This is a very long time ago, so I’m comfortable sharing it now. I’m a new hire at a medical device company, with my main task being putting an anti-clotting coating on some of the products.

I’m being shown around, and every time my manager introduces me, I’m told they hope I’m better than the last guy. After the fourth time hearing this:

Me: “Hey, [Manager], I gotta ask; what happened to the last guy?”

Manager: “Okay, so the last guy realized that he was basically unsupervised to do his work the entire day, so he started a routine where he would clock in at the start of his shift, leave the building to do whatever, come back at the end of the shift, and just… move all the products he was supposed to have coated from the “In” pile to the “Finished” pile without actually coating them.”

Me: “For real?!”

Manager: “For real. He was immediately fired when he was caught, and so now you’ll see a  bunch more security cameras here to make sure nobody else tries something similar, not that I think you will.”

Me: “What happened to all the devices?

Manager: “It caused a major medical recall.”

Me: “Was he sued?”

Manager: “Ha! No medical company in their right mind would want it to come out in discovery that their quality control for medical devices was just one guy saying he did a job. Like, they didn’t perform tests on anything he was doing before it went out the door? Not auditing products for quality purposes is a real easy way to lose your ISO accreditation.”

He takes a pause and then fixes a stare at me.

Manager: “Don’t get any ideas…”

This story reminded me of something I experienced at the old place I used to work:

We did chemical analyses for other companies; one day, one of the instruments we used broke down (a normal occurrence since they were more or less kept running around the clock).

We notified higher management that we were down one machine and that without it, we were unable to run one of the classes of tests (ATM-test) that we normally did.

The answer we got amounted to “The Excel spreadsheet shows that we are not supposed to have any more machine malfunctions this month. By the way, pick up the pace, because it also shows that your department has been running behind on the ATM tests since yesterday!”

It took weeks before they realised that “Oh! They can’t run the tests unless we have the machine repaired!”

By the time we had the instrument running again, the backlog was nightmarish; of course, since we were able to run one fewer class of tests until the situation got sorted, the department was reprimanded because we showed lower productivity for those weeks.

Back in 2014, I was driving home from going clothes shopping for my new job, which I was starting in a week, when my car literally caught on fire with me and my then four-year-old son in it. I had just bought $200 worth of clothes, AND my laundry was in my car from the laundromat (including my work shirt and white lab coat).

I had already given my notice to my boss that I was leaving, and the next day (Monday), I called in to tell her what had happened and that I would not be in due to smoke inhalation issues and needing to go buy a new car.

This was supposed to be my last day.

Boss: “You need to return your three work shirts and both lab coats, or you’ll have the costs garnished from your last check.”

Me: “They are a pile of ash at the salvage yard.”

Boss: “You have to bring them in.”

Me: “Okay. Will do.”

Insert eye roll and a certain finger flashing from my side of the phone. 

Tuesday, I walked in with a picture of my laundry basket melted in my car and a Ziplock filled with ashes and mud. I recorded myself giving them to her and telling her again what happened. I got a side-eye and a “WTF?!”

I walked out with a smirk.

I’ve been at the new job for ten years. Best move I ever made.

Our lab has a small office/lab space away from the main area where three of us work. One day, we start getting calls to speak to someone in another lab about a job. As we don’t have the correct number ending (all numbers for the building start the same, but differ by a few digits to get to the correct office), we tell them to email the person they are looking for.

However, after a few days of being interrupted more than five times a day. It’s getting pretty irritating, and we decide to look it up on the department’s web page to give them the correct number, only to find our number is listed.

We reach out to the lab (it’s a floor below) to tell them about the issue… and nothing happens for a week.

Okay, it could be IT mucking up as it is the website, but we three are not secretaries for them, so we go on a hunt for the boss’s number and start giving that to the people calling.

The day after the number has been corrected and no more phone calls, success!

In the era before cell phones, my college had one system for getting a message out fast: an incredibly loud PA system with all the audio fidelity of two cans and a piece of string.

Lab Manager: “We’re going to have a surprise emergency drill tomorrow.”

Grad Student #1: “That’s not much of a surprise, is it?”

Lab Manager: “Well, no, but they told the lab staff so we could make sure we didn’t have anything too dangerous or expensive going on. So tomorrow, we’re going to work on [completely safe project] instead of [less safe project]. And they’re going to set the fire alarms off, and then we’ll get evacuation instructions over the PA.”

The next day, all of us grad students are working on our safety project, nervously staring up at the fire alarms. Sure enough, right before noon…

Fire Alarms: “WHOOP WHOOP!”

Me: “Okay, so do we run?”

Grad Student #1: “No, I think [Manager] said we wait for instructions over the PA. I guess they’re going to tell us where to go.”

We wait for about thirty seconds, which feels VERY long while the alarm is going off. Finally…

PA: “Gabo! Thazzy nog roll! Gumow! Sizno jull!”

Grad Student #2: “Well, I certainly feel like we’re in safe hands.”

Me: “I guess I’ll just go downstairs and tell whoever is trying to use the PA we can’t understand him.”

I jog downstairs. Undergrads are rushing around with a lot more care than they usually give a drill. I chalk it up to this being a surprise until I get to the ground floor, and…

Campus Staff: *Screaming into PA.* “Get out! This is not a drill! Get out! This is not a drill!”

I have never run up three flights of stairs so fast. The next day, we all had a meeting and quickly decided that the default option was ‘if in doubt, get out.’