The Hot Seat

Another workday in the office with Nigel's chair now very cold and all the dictionaries and bits and pieces reminding me of his presence long gone.

My 11th working day as a brand new German employee of Wienerwald. I had taken Monday off free as the bedroom furniture was being delivered to my flat and in Germany, you accept you have to be there all day waiting for the delivery men to arrive. Nowadays (2018) a good company will give you an a.m. or p.m. slot and if you are really lucky maybe a 2 Hour slot. Back then, that was not the case.

Tomorrow a 9:00 a.m. meeting with the Finance Director, officially my boss since 2nd October although he had been my working boss for months. So need to be prepared, as prepared as any of Mrs Thatcher's ministers needed to be when they were grilled. David like facts and not waffle.

HOWEVER ..... 8:30 a.m. and David knocks on the door and comes in and plonks himself down on Nigel's chair and rolls it around the side to lean his left elbow on the edge. No doubt a chat about what he wanted tomorrow.

"Well how are things going?" and then fairly quickly, "Grand Met is selling the business and that means the job is no longer required. We can look to see if Grand Met has something back in the UK or you can opt for redundancy".

?????????????????????????????????????

While still stunned, David mentioned a few points but I didn't pay much attention. He knew what was going on in my mind and withdrew but said he was at my disposal at any time.

I had never been sacked or made redundant in some 16 years of working, 15 of them for my current employer.

Nearly two years of flying around Europe weekly on Business Class, a large family estate Volvo company car in the UK usually at one airport car park and another big E class company Mercedes Benz at the other airport car park, staying in 4* star hotels all week with all three meals a day paid. And then asked to relocate, all moving expenses, cost of a solicitor to buy a new property in Germany and if necessary sell the UK one, German Estate Agents fees, the connection of all services (telephone etc) and 10,000DM (€5,000) to cover all those annoying little costs like new curtains etc. 

What had the last two years cost the company just in my costs never mind all the other people? David, for instance, had gone through the process as had the British Director of Wienerwald. There were Nigel and Tom and loads of others?

What were the directors of the mother business, Grand Met plc in the UK, thinking when they made such decisions? The decision must have been made weeks before I made the move.

Just sat there for the rest of the day with a big question mark hanging over my head.