2004-03-27 - 10:17 p.m. (edited 3.29 6:15 pm)

Addendum: (Stolen from various livejournal sites) Sum up your opinion or impression of me in one word, leave it as a comment in this posting, and then post this sentence in your own journal, please

I got someone fired yesterday. Not by accident or mistake or maliciousness or anything; all the same she wouldn't be coming back on Monday.

I train the trainees. I'm pretty fucking good at it too, but this one woman just didn't get it. She wasn't a good fit for the job. They (being the management) noticed this and asked me to keep an eye on her and evaluate her. I decided that she was not going to be able to meet the metrics so I told them and she got canned.

I've never been called upon to decide someone's fate in quite that manner. I've got mixed feelings.

One the one hand, I was honest. She wasn't a good fit for the job.

On the other hand, I feel bad removing the economic freedom from another member of the proletariat. Seriously. That's the biggest reason why I almost said to keep her on. When I told my boss and HR that she wouldn’t work out, I felt like I was betraying my identity as a worker.

What's more, I didn’t like her. That's weird, but I feel bad having someone I didn't like fired. Part of this is because I felt bad about not liking her. Why didn’t I like her? Well, she was ugly. Like UGLY. That sounds terrible, but it is true. I, like most people, made a snap decision the first time I saw her and decided she was no one I wanted around. I feel bad cause I assumed she was a wretch even before I met her. As it turns out, she was as dull as a peen hammer, but I still felt bad for making that first judgment.

It also pisses me off that management made me make this choice. I don’t get paid any more for training and firing people, but I still do it. I'm given a lot of responsibility for my pay.

Management also manipulated me. My boss basically said that if I vouched for her, questions would be raised about me if she didn't work out.

In the midst of this, I am putting in for a promotion.

-Jesse