It's Over Already?

It's amazing how quickly time passes when I am not at work. Ten days just whooshed by and here I am preparing to go back to work tomorrow and face a shit-storm. Here's how it went down: the boy and I decided to go camping. We gathered our gear, bought the food and booze, rented a car, and off we went. I told everyone in my office that I would not be able to respond to any messages until we returned. Right in the middle of the trip, I get a message telling me that one of our clients did not renew their contract and would be pulling out November 9. This was not a surprise, and I was more than a little shocked to hear that the office was upset about it. These are the same clients who, for the past year or so, have not paid my company for services rendered above and beyond the scope of the contract. People in my office have been complaining that they are working for nothing, even though they still get their paycheques, and now they claim to be upset at losing the client that wasn't generating any income for the company? Maybe it's me, but I just don't see what the problem is. Not having their shit to deal with means we can focus on our clients that do pay.

More than that though, is why on earth my office thought it was a good idea to call me while on vacation to tell me this. I am, quite frankly, very surprised that I was informed while on vacation. The whole office knew that I needed time away from this shit, so why did they call me and tell me? Because they are women, that's why. It doesn't matter that I have never taken more than an extended weekend off in the past four years I have worked there. What matters is that I wasn't there and they had to deal with the shit themselves instead of shucking it onto me. So they did the next best thing: attempted to ruin my vacation. What they didn't count on though, was my bitchiness surfacing before my compassion.

It's not that I don't care about the lost client; I do. I understand that this is more of a morale issue than a dollars and cents issue and that losing a client makes your employees wary. Despite that, I ignored the call. I sent a quick message letting the office know I got their email and shut off my phone. Then we went to the beach and frolicked in the water because we were on vacation. Remember? VACATION. Geez.

My vacation was amazing, despite the obvious attempts of my office-mates to ruin it. I didn't set my alarm at all and was not woken up once by texts or facebook messages. Tomorrow, though, I go back to work. I am not looking forward to it because I am not in the right place anymore. I need a change, I need something different and although I have a plan, I know it won't be a quick and easy process. Losing this client has shown me that the company I work for might not be the best fit for me, simply because there were a few key things that could have been done to prevent them from leaving. Things that my boss should have seen and acted on and didn't. Because of that, I can safely assume that she was prepared to let this client go but wanted them to sever ties. Kind of like making your boy- or girlfriend hate you so they break up with you because you are too chicken to say the words. Not the kind of behaviour I expected from my boss, someone I used to look up to.

I am more than a little disappointed with the way this whole thing was handled. Then again, it isn't my company and I have no say in the way it is run. That being said, I certainly do not need to stay in a environment where situations such as this arise.