6 Kids, 3 cats, 1 dog, Mom, and Dad

Everyone deserves a fair hearing or I hope they make her squirm.

I've been listening on the radio and reading in the news the ongoing saga with ex Cabletron alumni Linda Peppin and Joe D’Alessandro. Anyone that worked there for any length of time has a story to tell about one of the two.

I can remember a trip down to HR to work out a pay snafu. These seemed to happen all too frequently and seemed to be tied to either changing positions, getting a pay raise, or when it was time to be paid a bonus. I happened to be standing there waiting to talk with someone about it when this very topic was discussed in the aisles and loud enough for anyone in the immediate vicinity to hear. Basically, it wasn't a private conversation and no pains were taken to keep it quiet.

They realized that they had screwed up on a bunch of people's pay and they were trying to decide what to say and how to handle it before all the "whining cry babies" started to call and complain. This is the cleaned up version, by the way. The real kicker was that they knew the pay problem was going to happen and didn't think it was worth mentioning to anyone.

I let them wind down and then mentioned that I was one of those people, and that if I ran my group in support and dealt with my customers the way they did theirs I would be out of a job. I manged to say it more diplomatically than that but had to wonder if I'd be the victim of one of their legendary vendettas.

I wasn't and I think it is only because they were so wrong and there were so many witnesses to their admitting it.

I wonder if they feel like cry babies as they deal with the feelings of their jobs being gone and their finances in jeopardy. I don't think you'll find many willing to step up and plead for leniency.

Posted by bbarton at April 28, 2004 10:52 AM