Hasta La Vista, Baby

And so . . . the exodus begins . . .

T accepted his new job offer and will turn in his notice on Monday . . .

E got a job offer yesterday and he has counter-offered and is awaiting a reply . . .

And . . . it turns out that L (whom I hadn’t mentioned before) turned in his resignation last Monday which, I’m sure, explains Whackjob's extreme niceness this week. Apparently she asked him not to tell anyone because she wanted to tell us herself and he agreed as long as she told us by last Wednesday. She agreed and . . . she didn’t.

So, L told me himself yesterday. His exact words, when he told me about this, were, “I don’t need to put up with her shit anymore. I can work 10 hours a week as a consultant and make more than I’m making here and not have to put up with a psycho boss.” L is not in the development group, he is in the services group . . . okay, he IS the services group . . . and that is the only area of the company that makes money.

Basically we sell L’s services (that sounds so deviant) and the money from that funds development of our software. The idea was that once the software was finished and launched we would morph into a software company and while the services side would continue to exist it would be a much smaller player. More of something we keep around to offer clients as a courtesy. Sort of like the wife who puts the husband through medical school and who then gets dumped for a hot new wife once the husband is a successful doctor.

L is a great guy and the only part of the company that was making money and . . . Whackjob shoulda been nice to him, treated him well but . . . that would make too much good business sense so, of course, she didn’t. She treated him like the rest of us . . . all being held hostage at the whim of a mad-woman.

The nice thing is, she can’t blame me for L. He and I, while friendly, never worked together or spent any time alone thus thwarting any efforts I might have made to disgruntle him.

So, with the loss of L and T the company is seriously wounded but could recover with some hard work from the rest of us but . . . with the impending loss of E and me . . . it is mortally wounded. The death knell has begun.

It’s kind of nice that we, the development team, didn’t draw first blood. The big question now is, do we torture her by drawing out the development team’s resignations? T is giving notice on Monday so do we wait until she calms down from that and then have E hit her with his notice and then let her calm down from that and then I hand in my notice?

As much as a part of me would like to torture her (payback for having had to deal with her insanity), I can’t do it. But, neither can I control when the other two will turn in their notices (okay, that’s kind of a lie . . . I can control that but I don’t really have the right to). T is a done deal (or will be on Monday) and E should know about his counter on Monday and I haven’t gotten any actual offer yet so . . . it may turn out that way just because of timing. But, if we all pretty much know by Monday/Tuesday, we’ll probably just tell her en masse.

On one hand . . . it’s a bittersweet thing. Bitter because, we really had an awesome product designed (thank you) and coulda been real contenders. Sweet because, I’ll be escaping a nut-job boss and while I know she will blame me for the demise of the company because NOTHING IS EVER HER FAULT, I know the truth and she will suffer from the stress of this.

I truly hope that it opens her eyes to the error of her ways but, the sad thing is, it won’t. She’s been trying very hard the last couple of weeks to “be a better manager” so all she’ll take away from this is, “See, I was nice and a better manager and then they all left.” The thought will never penetrate her brain that it was too little too late. That the damage was done and that we all knew that the new nice Whackjob was a façade because she’s scared about L’s leaving. She’ll never admit that we were smart enough to understand that once she finds a replacement for L and things smooth out, she’ll revert to her true self – the Whackjob. Because, as she tells anyone who will listen . . . She does NOT trust ANYONE.

So . . . in a perfect world Whackjob will learn from this experience, grow as a person, and apply the knowledge gleaned from this forward and do a better job next time but . . . we don’t live in a perfect world. In this imperfect world, Whackjob’s receptors are tuned to a slightly different frequency and the lessons that she’ll have learned won’t be to treat your employees with respect and in a professional manner, they will be that no matter how nice you are to people, they will turn on you and that no-one can be trusted. Oh, wait . . . THAT she already knew.

Whackjobs R Us

So, the interview today went well. I like what the company is doing and where they’re going. I like that they’re honest and forthright about the state of things within the company. I like that they’re organically grown without investors or VC funding. I like that we all seem to be on the same page about what’s important, etc.

I loved when Brian opened his mouth and said, “Oh, by the way, I don’t care where you work from. The whole point of investing in all this technology is so that people can do what they do from anywhere so, if you choose, you don’t have to come to the office at all.”

And I also loved when he further said, “Also, if you tell me that you wanted to take a month, 6 weeks, 2 months, whatever before you start, I’m perfectly fine with that, if you want to take some time off between the jobs. As long as you actually come to work for us.”

I always take time off between jobs. It just seems too odd to me to leave one job on Friday and show up for another on Monday. But, it’s usually something I have to negotiate because the new co is always trying to get me to start as soon as possible.

So . . . I’m going back next week to chat with a couple more people and then . . . we’ll see what happens.

Whackjob continues to do everything possible to just destroy the company. Taking projects in that we do not have the infrastructure to handle and which are going to blow up in our face, not listening when we all tell her NOT to take them, etc. She handed me a project today that we cannot complete in the time required (which I explained to her most vociferously) and I really, REALLY feel like contacting the customer and saying, “You know, you really should take this job away from us because it will not work out the way you want. Trust me.” Unfortunately . . . I can’t do that.

But, things will hopefully change next week.

Keep your fingers crossed.

Whackjob, Inc. Update

So, T and I went out to dinner last night and he told me that he has a job offer that he is going to take it. He’s our senior programmer so . . . we’re pretty screwed. I also happen to know that E is looking for a job and, if he leaves as well . . . the company will have to fold.

Whackjob is going to flip. She suspects something because she came into my office today to ask whether there was anything going on with the development team because E and T have been "taking a lot of walks lately". I told her that I had no idea of anything going on and then she asked me if I would do her a favor and try to find out and warn her.

So . . . basically, she doesn't want E, T and me to be friends because she's feels threatened by it BUT, she's perfectly willing to ask me to exploit my friendship with them if it benefits her. Lovely.

Oh, did I mention that I have an interview on Wednesday?

It’s sort of an interview . . . the owner of the company called me last week and the conversation went like this:

Him: Hi Urban, this is Brian.
Urban: Hi Brian, long time no talk to. I haven’t seen you since Chicago.
Him: Yeah, I was just telling Sandy that same thing.
Urban: That’s right, I saw Sandy in Florida.
Him: Yeah, I was supposed to be in Florida but had to cancel at the last minute.
Urban: Yeah, that happens.
Him: So, Urban . . . when can you start?
Urban: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha . . .
Brian: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha . . .
Brian: Whooo . . . so, seriously, when can you start?

He told me what his company’s been up to, growth, etc., and then asked me to come in this week so he can show me what they’re up to, etc. So, we’ll see. After making a couple of bad decisions on companies lately . . . I’m going to take my time and try to make sure (as best I can) that I’m going to like where I’m going.

Oh, and I’m also talking with another firm tomorrow morning. This is a firm that I’ve worked at before but they’ve turned over the department and are rebuilding and want to bring me back.

It's going to be ugly. She will, of course, blame me for T leaving, accuse us of planning this, scream and cry about how this will ruin her, etc., but . . . it's not business, it's personal. :) Just kidding . . . sort of . . .

I’m a little conflicted about the job prospects but, I can't work with Whackjob anymore. It's just not possible. Not without bloodshed.

So . . . tomorrow will be an interesting day. T is going to turn in his notice on Friday that will be uuuugggggggggllllllyyyyyyy but I'll be in Tahoe not answering my phone.

So . . . Wish me luck.