The more I pay attention to the world around me, the more I realize how few adults there are in the world. Mostly, there are just a lot of whiny eight year-olds who are very tall. I know, I've sung this song before, but still.
They're doing a training class here onsite this week and next, and one of the attendees, we'll call him Smilin' Tommy, is acting like--well, like an eight year-old. A disturbed one. He passed preliminary approval to be granted territory a couple of months ago and then failed to pass the final vetting with Jason and was sent home empty-handed. Smilin' Tommy then got CEO Jason on the phone and told him something that made Jason re-open the closed door.
So, starting at 8:00 this morning Smilin' Tommy is here onsite, in a class of seven people, learning to run a business.
And, by all accounts, he's doing pretty much all he can to disrupt the class and destroy the other attendees' chances of learning what they need to know. Muttering, not too quietly, about how the entire training program is "bullshit" and garbage and keeping the trainers from presenting their material.
I mean, he was sent out of the room. Can you imagine yourself, at the age of +/-50, being so disruptive in a training class that you get sent out of the room like a five year-old misbehaving in kindergarten?
I passed Smilin' Tommy just now. He was in the lobby, outside the office suite, talking to someone on the phone. As I passed, I heard him say, "Yes, obviously I want to cooperate in any way I can, but the atmosphere here is just so toxic."
He's doomed to fail. He's determined to fail. And I can only think that he persuaded Jason to give him a second chance because he has some kind of nefarious plan to wreak revenge on the corporate that rejected him in the first place.
My sympathy is with Jason. He made the right decision in the first place, then allowed himself to be persuaded to change his mind. And now we have a very tall two year-old who, assuming he makes it through training, is going to make life miserable for everyone in every way he can.
But mostly? I'm sort of worried. Because Smilin' Tommy strikes me as the kind of guy who might show up for tomorrow's class with a gun in his hand.
I had a guy in a training class once who was like that. Thought he knew more than the instructor. Wouldn't shut up. When we got to the hands on part of the class, he wouldn't do the procedures as written, and I finally blew up at him, which offended him enough he went to work with the other team in the class.
OTOH, the class members thanked me for stepping in and being the bitch *g*
posted by: Dail on 09.08.08 at 08:21 PM [permalink]Hee.
I'm hoping this guy bails out on his own and leaves town.
posted by: Anne on 09.08.08 at 09:10 PM [permalink]well, I'm glad to say he did NOT bring weaponry on his second day. Nor today.
They say he's no longer muttering about the the stupidity of it all, although he's doing a lot of eye-rolling and sighing. (If he thinks it's all so stupid, why doesn't he just bail out?)
Sad to say, Dail, the most of his fellow clasmates are Canadian and thus too polite to call him out.
posted by: Anne on 09.10.08 at 08:40 AM [permalink]