It’s A Mutiny!

Hey, folks! Remember when I used to have a blog post up every Friday? I do, and I miss it.

What the hell happened?! you ask.

Well, to be perfectly honest, the Other Job happened. It’s like that workplace is determined to beat the will to live out of me– or just kill me with exhaustion. Here’s a short recap of events leading up to the blog schedule failure.

Earlier this year, upper management bit off more than they could chew with a bunch of new routes out of my location. Meanwhile, we didn’t (and still don’t) have the cargo handlers, crews, or functional planes to accomplish this. The result has been as chaotic as you would imagine. People have quit– or threatened to quit– and morale took a nosedive. Our staffing dwindled down to a skeleton crew that was grossly ill-equipped to handle the volume of freight we need to move.

In September we lost our most experienced cargo agent, a beacon of calm and common sense, to a massive heart attack on the job. His passing, and the way management handled it, was the final nail in the coffin of workplace morale.

Which brings me to the subject of management. Much of what’s wrong with our department is due to one man: our direct supervisor. Lazy, petty, malicious, and egotistical, he has more in common with a shady salesman than a member of a professional management team.

However, it’s important to remember that this situation wouldn’t exist without those above turning a blind eye to this guy’s behavior. Upper management doesn’t communicate, has little in the way of a coherent plan, and doesn’t provide any support to those of us who are the “boots on the ground.” Pleas for something to be done about the staffing and lower management situations have fallen on deaf ears.

That’s where the mutiny part comes in. Relations between the direct supervisor and most of the cargo handlers have gotten worse and worse as winter progressed– and those who have been getting a free pass for shirking their responsibilities have gotten even more blatant about doing so. It came to a head on Thursday, when management tried to issue a retaliatory formal warning to one of our more competent cargo agents, and the situation wound up in the Human Resources manager’s office.

Names were dropped, and all of the employees of our division at this location are being interview by HR. When my time came, I told them everything I’d seen and heard. Apparently quite a few others have as well.

This didn’t go unnoticed by the problem supervisor. Within hours of my interview, I was warned by another employee that the problem supervisor had taken my subordinates aside and told them to start taking notes on anything and everything I did, especially anything that looked wrong or might be used against me.

In short, this guy’s not nearly as smart as he thinks he is and he’s running scared.

With so many other employees fed up and willing to talk, I’m cautiously hopeful that something positive will come of this. Things desperately need to change.

To be perfectly honest, helping a mediocre-to-shitty regional airline avoid getting shut down by the FAA is not what I want to do with my life. I would much rather be writing. But bridging the gap between traditional employment and being able to support oneself by writing is difficult– especially when the Other Job eats most of your free time and energy.

If you’d like to help, please consider supporting me on Patreon at the link below. In exchange, you’ll get never-before-seen short stories, flash fiction, and excerpts from works in progress– a win-win situation for both of us!