This morning, the manager of my shop way overstepped her power, to the point of significantly breaching established labor law (not to mention showing me that I was fully unappreciated in my job). So, I left.
It wasn't a screaming "I'm never coming back to this dump!" kind of thing. I just said "Okay, if you think that is best, then good luck with (Insert important account name here)."
The owner called me less than 5 minutes after I left (Manager is his daughter, way too young and inexperienced for the responsibility, but she does put in some pretty good effort). I resisted the urge to lay blame on anyone, merely said that I had determined that my attitude was not conducive to a good, productive day of work, so I had decided to remove myself. He asked if that was something I wanted to make permanent, and I said I wasn't sure, that I had enjoyed working there and believed I had done a good job, but that I could not justify staying there with the kinds of issues that are currently going on. He said that I should take some time to think about it and talk to him later. I agreed, and will do so.
He also informed me that my partner is, in fact, in the hospital now, so I think I'm going to see if I can't get in to visit with him today. Afterwards, I'm gonna see if I can impose on MIL to pick S up earlier than planned to spend a little more time with him. I just really, really miss the little guy.
Back to the job thing: This morning's incident is, in large part, my own fault, and I accept that responsibility. The owner had instituted an "internal managerial enhancement" consisting of increased tracking of how my time is spent (I'm full commision based on my billable hours, so any time not spent on billable projects means money lost for me and the shop). I was actually very glad to be involved in the procedure, as it gave me a chace to show him how much extraneous nonsense was dumped on me on a daily basis. Once he started to see that, he pretty much stopped looking at the time sheets, probably because it would require him to admit that the (family-laden) management team at his business was not keeping to the plan that he had set out (3 of his daughters work there, and only 1 is what I would call a "valuable asset", though she is certainly not what I would call "easy to work with".)
The task of collecting these sheets then fell to the absolute worst of the 3, who I had been assured would not have anything further to do with the shop after she stormed out in a huff one day, then returned on a (supposedly) strictly limited basis (she is going through some tough times herself: 19, has a son, suing his father for child support, fun stuff).
Ealier this month, I got busy, was in an especiallly hard period with my sitch, couldn't help but notice that the time sheets were not being read, and just quit doing them.Some questions were asked about them, I pretty much let it be known that I was not doing them. Today is the day that payroll goes into the system, and I was informed this morning that if my time sheets were not turned in they would be holding my paycheck.
I figured that was a good enough reason to take a personal day. Also, with my partner laid up, and me (possibly) resigning in disgust, they literally have no one to perform service right now. Service is the real profit center of the business, though product is the volume center, so I guess that puts me in a reasonably good bargaining position. Who knows?
Either way, I'm not gonna sweat it. I can get a job, probably a better one, today if I choose to. Pluss, I've got enough commission pay backlogged that I could afford to take a week or two off, again if I so choose. They cannot hold my paycheck on something this trivial, whether they realize it or not, an I am certainly not afraid to call the labor board if necessary.
So, is that enough tough talk and rationalization for one morning? I think so.
