Can't people just leave me alone & let me do my job?
Thursday morning, when all was quiet in the store & the snow was coming down in buckets, a lady stepped out of her mazda car, puffing on a cigarette. There is a one on one fitness place to the right of our store, & a Michigan Works employment office on the left. When we are slow, & we see somebody pull into the parking lot & watch them get out of their car, we try & guess which place people are going. The cigarette tipped us off that she wasn't going to the fitness place. She had one of those carry along briefcases with wheels on it that extend. She was headed our way.
We give the standard greeting & ask what we can do for her. It was our auditor. For some reason, my stomach always falls to the floor when the auditor showed up. It's not that my store isn't in good shape or that I'm doing anything grossly wrong, it's the fact that you can get caught doing something wrong that always makes me nervous, like when you pass a cop on the highway you instinctively slow down even if your not speeding. The fact that we haven't seen one in almost two years made it a little worse.
Everything went fine, of course, & after I found out that I did reasonably well on the audit, I took the opportunity to question the reasoning behind many rules. Most notably, I asked why it was an audit infraction to not have printed out a fifty page report that can easily be viewed online just so you can prove that you looked at it.
The audit lasted for three whole days, after the auditor would take an hour & a half for lunch each day, another 1/2 hour smoking & she'd spend another 1/2 hour on the phone for personal calls. Today took the cake, however, she finished the audit at 10:30 am, then proceeded to go online & check menus of restaurants in towns where she'd be spending time in the future. She filled out Christmas cards. She talked on the phone some more. She bugged my employees. She left at four. Can I have my auditor audited?
Tomorrow, my boss & my bosses boss are scheduled to visit my store in the afternoon. We've spent the last week painting the floor in the back room, cleaning the floors in the front, changing ballasts & light bulbs. I'm sure I'll get a phone call telling me that they didn't have time to make it, after all.
Wednesday, I have "Diversity" training. I think it's quite hypocritical for a company who has very few minorities & women in managment to have diversity training, but what do I know?
No more complaining. Not until tomorrow, anyway.
Five Favorite Songs of the Day
Alexandra Leaving-Leonard Cohen, Ten New Songs
Baby's Got New Plans-Alejandro Escovedo
Everybody Knows-Leonard Cohen, I'm Your Man
Shelter From the Storm-Bob Dylan, Comstock Park, MI, 2006
Cold Irons Bound-Bob Dylan, Portland 2006
Happy Monday, friends!
andrew
3 comments:
Your audit department irks you like the Michigan Department of Education irks me. It's the paper chase that bugs me the most.
I used to get nervous and intimidated by "authority" figures, but I've learned that we are just all "diversely" different beings with one thing in common-- not one of us is perfect.
Audit, Meaps, Angry Parents ... blah, blah and humbug to all who cause stress. I did get an awesome old Christmas album from Matt this weekend pretty fun to listen to. It contains a jazz version of Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixon... with a raspy voice and a great beat - it makes me smile!
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