My personal hell - part two

As best as I can, the events leading up to the title subject. Caution, it may wind up a little wordy. But I'll do my best.



Monday January 26, 2005: I get to work and check my emails. Among them is one from my manager concerning a training session that had been facilitated at the end of October and the corresponding "sign-in" sheet. The message indicated that the vendor company for which the training had taken place was concerned that the "sign-in"sheet did not look authentic and they implied that the training did not actually take place. At the end of the message to me was an indication from my manager that I needed to reply with a good answer (in my reply message, I deleted this sentence, as I knew my reply would be forwarded to the vendor).



Having a very vague memory (in other words, I basically had no idea at that time) of the events of the night in question, I did ask around for whatever information I could get quickly and wrote my reply. In my reply I indicated that I took offense at the implication that we would claim to have made a training presentation without actually having done so, and, if there were any inconsistencies, they were made in good faith. I also expressed my apologies for allowing correction fluid to be used on the "sign-in" sheet, against vendor company rules (which I overlooked when reading the class trainers' manual).



Tuesday morning I got a call from my manager complementing me on the reply I had given, even commenting on the extent to which his boss's liked the part that if we said we did it, we did.

He then proceeded to tell me that several of the "facts" of my response were in question and I was going to be placed on unpaid leave until an investigation could be completed.



Now to the heart of the matter. In the section of the "sign-in" sheet requiring the instructors signature, correction fluid had been used. Over the correction fluid was my signature. My original explanation was that someone in my department who was not certified to give the training had gotten the paperwork started for the class and had signed the form though I actually taught the class. In order to keep from having to track down the students to have them re-sign on a new sheet, I just corrected the one I had. When I wrote this, I wasn't completely sure if it was exactly accurate (especially given that the day in question was 3 months earlier) but it sounded reasonable and probable ( as this type of thing had happened in the past). It also was the type of answer I thought my manager wanted from me (one that minimized any fault on the part of my company; he said he wanted a "good" answer).



Turns out, I was wrong. The uncertified person had made the presentation. He even told me so on Monday night, but I thought he had to be mistaken. Why would my signature appear on the paperwork from a class he presented and why would he handle a class he was not certified to facilitate? On Monday night, I had no idea.

By Wednesday, I was freaking out over the whole matter and I wound up going into work to have a talk with my manager and a member of Human Resources. This is when I was shown the paperwork in question. I was also told that the employees who attended the training all said, when asked, that my coworker had run the training. After some time, I asked my manager if we could talk privately as there were things I didn't want the HR person to hear.

Outside, I told him about the underlying meaning that I had gotten from his message and that I didn't understand why he wanted to continue to pursue the issue. Wasn't my original response enough to satisfy the vendor company and keep us from looking bad in their eyes? I also indicated to him that I thought this whole thing was being blown out of proportion to be used as an excuse to get rid of me and not have to pay me the incentive money we were all promised (if we stayed with the company until closing).

He assured me that this investigation had nothing to do with the incentives. Then, after he indicated that I had misread his intent and that he couldn't imagine why I would even think that he would want me to sugar coat reality, I went ahead and told him what I had learned, remembered or thought I remembered about the incident since my original response. He told me to write it down and get it back to him.

In short, it said that I put the correction fluid over my coworkers signature and replaced it with my own as an attempt to get under the skin of one of my other coworkers. As the class was invalid (due to being presented by an uncertified individual), any resulting paperwork would be invalid and could be thrown away. Unfortunately, after I messed with it, I forgot to throw it away and somehow it wound up in the hands of the vendor company.

Thursday morning I was called and asked to come in to discuss the situation. When I got there, I was led into a little office by the security station and met by my manager and someone from HR who proceeded to tell me that they were going to have to let me go. While I usually try to be prepared for most anything, I was shocked. I had no idea what to say or do. When I asked to go up to my desk and get my personal items, one of them went over to the security station and grabbed a box full of my personal effects. I was told that if there was anything else of mine that I wanted to get, I would have to schedule an appointment to be escorted up to my desk to get it.

I left that building with my box in my hands, my brain totally confused and very upset and angry. Not just from the being fired, but from the attitude I was shown. One would think I tried to rob the place or I had shot someone with the attitude given me.

A day or two later, I called to go get the rest of my stuff from my desk. I was basically told that at no time would I be allowed to go back to my former desk to get any remaining personal items (so I had a co-worker pack up all of my things and meet me at a store on his way to work the next night).

Three months later, I find out the the information I was given concerning closing my retirement account was incorrect. I was told by the HR rep to wait until the end of the fiscal quarter (March), then to contact the retirement people. I waited until April and made the call. This is when I learned that I should have called immediately after losing the job if I wanted to take a payout of my account (and these rules had just recently changed). My companies regulations allow only a 60 day window for such transactions.

The bad news is that I lost a great job and lost out on a lot of money. The good news is that the company that now wants nothing to do with me, in about 15 years, has to start sending me a check every month not to work for them. Retirement can be a wonderful thing.

Part three is the rest of the story, the stuff that will make you wonder.