Dr. Stay-At-Home Mom: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Broken System.

Life has swallowed me up so much as I work on being a more involved mother, forming better habits, and breaking into the writing industry, that I have neglected to post about work. Fear not – I have been drawn back to the humming sounds of the office printer and the high-pitched squeals of employees begging for help (and sanity) and have been inspired to write this post about work benefits and how I lost a ton of money and support when I became a stay-at-home mother, aka a dinosaur supervisor.

A wise person once told me if a problem or dilemma is brought up three times in a given period by three different people, then that is a problem worth paying attention to. This past week I had three different discussions with three different people, two of which were acquaintances, and one a tremendous friend. Out of these three people, two were mothers and one was a seasoned father. Biased group, but what the hell, let’s talk about it anyway.

Break a leg (but only if you work full-time)

Way back when (what feels like eons ago but was no more than seven months ago) I was a marionette for the wealthy and powerful, I had a vast portfolio of kush benefits from my employer. This array of insurances covered my and my family’s lives; our health, teeth, eyes, cars, pets, home, daycare, chronic illnesses that might be lurking in the dark, and even accidents that we kind of knew were going to happen but clenched our teeth in anticipation for if and when they would happen (like my child falling headfirst off of a kitchen chair on to the hardwood…yup). If anything crazy happened, or if one of my children stuck a crayon up their nose without me seeing it, we were covered financially.

Ah, when we had those benefits, life was good. Or was it? Looking back at that time, it was a stressful period of life, and I do not believe my newborn or toddler children were the main contributors to hair-pulling anxiety. Lest we forget I also had to sell my soul to get those benefits – I sacrificed so much for the damn benefits, including beautiful moments such as spending time with my family, following my passions, reading books regularly, exercising on a healthy basis, and making my own decisions in any given situation.

Come to think of it, the incidents that were then covered by the luxurious insurance might have been occurring more frequently because of the long hours and multiple balls in the air. Similar to the Tootsie Pop theory, the world will never know.

No soup for you (when you are sick). You cannot afford it.

When I left my role at the hospital, I also said sayonara to my benefits, but I did not say goodbye to the company itself. However, I still work for them off and on, about twenty hours per month, because that is about all my mental capacity can stand.

I tried working more, but raising two children and following dreams takes a lot out of me, and I make mistakes at work if I overextend at home, which can lead to killing someone unintentionally, which I try to avoid at all costs both inside and outside of work. So I told myself to stop working for them so much because no one needed to die from a mistyped unit of blood or an inaccurate lab result that happened because a working mother could not keep her eyes open after a long day at home with her children. I was stuck between a rock and a hard place: Work more and make errors, or work less and go broke. Choices.

Because I chose to step back and work less, I am not eligible for benefits. The rule is that you have to be working full-time to receive benefits, part-time workers have to pay about $10K a year for family health insurance (as much as my husband’s benefits cost, so it was not worth it for me to go part-time and put the girls back in daycare), and per diem employees (what I now am) get zero benefits with the exception of the pension (which I am grateful for).

A handful of people would say this benefits structure makes sense – you have to work your hours to get your benefits. What I see is a huge gaping blind spot that is invisible to the naked eye, the kind of hidden snack only mothers can spot in the pantry.

Here are the questions I have for the corporations with people who had to cut their hours because of life events:

1. Have you thought about the caretakers that cannot work full-time but still need benefits?
2. Do you want to be the company that supports their people no matter how many hours they put in or do you want to be the company that requires full-time hours in order to get reasonably-priced health benefits? Let’s say someone is holding multiple, part-time jobs, probably a single mother or someone who never got the opportunity to go to college because it costs Elon Musk’s annual salary to do so, don’t you want to be THE employer that supports them with benefits? If they choose to switch jobs, chances are they will not drop you from their list since you are treating them like the amazing and overworked human they are. Let them work their multiple jobs at least knowing they are covered if something happens to their health.
3. What about the people that sacrificed their careers to spend time with their family? Right now it feels like we are punishing them for choosing happiness. They leave their toxic workplaces only to find that the doctor’s visit that once cost $50 now costs $350, thus deterring said people from maintaining health for fear of a large bill they cannot pay because they are too busy shoveling money into groceries for their gremlins?

