Tricks Employers Play

You sit at the kitchen table looking at the pile of bills. Everything, and I mean everything is due. Last month your job terminated and you have filled out applications until you dream about them. You’ve spent beaucoup dollars riding around having interviews and still, no one calls you. It’s call the waiting game, but you can’t afford to wait on the meager unemployment benefits which haven’t kicked in yet. Desperate, you finally decide to take a job at a place known for rapid turnover. You make that final call to them, and you are fortunate to know that they are hiring and want to see you immediately. You feel good, and look forward to working once again, however, you don’t know what’s up ahead for you.

We’ll call your company, Company A. When you go in, you are hired on spot. They have a brief training session for all new employees which will last 3 days. You go, and participate with other trainees. Everyone is pleasant and Company A gives you a handbook with their mission statement, policies and procedures. You are elated, because everything in the book seems so sensible and just. The three days are not enough for you to really absorb everything in the inch thick booklets, but they tell you to read it as you go. They guarantee that you’ll have the information down pat in a few weeks.

Staggered Hours

Company A gives you your week’s schedule. Unlike most companies, they stagger your hours. You see that you are part-time, however each day there are new hours. On Monday you work from 9-3. On Tuesday, it’s 4-9. On Wednesday, you are off. On Thursday, your schedule demands you to be there from l-7, and on Friday it’s a short schedule from 2-6. Unbelievable, but you need that stack of bills on the table to stop haunting you, and so you hope your hours will somehow revert to a regular shift of either mornings, second or third. It never happens. Company A has learned that they can weed out the desperate from the not so desperate. Those who take staggered hours every week, each week demanding uniquely different hours from the previous, will not be able to pursue any other job. They have you stuck. You are at “their” beckoning call.

The 89th Day

Company A has a list of employees that have worked up to a full-time status. However, on the 90th day, they must begin paying unemployment for those workers. A few weeks before the 89th day, they begin to make oppressive demands on those employees. These targeted ones are told that their work performance is poor. No matter how much output they accomplish, the ratings are still poor. Finally, on the 89th day, they are called in and fired. There is a clause in their manual that says they can lay off any worker who fails to meet the desired expectations and requirements of the company. They have you, and you have no unemployment benefits.

Criticism and Excessive Work Load

It has been said that words will never hurt you, but in the case where Company A begins to pile work up on you until you are exhaused, and at the same time criticize your performance, it becomes almost unbearable. This trick is old. Blame the employee for every thing that goes wrong. Beat him over the head and verbally berate him until he seems worthless. It’s called bullying an employee, and there are laws against it, but if you don’t know that, Company A will continue to give you this preferred treatment. You always feel helpless, hopeless and worthless, and non-productive.

Train Others to Take Your Job

By the time you feel you have just about mastered your job, and know the ins and outs, Company A informs you that you have reached management status, and you are to train a crew of five people to do your job. You are elated because the pay increase is only $l.00 per hour, but that will really help you with the bills. They provide you with a badge symbolizing your new prestigious position. Your head gets a little big as the new employees call you, “Mr.”. So you work your hardest training the new employees. In a few weeks, they are able to do your job. Hoping that you’ll get more trainees to call you “Mr.” you begin making plans to buy that new bedroom set you’ve always wanted. However, just as you think you have “arrived”, Company A tells you they will have to lay you off. The five new employees know your job, and now you are dispensable. What they don’t tell you is that the five new employees will eventually experience the same treatment in time.

Less and Less Hours

There is no law to prohibit employers from being selective in giving you less and less hours. Your part-time, then full-time job can become a mini part-time job. The employer can ask you to work as low as 1-3 hours per week. Now, you wake up one morning and the stack of bills seem to have grown exponentially. They stare you in the face, and the less hour factor stares you even more starkly in the face. You feel it’s not fair. Why should all the new employees have 20, 30 and even 40 hours and you face 12 hours a week of work. You can hardly feed a bird on that. This is called, “Wake Up Time!” So you go in and discuss this with good old Company A. They tell you they had to cut everyone’s hours down. They did, but they cut yours down the most, meaning, “Can’t you see– you are no longer wanted here.” This is a subtle way of letting you cancel yourself out of their workplace.

Rewarding Tattlers

Company A wants to make everyone’s life uncomfortable. They tell you to report anyone who is not doing their work. Actually, the supervisor’s job is to do this, but Company A wants to keep costs down, and the supervisor is all over the place doing three people’s job. He is rarely available, cantankerous, and not approachable. Nothing is ever done anyway when you complain. So, Company A rewards the tattlers. Those who tattle on you are told they are good employees. They are promised a promotion as soon as promotion time comes up again. The tattlers feel they have an edge over you, and you, being naive, don’t even know that the tattler is the person working right next to you. Before you know it, you are called into Company A’s office and given and your list of infractions are read out to you as though Company A had a camera on you. You are threatened with being fired, all because Company A wants you to quit anyway. You have reached the maximum salary they want to pay to any worker.

Reprisals for Newspaper Reports

Company A longs to read the newspaper and find that you have been to court for some infraction of the law. Their policy book tells you up front, that if this happens, you will be fired. They read the newspaper like a gold miner looks for gold. You, perhaps, forgot about the newspaper reports, and don’t even know that your private life is under the scrutiny of Company A. Because they pay the lowest wages in town, should it matter that you have a little infraction of the law? “Yes!” it does matter, and as soon as they read about you in the paper, they rub their hands together and proclaim, “Another bites the dust!” And you are thrust out on the dust!.

Threatening

Humans do not operate well being constantly under the barrage of threats, however, Company A keeps you threatened every day. They tell you not to discuss anything negative about their company, to anybody. You are therefore afraid of speaking to your fellow workers. You just go home and tell your family about the job, but feel you can’t even open up fully to them. You feel constantly threatened if your freedom of speech is challenged. So you get silent. Company A wants you to see wrongs and look the other way. They do not want you to be a whistle blower. They want to blow the whistle and tell you how to march, when to march, and where to march. Every day that you come to work, you consider the large pile of bills on the kitchen table, and decide to put up with Company A for another day. It only grows worse, however.

The final straw for you will be reached when you conclude that Company A has been playing tricks on every one of its employees. It abides by the fair labor laws on the fringe. Many times it topples over to the other side, but you don’t know it– you just feel it. As long as Company A can get away with these subtle tricks, there will be employees flowing in and out of its doors, and Company A could care less. You see, Company A has no heart. Having a heart is what makes a company a good place to work. So, leave, my dear friend. Leave and go to another place that will embrace you, your labors, and your life with a heart. Oh, it may take some time to find another job, but you will. As long as there are people on earth, there will be jobs– jobs of all sorts. Pray and ask God to help you find one, and He will. You do your part in looking and He’ll do His part in helping you. As for Company A, eventually they will have to reform or go out of business. They may be able to get away with their tricks for a season, but when the season ends and everyone is on to their tricks, they will have to pack up and leave town. If they choose to reform, Company A will have to change its name. After all, Company A has acquired a bad name. They must change their name, their ways, or leave. Now, look who’s leaving!