Thursday, March 21, 2013

"Determining the Relationship" at work

I apologize in advance if this offends anyone. Please note that I only apologized to avoid conflict.

I've been staffed with my team for about six weeks now. In consulting, this is the point in the relationship where you think, 'Okay, are we going to stay friends after we break up, or is she such a masochistic nightmare that I won't want to ever see the crazy bitch again?"

The breakup is inevitable. (I wanted to write a disclaimer as to how this is different from my real social life, but I couldn't think of anything that made sense.)

These are the three types of teams you may come across... (I'm going to refer to "teams" as "girls" because it's more applicable to non-consultants.)

1. Girl is fun, chill, smart, and most importantly, doesn't take work all that seriously.

This is a girl you try to keep around as much as possible. You actually find yourself wanting to hang out with her outside of the office, and ... dare I say... add her on Facebook. You see eye-to-eye on getting work done in the most efficient way possible, talking about the real lives we have, and using the F-word at least 50 times a day in a positive way. Girl is fan-fucking-tastic.

2. Gets her shit done, but chick is boring.

You try to start a conversation about sports, music, art, books, movies, animals, cookies, anything... and get no sign of life. You try to avoid a conversation about pivot tables, PPTX shortcuts, benchmarks... and can't get her to shut the fuck up. In the team room and in front of the client, you're extremely grateful for having her around. But once your foot feels the fresh concrete outside the office, you think of every excuse to not have to have dinner with her. Girl is as exciting as cardboard.

3. Bitch is cray.

This little twat takes the simplest tasks and somehow turns them into painstaking processes that make you want to strangle kittens. She promises shit to the client when, hello, it's not on the fucking proposal so shut your trap. She forces you to skip meals, workouts, weekends, and life in general. You don't agree on anything, find yourself plotting ways to kill her, and use the F-word at least 500 times a day in a negative way. Girl is a fucking psychopath.

So my 6-week evaluation of my "girl" puts her at a solid 2 who teeters between a 1 (when I'm challenged to a night of blackout debauchery) and a 3 (when I start to write a blog at 2:00AM waiting for comments). Where will we end up? This is what I call the "probation period" - which will be saved for another blog post entirely.

A few insights into my interactions
N: Can I take a minute to vent my frustrations?
A: I don't think this is the time for us to vent right now.
C: No, she wants to vent her frustrations. She doesn't give a shit about yours.

A: You don't look so happy.
C: It's 4-fucking-AM.
A: It's 7:00AM.
C: It's 4-fucking-AM in LA, where things really matter.

A: We'll leave in 15 minutes.
C: So you mean an hour.
A: Hey S, I have to go soon. I have an angry Korean girl who will kill me if I don't feed her.
C: At least you acknowledged that you know what I'm thinking.

C: You want me to go to the meeting?
A: Yea, the client seems nicer when you're around.
C: That's because she likes me and she hates you.
A: Yea... I don't know how that happened.
C: It's because she watched me binge eat a pint of ice cream.

On an unrelated note, Pegasus & Condor attack Chicago this weekend. BEAST.

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