Or so I was told by my now-former boss shortly after he refused my two weeks' notice this afternoon. I knew when I took this job that it wasn't the place where I'd spend the next 30+ years, but I never dreamed it would turn to shit in less than three months.
I was employed by a small GIS/surveying company with less than 10 employees. The work they did seemed interesting, the pay was below industry average but much higher than $0 (which seems to now be the prevailing wage in Ohio and surrounding states), and they offered pretty decent health insurance. I was told to expect some evening and weekend work, but I had absolutely no idea what I was getting myself into. It soon became apparent that the company was at the end of a two year financial tail spin (almost directly coinciding with the current owner assuming control). Employee turnover was sky high and they seemed to be conducting an experiment on how to push workers past their limits with endless hours and staggering performance targets. In nine weeks, I had five days off. I once worked 14.5 hours, 18 hours, and 13 hours back-to-back. Two Fridays ago, I flew to the Los Angeles area to collect our mapping van and drove it 1300 miles from LA to Oklahoma City where another employee picked it up and I flew home. I should add that our van is nearing 200,000 miles and has had little maintenance aside from oil changes. The suspension is shot, the brakes make terrible grinding noises, the transmission slips, and the air conditioning doesn't condition jack shit. The perfect vehicle for a desert road trip. Did I mention the V10 gets 9 mpg highway?
When I returned to Ohio, I worked a weeks' worth of 13 hour days mapping in the Dayton area. With our computers going and no a/c, it was easily 100 degrees inside the van. Thursday was supposed to be pay day, and I was owed a four figure paycheck, so that was the only thing keeping me sane. The position was salaried, but they paid minimal overtime (actually 1.5x the state minimum wage) for hours spent in the field. From the first week of March through last week, I had accumulated more than 80 field OT hours, none of which had been paid and all of which was supposed to be on last week's check. Thursday came and went, and no one had a paycheck. We were promised Friday... nothing. I basically put my foot down and refused to work through the weekend, and then used a sick day today. The owner called me last night, apologized, promised me a check today, and we agreed to meet this afternoon and talk things out. Prior to the phone call, I was fully prepared to walk away. I decided that even if they paid me today I didn't want to stay in this situation (this was like watching a business school case study in how a company fails, and the resulting mood in the office was worthy of a reality show on Fox) but I figured I would do the right thing and give two weeks notice.
I should mention the head honcho at this company was almost a walking caricature of an abrasive New Yorker. He was 6'6", 300+ lbs, carried a knife on his belt, and his favorite word in the English language started with 'F' and rhymed with 'truck'. He used to work in construction in NYC. You get the idea.
Suffice it to say my offer of two weeks' notice before I moved on was met with a counter-offer of "Get the fuck out. Now." At least I have a check in hand for most of what I was owed, with a promise to mail the rest ASAP. I just hope the check clears. Two weeks ago, the same day I flew out to collect the van, my car was broken into outside my apartment (in a very "interesting" neighborhood of Columbus) and they tore up the dash to rip off my barely working el-cheapo car stereo. It really feels like the real world came out of nowhere and kicked me in the groin.
So that sucked.
