They’d Better Start Praying For A New Employee

I did some computer work for a local Catholic church. The work I did was top-notch, interviewing the secretary about precisely what they needed. I got their software updated — and legal — as requested.

Two months later, I was called into our firm’s senior partner’s office and read the riot act. Mind you, I had done work for the priest for over fifteen years at a different church.

Senior Partner: “[Secretary] told her boss, [Priest], that you forced them to purchase the wrong software.”

Me: “I didn’t, and I have emails to support my case.”

Senior Partner: “[Priest] wouldn’t lie about this matter.”

Me: “He probably wasn’t lying but received poor information from [Secretary]. I’m more than willing to fix it, though, if they’re not happy with the software.”

Senior Partner: “No. You are not to make contact with [Church] or [Priest] again. They paid [Larger Firm] to come in and fix it.”

I knew the owner of [Larger Firm], so I called him to see what he had been told. Sure enough, [Secretary] had messed something up, but rather than take credit for the debacle, she threw me under the bus.

I got the whole thing drawn up in a memo and presented it to my boss. He didn’t even read it.

Senior Partner: “How could you do something behind my back like this?!”

Cool. I went back to my office and sent an acceptance email for a teaching job at the beginning of the year.

How can you work with or for someone when they no longer trust your word or work ethic? My last day with that firm was the seventeenth anniversary of starting with them.