Gone - But Not Really

Dilbert unfortunately is still lurking in the shadows in my department. I just found out some stuff today when I was at work that just pisses me the hell off. Let me explain.

On June 16th, Dilbert went to another management position within the company leaving Ms. S to handle the mess he left behind (a.k.a. our nightmare work schedule). Unfortunately that same day Ms. S's mother passed away taking her away from work for a week. We had already passed around and picked our new shifts on a new six weeks schedule, but some issues arose and that schedule was scrapped. They had decided before Dilbert left to just extend the current work schedule another 2 weeks much to some people's delight and other's disappointment.

Anyway, with Ms. S being gone for a week, the current work schedule got extended for another week. Not surprising to any of us considering the circumstances. Once she returned to work, however, the new work schedule was not produced. Mo-Mo finally sent her an IM asking where the new schedule was. Ms. S replied that some "issues" were causing the the delay in getting a new schedule out and we were probably going to extend our current schedule for another week or so.

This continuous delay in setting the schedule is taking a toll on many of us. We can't plan anything in advance since we have no clue what our work schedule is going to be. Luckily I don't have kids, but many of my co-workers like Mo-Mo do and they need to make arrangements and whatnot for their children this summer.

Tueday, July 3rd Ms. S finally put out the new six weeks schedule before starting her vacation. She made me mad that night cause I kept bringing things to her attention about our work tools that needed to be fixed but she claimed to be too busy working on our work schedule to handle them at the moment. Of course, I hear her on the phone making stupid personal calls. I overhear her discussing someone's diaper change and would someone be home in time to meet the cable man who's coming to fix their cable. Here I bring legitimate items that need to be fixed on work tools we use day in and day out all day long but she is too busy?!

Then when she finally does release the schedule, nothing has changed on it! What required so much fucking concentration that she couldn't address the work items I brought to her attention? All she did was eliminate 2 slots. She didn't move them. She just eliminated them all together. Seems they (meaning management) finally got a clue and decided not to add those out on disability to our work schedule. Of course, she didn't explain this to us when she posted the new schedule. So when we noticed the missing slots I called her up (at home) and asked her about it.

Now before Ms. S left that night, she made a phone call which sounded like it was made to Dilbert explaining our work schedule. I thought it was extremely odd seeing how he's not been our manager for weeks now. I mentioned it to Stick Figure after she left. He overheard the conversation too, but didn't conclude like I did that she was taking to Dilbert.

So the new schedule is out and people have begun to pick their tours. I worked the 4th of July and discussed my irritation with Ms. S with a couple of my co-workers. I told them about the mysterious call and explained the missing slots on the schedule. I was informed that Dilbert has still been messing with our work schedule. It seems the week Ms. S was out for her mother's furneral, he took it upon himself to "fix" our work schedule. Plus the acting managers for our crew went to him for decisions needing to be made regarding our crew that they should have made themselves. I was oblivious about it at the time cause those decisions effected the day crew only. I work nights.

Well when I came in to work today, speculation was going on surrounding what shift slots were left and who was going to pick (or get stuck with) what. I eventually told the story again about my irritation with Ms. S and the mysterious phone call she made about the schedule. I was then informed about Dilbert sending one of my co-workers IMs today questioning her about work related stuff in our crew. That just went all over me. He is no longer our manager! Hell, he's not even in our department anymore! He needs to stay out of our business.

I told my co-workers that if this continues that we'll need to file a grievance with our union. He has no business managing our crew anymore and it needs to stop. Also Ms. S needs to step up to the plate and manage our crew instead of handling all her personal business at work. Someone told me one day she spent all morning calling plumbers for one of her rental houses. I myself have overheard many personal phone calls of hers. Plus Mo-Mo reminded me of the time Ms. S spent DAYS looking for this particular dress to buy for her boss' (at the time) retirement party. One thing I can say about Dilbert is he rarely handled any of his personal business at work. Honestly, I could care less if she makes personal phone calls all day everyday as long as the needs of our crew are met.

Ms. S has over 40 years of service with the company (she started when she was like 16 years old) and several co-workers have stated that Ms. S should retire already. I joked that she doesn't have the right dress for the occassion. Hopefully when she returns from vacation on Monday things will be better. Maybe her head will be in the right place and she will start managing things. I can dream, can't I?