I Got Bills in Low Places

I need to be honest and face reality – this post is not about my employer or any employer for that matter, the real cause of this post is the American health system; you know it, I know it, let’s face it, it’s terrible. Other countries with universal healthcare understand that health is a right, not a privilege. Similar to how people should not have to pay to use the restroom, I, nor you or your family, should not have to pay to be healthy and survive this tricky, relentless, and joyous game of life. Sure, we need to be accountable for our health by taking measures to prevent illness and accidents, but if I get cancer, have a baby, or become diagnosed with an illness out of my control, that, my friends, should be covered, with minimal financial damage to my pocket and yours.

I now am under my husband’s health insurance, and it is ridiculously expensive and covers very little. Still worth it to see my family more.

Would you rather

Would you rather get a wart removed or push a baby out of your vagina?

I would rather get a wart removed.

But wait! What if it cost you $400 to get the wart removed and only $200 to push the baby out of the vajayjay?

Wait, I want to change my answer. I want to have the baby instead.

That scenario happened to me because I lost my benefits with the employer I currently work for. And because American health insurance is complicated, unreasonable, and not in the best interest of anyone except for those on yachts.

And maternal and paternal benefits are lacking. There, I said it. There is little to no support for those who are building the future of the world. I want to have a third baby, but I cannot afford it. I will have a third baby, you watch me, and I will go even broker doing it, but it will be worth it. And I will not go back to work full time in order to be covered financially to have the third baby. I refuse to see my family less.

Support those who support others.

I could have just written those five words instead of going on this rant.

Thanks Obama. No seriously, THANKS OBAMA.

Back when I moved to Colorado, I was wrapping up my Master’s Degree in Health Administration, and I had no idea where it would take me. I knew I wanted to keep learning, I wanted to make a difference, and I wanted to help people. It was an online program that I hit hard when working night shift in the lab at my first job as a clinical laboratory scientist in Chicago. Keeping my eyes propped open with toothpicks, I would write entries on the implementation of Obama Care (also known as a damn revolution in healthcare, for the better), watching Barry singlehandedly kick everyone’s asses and take progressive thinking to the next level.

Side note – If you have your heart set on keeping American healthcare costly, confusing, and only accessible to the rich, I welcome compelling arguments in my direction.  Anyone who lobbies for American healthcare to stay the same is a fascinating beast to me, like a mythical creature or a car wreck that you cannot look away from, and I want to learn more about them.  My hunch is that this group of people probably has not ever read a single bit of information on why our current system is absolutely terrible, however, I do not like to assume or put people in stereotypical buckets, but it is hard not to do that with this one.  Sure everyone, keep fighting for higher bills, less help, and for all of us to die a bit sooner than we normally would since we do not have universal access to basic necessities and support.  That sounds wise….not.  Again, I welcome, and appreciate all perspectives, so if you want to school me on this one, go right ahead.  My only ask is that we have a beer or a whiskey while we talk it over to keep things exciting.  

Quit [Power]Playing Games With My Heart

When completing my master’s degree coursework, I would write stuff, and I would get A’s on my papers, because that is what happens after you procrastinate for four weeks and then spew out a 10-page paper days before it is due, editing it in hours before the deadline, and I would think to myself, man, I really like learning about this.  I thought, when I graduate, I am going to help so many people and make so many differences.  I might have been a tad off on that theory…

You see, the class they forgot to sign me up for (or even have on the course list), was “How to Play the Game.” That lesson came from the School of the Hard Knocks, which I am still attending, thank you very much. No one prepared me for the Game. No one told me that at 30(ish) years old, a middle-aged man in a director role would tell me “Oh you want to be director, oh that is a reach,” even though I met all qualifications for the role.

Not one person warned me that the same slimy lizard would tell me that I was “power-playing” him when I asked him to involve more stakeholders on a discriminatory decision he was making.  Spoiler alert – he made the decision without involving anyone else, and he got promoted for limiting diversity and inclusion in the workplace.  Gasp!  Shriek!  Are we really surprised here?  What a meatball.  On top of that, when I brought this to the head of HR’s attention, A FEMALE MIGHT I ADD, she backed him, saying that we do not always have to agree with every decision, but at the end of the day, we all have to walk out of that meeting rooting for the idea that was chosen.  What a load of nonsense that was.  If it is a wrong decision, if it is not the right thing, we do not have to agree with anything.  Quit trying to control our thoughts. 

