You're Fired!

In my time at FederalEntity, I've encountered over 100 people who I've felt should be fired immediately. From sleeping under desks to selling bootleg DVDs; from looking at pornography while at work to not even coming to work at all - I am surrounded by a sea of underachievers who would have been given the boot ages ago if they worked in the private sector. It's nearly impossible to fire a Fed, though. In 2.5 years, we've successfully gotten rid of 2 people on my staff (out of 20 who deserve it) and believe me, the process is long and painful. Their stories are below:

1. Sarah the Crazy Secretary - Sarah was a secretary on in our division. I only met her once, and fortunately never had to work with her. My coworkers John and Jessie were not so fortunate. Apparently Sarah wasn't just crazy, she was vicious. Even a simple hello would elicit a mean response. If you asked her to do some basic aspect of her job (filing, for example) she might snap at you. She probably did it to frighten people - thinking it would keep them from asking her to do anything (it worked). The tasks she did take on were completed incorrectly and past deadline. She had behaved this way for years, but this wasn't enough to fire her.

Keep in mind, doing your job poorly isn't grounds for being fired. Maybe the expectations weren't clear? Maybe you were never provided the necessary skills or resources to complete the task? Maybe you can attribute it to "everybody makes mistakes!"? Of course, those are all BS excuses, but they actually work in the Federal Government. You may not have done your job correctly, but at least you tried! How can you fire someone for trying??

From what I've gathered with Sarah the Crazy Secretary, she was finally done in for two reasons. First, she eventually stopped trying. When she was given a task by her manager, she would outright refuse to do it. As in "no, I will not even attempt to do the most basic elements of my job". This is not easy to prove, however. Staff members had to document when they had assigned her work and if the work was completed correctly / at all. This went on for months and months before they had enough "proof" that she wasn't doing her job!

The second reason she got fired: She was crazy and created an unsafe work environment. This next part is going to sound like a lie, but I promise it's not. Sarah would post biblical passages outside of her cubicle. The passages she posted were the ones where God enacted his fiery revenge upon evil sinners. But she would replace the names of those sinners with the names of her bosses. Imagine being a boss and seeing your name in a re-written biblical passage outside of your secretary's cube!

("And God smote Bill Johnson, sending him to the eternal fire pits of Hell to be tortured for an eternity!")

Towards the end, she would go into her boss' office and just scream at him. She was heard on more than one occasion calling him a "plantation owner". Yeah, it went there. They fired her a few days before Christmas. Armed security guards came to her desk with an empty box, gave her 20 minutes to pack, and then escorted her out of the building. Her picture was posted at every entrance of the building so that all of the security guards knew not to let her in. That evening, the guards escorted her boss to his car as a precaution, lest she be lurking in the bushes.

I wish that's where the story ends, but it isn't. Sarah appealed her firing - saying that it was racially motivated. The Union jumped in to fight for her. Despite the mountains of evidence against her, Sarah won her appeal and had the "firing" expunged from her record (it now just looks like she quit). I'm not sure if she won any money in the settlement, but it's a very real possibility. Even scarier, she may very well be working at another FederalEntity.

2. Firing #2 is shorter and less interesting. I don't even remember the guy's name (doesn't matter, all the names/genders on this blog are made up anyways). He sat in a cubicle sort of near mine - it was down the hall and around a corner. He always came to work, but I could never figure out what his job was. I think it had something to do with ordering office supplies. There were rumors that he had gotten into screaming matches with several bosses, but I always found him to be quiet and pleasant. He was the #1 fan of my motivational mirror!

It was a known fact that he had severe mental health issues and he took long periods off for "health" reasons. I think it eventually got to the point where his mental state was preventing him from doing anything. My staff director had been diligently gathering evidence and when the case was strong enough called a meeting with him. The proposition was laid out: "Here are the facts. I'm about to file the papers to start your termination process. If you don't want to go through with all that, you can quit and it won't show on your record that you were 'fired'". The guy knew that he hadn't been doing his job, so he agreed to "quit" and that was that.

After recounting those two stories, I'm actually a little depressed. It's so hard to hire good people. It's nearly impossible to fire the worst people. If that's not the recipe for a sinking ship I don't know what is...

There are, of course, a number of offenses that can get you fired right away - stealing Government property, physically assaulting someone while at work, selling secrets to a foreign country, etc. but unfortunately the people who deserve to get fired know better than to do any of those.

I guess the question that remains to be seen is: can I be fired for writing this blog? It would be an interesting court case, that's for sure. Just to be on the safe side, do me a favor - if you think you know who I am or where I work, keep it a secret when you send the blog to your friends. Thanks!