You’re Only Gonna Let Me Down

          I have recently started a new position at my job. I was made a manger over the receiving dock in the department store. Luckily my employees do not have to worry about sales or customers. I work with some of the best people I have ever met. They are all very helpful and hard working. The only problem is that I cannot communicate with most of them. Four of them speak English, even then it is broken English for two of them. With the other two it is unique because one is a 50 year old Autistic guy and the other is older and he is kind of off because of a past head injury. Needless to say it is hard for me to express my appreciation when it is hard to communicate with them.
          Before I became the manager of the house-keepers and the handymen I was just a lowly sales associate. Something we had a little fun doing was bashing on the cleaning ladies. I am sorry to admit it but we did complain a lot about the dust. Still to this day I am a little bugged about how dusty it is; that is only something I have to fix myself. This is relevant to the point, I promise.
          Once I have become their manager I see how hard they work. I also see how poorly they have been treated by other managers in the past. The reaction from the majority of them when I was put in this position was kind of funny to me. They would say to me, “Finally a manager who will work” whether it was in their broken English or mumblings. Now I can see how the position I am filling has been neglected and treated as a royalty position in a way. The last manager would assign his people to work and then go chat it up with other managers and leave the hard work to his employees while he abandoned them for social gatherings. When going into this spot I knew I needed to be an equal with my employees (on a working level) I know I will have to show seniority over them eventually. I have had to do that a bit already.  But I think respect is needed for them because of all the work they have to do.
          Today we had a shipment of clothes and other things for the store, so we had to unload the freight. This is not an easy task, and we had to get it all done and put away today because tomorrow we have another tuck that will bring the same amount of stuff and possibly more. We got everything arranged and on the floor for the associates to put away. As I was on my way out the door for the day I was stopped by a lady, whom I really like, and she starts degrading my employees; calling them dumb, incompetent and lazy. She expected them to know exactly what merchandise she had in her area. “The Wool-Rich clothes don’t go over here!” and “I had to walk a lot of Juniors clothes to their area!” I was surprised to see her talking to me like this. The comment that really got to me was, “If I did my job as poorly as they do theirs I wouldn’t have a job.” She let me down at that point. I was really sad to see her talking about these awesome people so poorly. I tried to defend them, but she talked down each positive remark I said. My blood was boiling, I had to bite my tongue and just suffer through her complaining.
          On my drive home I thought about all of this; letting the entire day process through my mind. I realized I was one of those complainers only last week (I have only been in this position three days). The lady that talked with me let me down, but the thing that really got to me the most was I let myself down. I can see the both sides of the argument; the house-keepers have a lot they are expected to do. With two employees less than I am supposed to have, it is hard to accomplish everything. I have two older guys who do things their own way. I don’t care because the things I ask them to do get done. I have three Hispanic ladies; one of them has breast cancer and was in surgery two weeks ago. They all get the things done I ask them to do. All I can say is I am ashamed that I had not looked at their entire situation. I get it all now; I just wish they could all see it before they degrade the great people.

Dr.K

(Song: Let Me Down; Artist: Kelly Clarkson)