Great Expectations

My husband, I have so many kind words to say about him, but I know that you know that I know that you know how much I love him, so we will refrain from writing a love letter since this blog entry is about people being ridiculous, and he is not one of those people, he would always say to me, “I am not sure why you are always surprised when people act indecent.  You always think people will be different, but they disappoint you.”  He is so right; I acknowledge that skewed expectations is a problem I have.  I like to think that the world operates with integrity.  That everyone is fighting the good fight.  Truth is, very few of us are, and those who are, I love that we are friends, and I thank you for your participation.  I look forward to meeting more of you lovely gems as I age and experience life.  The sad thing is, there are not enough of us to go around.  So if you are one of those people, continue making your mark on this world, because if you do not, the balance will go off-kilter, and the world will explode into a million tiny pieces since the terrible people are going to have power-hungry battles and will end up blasting us all into oblivion. 

Back to what the hubs said….I am practicing on lowering expectations for humanity.  Taking it a step further, I am not expecting anything from anyone.  It has taken me years to get a feel for humans, and I am spellbound by their many behaviors and tendencies.  People can be absolutely awful to each other, especially if a personal gain is involved.  It is mind-boggling, not to mention terrifying.

Hate the Game, but Know the Game

So here I sit, trying to cope with the fact that evil lurks in all corners, and there really is no way out of it.  Sure, integrity and kindness can be found if you look hard enough, but ultimately we must admit and accept that the world is run by a bunch of assholes, and that, my friends, is why you MUST learn how to play the Game.

Here are some tips I have learned when playing the Game:

• Listen, a lot, listen to people and find out what their motives are before opening your mouth.
• Observe, watch, peep, ask to shadow people, find out what in the hell is going on, infiltrate, inquire, be curious.
• Know that people love to talk about themselves.  This helps with the creeping. 
• Ask an absurd amount of questions.  Also, ask questions that let them know that you know what they are up to.  Ask them questions they cannot seem to answer.  Put them on the spot, and make them share with the world that they are awful.
• Let them know that you are a Fighter for Good.  It will blow their mind, and they will be scared, because they will realize they let you in for long enough that you cannot easily be removed.  Think of yourself as a barnacle.  Just keep hanging on.

Keep living that sweet, sweet barnacle life, and it will take you far, my people.

How do you play the game?

Listening to: Poison Trees by The Devil Makes Three

Watching (still, because I still kind of work and have kids..): The Knick, HBO, Clive Owen, early 20th century medical breakthroughs, addictive personalities. Full send.

**Caution: This post is long, and kind of old. I wrote it a few months ago but never published it. I had to break it up into two parts so your eyes would stay in place.**

Have you ever felt that you did not belong?  Perhaps you were an imposter to your own game?  Maybe you acquired access to a high-clearance area, got giddy, yet immediately questioned why anyone would have allowed you to be there?  And every time you turned a corner, opened a door, or read a document, you kept saying to yourself, “Did they mean to let me see this?  When are they going to find out ?”

This takes me back to the Bizarro Jerry episode on Seinfeld when Kramer uses the restroom in an office building, tries to help someone fix the copier machine after he leaves the bathroom, and gets mistaken for a full-time employee. He rides this mistaken identity for all it is worth and begins showing up to “work” each day, working 9 to 5, throwing jokes out at the water cooler, bringing in a suitcase full of crackers, and living that corporate dream. Eventually the jig is up, and Cosmo Kramer ends up in the boss’s office, where he is told he is being let go, only to respond with, “But I don’t even work here.”

Even though Kramer was living that uninhibited dream, me, myself, and I had a lurking, uneasy feeling of trespassing when I was a “leader.” Imposter Syndrome was a real thing.

