Office Politics

It's been a strange week or so recently. I thought I was on the brink of leaving work, but I've come out the other side slightly better off...

Work hasn't been the greatest in the past few days. Constant emails from my boss ordering changes to the make-up of the office. No sense of discussing it, or asking, just demanding. It can really lower your self esteem if you carry the title of 'manager' but never get the chance to 'manage'.

In all of this, most of the changes are against the contracts we've all signed, so rather than impliment any of them, I made a demand of my own... I told him I wouldn't change anything until we'd spoken in person. Face to face wasn't going to be possible for a while, so he called me.

...and that's when it all fell into place. Sometimes it's easy to forget he is German and his written english is poor compared to his spoken. Where he had 'demanded' and 'ordered' changes, in retrospect he was politely asking. There were also a list of benefits to be added to our work, which he had failed to bring up initially.

So, would you like to hear the details?

Firstly the 'bad' things.

The office is now to be manned from 6am, instead of the current 7am. Due to the fact I am the only member of staff in walking distance of the office, and public transport round here doesn't start that early, you can imagine who that affects the most.

Secondly, the 40 hour a week working contract we all signed is now to be ridgedly enforced. Before, we didn't take proper breaks (no one wanted to) but in return I was only expecting my colleagues to work about 35 hours a week. Now we all actually have to be working a full 40 hours. Not too much of a heart-ache, given the nature of what our day-to-day workload is.

Finally, holiday requests must be limited during the German football season. Not banned (as his original email implied), just kept to no more than a week at a time, and no more than one person out of the office at a time. Well we were already doing that, so again, no great struuggle to comply.

But now the goodies.

Firstly, he has a cash bonus to give us all for the hard work we've put in in recent months. Something I pressed him around Christmas time. He sometimes forgets we have access to the betting figures and can see the profits we've helped the company make.

Secondly, all work we do on a Sunday will now be paid at double rates. This is a huge bonus for us as on average we all work about 3 sundays a month (8 hours at a time). Over the year this equates to a full extra months pay.

Talking of extra months pay, the bonus we already got (called the 13th month in Germany) is now going to be official and added to our contracts. This is your usual monthly salary paid as an extra payment, partially in summer, and partially at Christmas.

Finally, bank holidays have always just been a day in lieu for us. Now we have the choice of having those as double pay instead if we prefer.

So all in all, it's ended up being an okay set of changes. The earlier start will be a struggle, but the increase in wages should be a small comfort. Coupled with that, he also hinted my salary was long passed it's review which could mean an extra increase is on it's way.

...finally, someone appreciates me :o)

p.s. I'm back in training mode soon. The Maltese lad I interviewed whilst over there is coming to Southampton to be trained. He'll be staying in my flat while he's here as my temporary new flat mate. Still no idea what's happening to it after that.