted. Today, at 11, my coworker came into my office, and asked me not to come to lunch. It was very hurtful. My boss was put off by this, and insisted that I go. Lunch was terribly awkward.

The only upshot to all this?

She's leaving to move to Colorado.