Most Hated

Today it was decided that we will be terminating another employee. The manager who has to do it is not happy about it, and further does not like the fact that I'm telling him how it has to be done. So, I'm on another "Most-Hated" List.

Being the HR person in a small company is, just simply, a no-win proposition. My current arrangement is complicated by the fact that the CEO is extremely volatile and the only two people in the tri-state area who seem able to calm him down are me and his ten-month-old daughter. Since her schedule is packed with teething and pooping, I'm left with the majority of the responsibility of soothing our savage beast. To his defense, the CEO has to deal with such indescribable stupidity that his rants more often than not are restrained in comparison to the provocation.

Anyway, although I wasn't in the meeting and although I had absolutely NOTHING to do with the termination decision, a very high-ranking manager, who frequently does not get his way, sneered, "Well, we all know it's the HR guy who really runs the company."

That's not the first time someone has made that comment, and I don't know why I'm offended. While the CEO only listens to my suggestions maybe five percent of the time, it's five percent more than most. Still he has his own mind and the most I can ever do is delay him from doing something. If he's going to do something, it's done. But I seem to be the face that everyone is associating with "No." And lately a lot of people are being told, "No."

I have three secretaries bickering over who should do what, and who called whom, and said what, and I just can't take it. I'd like to slap all three of them and tell them to grow up, and this afternoon I metaphorically did that to two of them. The third, of course is the most difficult and refuses to meet. She gets one more chance to respond positively tomorrow and then I'm taking it to a higher authority.

And I thought that one of the benefits to being gay was that you didn't have to deal with children.