She knocked loudly on my front door and yelled my name until I finally answered it. I asked her to keep it down that the neighbors might call the police at this time of the night but she lunged past me and into my house and slammed the door.
“Who do you think you are talking to like that you liar, liar, pants on fire!” Her saying that made me laugh out loud for real and that made her all the more upset. She went on ranting as she walked around my house that was in perfect condition with everything put away in its place even though I had hosted a party earlier in the evening.
“You are the most disgusting boss I have ever had and that is saying a lot. The guy I worked for five years ago used to slap my butt every time he saw me walk by and then told me that it was all part of seeing if I was staying in shape like the company policy required. I would have sued him but I needed the job. He seemed to get a lot of satisfaction out of slapping my butt and I just wanted to kick his. I was so glad when he was transferred to another office even though it really got to me that he got a promotion in the move. The man should have been fired.”
I replied that I had heard of that guy and she knew that I never touched any butts so what was her problem. She had seemed to have a good time at the company party at my house just hours earlier, that is until she stormed out unexpectedly and no one seemed to know why.
Then she got right up in my face and pointed her finger and pushed it towards me and I backed up a little as she shouted that I knew what happened and I should fire that man. I wasn’t sure who she meant so I asked her to calm down and I would make some coffee and we could sit and talk about it. She calmed down just a little as I made coffee and took her a mug of it and we sat at the kitchen table.
Then she told me a story that I had never heard. How she had been married to the man who started this company ten years ago but then he ran off with his secretary, stereotypical I know, after just three years. He left her with nothing after selling it to another guy. She hadn’t really known the other person and was out of work until she talked with him and convinced him that she knew more about the business than her husband had and that if he kept her on she could be a big help to him since he knew nothing of the business.
At that point, she was assistant to the owner and had a broad range of duties that included advising him on the products and the clients and letting him know who the good employees were and who should be fired. I chuckled as she mentioned that she told him who to fire because that definitely fit with what I knew of her. She didn’t seem to notice and just kept explaining that it turned out to be a good position for her.
That had been her job until that owner sold the business to me two months ago. He had told her that he would let me know about what she did for the company and that she could go right on doing the same thing. Which was what she thought had happened and she continued to write up reports and give them to me and I would look at them and set them aside and kept thinking to myself that at some point I would have to find out what her position really was and why she kept giving me these reports. Meanwhile, I told the assistant manager to give her specific duties and have her report to him.
So evidently my assistant manager decided to tell her earlier tonight, at the party that I had thrown for all my employees, right here in my house. While people were eating and drinking and just having a good time he happened to mention to her that he wanted to see her next week to discuss her job description and see how she could best serve the company and in particular help us now that we had a new owner, me, and were moving in a different direction. He assured her that all of the employees were having this interview as well so it wasn’t personal. He was just treating her like everyone else.
That’s when she got red in the face and shouted to him that she wasn’t like everyone else as she walked quickly to the door and left. Nobody knew what she was upset about and after a little wondering about the strange reaction of hers, everyone just went back to having a good time. Several hours later everyone left and the cleaning crew hired for the event cleaned and put everything back in order.
That’s when I had just started to relax in front of the fireplace and found myself falling asleep. And then I did. Fall asleep. That is until I heard the loud banging on the door and the screaming voice.
As she seemed to be calming down a little just seeing that I was listening to her I let her know that I knew nothing of her husband, the previous owner’s deal with her and that he hadn’t mentioned her at all to me. I just thought she was another of the employees that were of course staying on because this was a great company that I had purchased and everyone was being treated well by me as they had been before. My assistant had come to the company with me from another company that I owned and he knew nothing about her either. He was acting on my instructions. Had he ever been inappropriate with her? Had he said or done anything at all that I should be aware of?
She told me no, that he was a perfect gentleman if there was such a man, and that she was only complaining about him about what he had said to her tonight at the party about her job and being treated like everyone else. I told her once again that he hadn’t meant any disrespect because he really didn’t know about her history with the company in the same way that I didn’t know.
She nodded and looked me in the eye and asked me what I was going to do about it. I looked back at her directly and asked her what she meant, what she was talking about. She said what I was going to do about her reports and was I going to fire the people that she told me to fire. Would I listen to her about financial plans and clients and would she be my top adviser?
I said we would need to talk about this at another time at another place. This was my house, it was late at night, and to treat her properly and business like we should discuss this at the office next week. Perhaps Tuesday afternoon. But I would have to check with my secretary to see when I could work her into my schedule.
I could tell that she was starting to get heated about my putting her out and off so I suggested that maybe tomorrow night we could have dinner and discuss this further. She could lay out her proposal for how she saw herself working for me and my company and I would listen and respond with the needs that I had at the company. But right now I really needed to get some sleep and perhaps it would be good for her to do so as well.
She smiled and said that dinner tomorrow would be fine. She knew that she could continue to bring value to me and the company and she would tell me more about that at that point. Rising from her chair, she paused just a moment before saying goodnight as I showed her to the door and she walked out to her car.
Watching her leave I understood about the one boss she had mentioned. It was as if she knew I was watching because she looked over her shoulder and smiled. She was used to getting what she wanted. She was a very shrewd negotiator. She definitely had skills.
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