Paint That Pollock – An Ode to a Damn Good Mentor

The person who initially let me through the door to corporate leadership was and still is an amazing person; they are part of the 3% (see Scary Happiness and the Corporate-Corpse Revival or Office Zoos, Innovation Incubators, and the Mother of All Schedules if you need a refresher). They knew what was up then and they still know what is up. They are my mentor for my life and they never signed up for that. Now they succumb to my midnight texts when I discover yet another thing that makes my brain swirl.

My mentor led me in to the Room Where It Happens, knowing I would f*ck sh*t up (in a good way of course). This act of promoting me into a manager role with zero formal leadership experience was similar to leaving a toddler alone in a white room with a box of markers and a tub of paint.

You say messy, I say “Damn, look at that badass Pollock-esque mural.”

When I was given the manager role, I was astounded. I said to my mentor (who then was not my mentor), “Really? You think I can do this job?”

They said with kindness and confidence, “Yes you can do it, and you will fail at times, but I will be there to pick you up when you fall on your face in the dirt.” And oh how they were correct. I ate mud and continued to smear my face with muck throughout my leadership tenure.

Not only did they believe in me, but they opened the door and guided me throughout most of the journey. Much like Gandalf, showing up when necessary yet offering autonomy most of the time. They allowed me to vent, to cry, to get angry, to be an idiot. At times it felt like we were on a tram ride at a zoo, but instead of animals, it was people in suits – VPs, CEOs, District Managers, all the fancy titles. When the time was right, my mentor would say to me, “Look over there, that is a monkey that looks sweet. Beware, if you come near it with a treat, it will eat your face right off.” or “Check out that tiny fox. So soft, so fuzzy, so cute, but don’t be fooled, it will scratch your eyes out if you get in that cage.” “See that bird with the beautiful plumage? Those claws show no mercy. It will shut down your creativity faster than the blink of an eye.”

My mentor taught me how to read people without having to tell them I was doing so. They showed me how to recognize discrete and subtle toxicity. Valuable life lessons that I am still learning.

Closer to the [Sun’s] Heart

Snapshot of how I felt each day in leadership – I showed up, I busted my ass, I used the techniques my mentor showed me, I exposed, I infiltrated, and I stood for integrity. Life was good. I was able to put more good in the world than not, and I was an advocate for the right thing.

My goal of not replicating actions of the terrible bosses I endured was being accomplished. My life plan was working. Most of you do not know this, but one of my main motivators for becoming a leader was to reverse the culture completely. To be a mole on the inside. To have more ability to changing the workplace for the better being closer to the “sun.”

As an hourly employee, I tried my damndest to get things changed, and I was met with little to no response. I have spoken up for my beliefs since I took a job at sixteen years old. A job where I was felt up by an older male employee one time, and when bringing it up to the leaders of the joint I was told by the female boss to “not worry about it because touching my lower back and butt was not a big deal.” Why should we accept this kind of leadership? How do so many toxic ideas rise to the top? Well I was climbing closer to the top to at least try and overcome the poisonous motives, and if I could not diminish the nonsense, at least I would be able to joust with the self-centered, money-hungry powerful people (and hold my own).

When I was given a leadership role, I felt like I had somehow tricked the head honchos into letting me run the show. It was quite exhilarating to feel like an imposter. But once they caught on to my works of integrity, that is when the blocking, suffocating, and withholding began in regards to carrying out my ideas and strategies. They brainwashed me into thinking I was doing something wrong whenever I brought up an initiative or pointed out a gap in the processes. Whenever I proposed a big project that would improve the workplace for years to come, I would get so confused when someone would shoot down my ideas, their reasoning being that it did not meet business needs, it costs too much.

What these power-playing people really wanted to say was the idea was increasing equality, making people happier, and making it a more fair playing field. But the idea was costly, moneywise, when in reality it was probably equivalent to one week’s worth of their pay. But they would never come out and admit it. They wanted to be the one with the ideas, not me. Day in and day out, I would shrink. The Imposter Syndrome was accentuated – and they made me feel like having integrity was a bad thing.

At that point, whenever decisions needed to be made, I would revert to the new mindset they instilled in me, looking only at the money, treating people like animals in order to make or save a few extra dollars; it was disheartening and defeating, and it jaded me in a weird way. I became like the others, making odd decisions that moved the business along but not the people.

