This story is a bit long. I apologize, but it's complicated.
My job is working for the Siemens corporation. We've got 500,000 employees around the world. I've been working here for 3 years and I get along with each and every person at the company but one. The one person I don't get along with is the secretary (administrative assistant) for the executives and the boss of the other secretaries. She only recently got this job. I got along very well with the woman who was here before her.
From the moment she got there, we didn't get along because she is abusive, rude, nasty, and she bullies people around. She kisses the asses of the executives and acts sweet as hell, but to everyone else she's a nasty bitch. She thinks because she works for executives, she is one, but there is no executive at the company (including the CEO) who ever acts rudely or abusively. She has dozens of complaints against her in her personnel file.
Let's call her Vivian....because that's her name.
Recently, I was at work alone and the entire help desk was out. She calls me screaming because there was a meeting in one of our other buildings that wasn't set up with computers. I informed her that there was a girl in that building who was in charge of setting those up for us. She kept screaming at me and being rude so I hung up on her.
She loses her mind and calls my boss. He asks me if I hung up on her so I say, "Yes. She was being abusive." He says, "You can't just hang up on her. We're in a service industry". I said, "Call the electric company and start cursing people out and see how long it takes them to hang up on you. Or call Dell. I reserve the right to refuse service to those who are abusive and rude." So I send her an instant message and say, "You WILL change your attitude IMMEDIATELY! If you don't treat us with respect and even kindness, you will not get what you want no matter who it is for. Even if the CEO wants something and you get rude with us, he won't get it, and it will be YOUR fault because you failed to act professionally."
She calls H.R. and says she feels "threatened" and files a complaint. I file another of the many abuse complaints she's got in her file. The company says it will investigate. I'm not worried because if they investigate, they'll see I've got no complaints other than from her, and she's got them from everyone.
About 3 weeks go by, and I do something monumentally stupid. I'm on craigslist in the politics room and some jackass starts flooding the board with messages to come to a real estate seminar. Everyone tells him to knock it off and flags his messages for removal. He doesn't get the hint and keeps doing it. Someone posts his personal contact info including phone number....
I have a moment of stupidity and call the number and leave a recorded message for him to knock off the spam NOW!!! He keeps posting it. So I call him again and leave another recorded message telling him "If you don't stop spamming craigslist, I'm going to show up at your seminar and pop a cap in your ass!" thinking it might get him to think twice about spamming the board.
Instead, he calls the cops. They find the number and call my company. My company checks the phone logs and calls me in to the H.R. office and ask me if I threatened this guy. I of course deny it. They tell me I'm suspended until the investigation clears up.
I feel like a moron and call the guy
(who happens to be an ex-cop who says I made a felony "terrorist threat") to apologize....A LOT!!
After about 3 or 4 days, I finally convince him to drop the complaint. During these days of sweating it out, I send my resume around to a bunch of places because I figure I might need to find a new job.
I contact my job and tell them the complaint is dropped, and they tell me to come back. I go back to work and they tell me I'm barely still employed. They write me up for "excessive internet and phone usage" and tell me even the slightest thing will get me fired. This is especially hilarious because everyone in my department ALWAYS has an internet browser on and is on the phone making or taking calls from our remote users. They have nothing on me but want to make something up because they want to get rid of me.
Vivian knows about this and like the shark she is, she smells blood and is starting to circle...
Here's the good part...
I get a call from someone who saw my resume and they want me to come in for an interview at a smaller company that has a fully outsourced I.T. staff and they want to build an in house team to replace them. They need a server guy who can handle windows and linux, and is willing to do all jobs from holding the user's hands, to setting up routers, doing active directory, exchange, writing shell scripts, etc.
It's a 6 figure salary. I find out several others have interviewed for the position but got nailed with very technical questions they couldn't handle. I go in to interview today and I answer every single technical question they have and the guy says he wants to take the next step and have me meet up with the CIO and CFO on Friday!!
Woo Hoo!!! I'm sure I'll get an offer and be able to quit my job before this nasty bitch gets me fired, and I'll be making more money, and I'll be a big fish in a small pond. Siemens has 500,000 employees around the world. I wasn't even a fish in that pond. I was plankton.
I'll be going from supporting thousands and thousands of users and computers to less than 300 and I'll be making more money for it. It's also a 10-15 minute drive from my house.
The recruiter who sent me there told me the salary range. I may be speaking out of line because I'm going by what he said. Hopefully this Friday, they'll make an offer and it will be in the range the recruiter discussed with me.
The best part is I'll be building a new I.T. team. I won't be the CIO, but I may be a director and it'll pretty much be my show from a technical standpoint.