Groundhog Day, All Day, Every Day

Minorities and women probably suffer more from Imposter Syndrome than anyone else, but that could be another fact that I just made up. We have watched the leaders from the sidelines so much that we have formed this twisted idea on how offices and businesses should be run. If we think about it, we are being told this is the way, slam the door on innovation, fight to keep everything the same. We must be robots. Can you really say that this is THE WAY? Is the paperwork that built this country in 1776 still THE WAY? I think not – that shit is in desperate need of an upgrade.

We update our phones on a frequent basis, we renovate our houses occasionally, we modify our hair, we change our minds, but why are laws and foundations of society (and business operations) the exception to this practice? Why are we letting people from 100 years ago dictate how we talk to and treat people? Times have changed, we have discovered a great deal, we have uncovered amazing techniques, but yet chauvinism and prejudice still remains in the world and the workplace. How old-school.

One of my interests is reading books from the early 1900s because it is fascinating to see how little things have changed. History certainly does repeat itself, and it is not ashamed of it either. People harp about learning from your mistakes, but our biggest role mode – our very own human race – does a terrible job at maintaining that rule. Way to set an example.

This post does not wrap up in a nice manner, but I am crabby and am spending little time on closing it up. If you want to keep reading, move yourself on to Part 2 please. I still love you all, but my head hurts trying to give you the closure you need right now.

Let’s talk about interviews, baby.

Let’s talk about you and me.

Let’s talk about all the good things and the bad things that may be.

Yes, let’s talk about interviews…

…and all of the nonsense games that people play with people’s potential and future career paths.

How did I do? Vote below if you want to provide invaluable feedback on my adventure.

Full disclosure: I wrote this entry without editing, and I wrote it fast. In this post you will feel my emotions, and I wanted it to be that way. Interviewing is an anxiety-ridden experience, and I had to shoot from the hip to get my points across.

Can you spot what is wrong with this picture?

Once upon a time, I led an interview panel. That interview panel was made up of nine leaders. Nine people, you say? Yes, nine people. Too big for it’s britches. Out of those nine people, all nine had biased opinions, including myself. All nine would sit in applicant interviews and listen closely, all nine would write down notes to keep the candidates’ answers fresh in their heads, all nine would go back to the office, would chat amongst each other over who was their favorite, and all nine would grade the interview packets days after the actual interviews, and all nine would stack the decks so their clear favorite would come out on top, regardless of if the candidate was the best out of the applicant pool. Because love wins over everything, right? And if you “love” someone, you will help them be successful by trampling on the more qualified candidate and lying about who was the winner.

You better believe I called out all nine of these people on their bullshit. And you might find it difficult to digest, but all nine of these people continued to stand behind their cliquey decision. Humans can be disgusting sometimes.

Filter out the poison.

So I did what any crime fighter would do, I revamped the interview packet so that the following happened:

1. Scoring for the interview happened within the interview. Interview panel members were not allowed to leave the room until they scored and handed in their packets.
2. The questions were modified so we heard more real-life examples less hypothetical scenarios. Yes people, we know what you would do in this moment if you were in a perfect setting, but what really happened when this occurred to you in real life? Did you falter, did you cave under the stress when you thought you would hold your head high? Did you actually flip out on someone instead of maintaining your calm composure that you originally sold to us in your previous interview question response about your character and integrity?
3. The questions were repetitive throughout the interview. We fact-checked the hell out of these people. If their story started one way earlier in the interview and ended up completely different after asking the question in a different manner, we knew we were in the midst of a fibber with flaming trousers.
4. The questions were the same for all applicants. This one was especially important, because some of the nine leaders would ask specific questions of their friends, or they would grill the applicants they were not fond of to better expose their weaknesses. Tricky, tricky, but I can spy evil a mile away, so good try, go use that tactic on someone else.

After this revamp, not many people wanted to sit on the interview panel. Aha! Success!

Also proceeding this revision, we started hiring people who had soft skills instead of technical experience, and the environment started to become kinder, smarter, and more communicative. Interesting what a little integrity can do for a cloudy day.

Willy and Canny were the best of friends.

The interview selection process is a bitch. No other way to put it. You know you are hurting someone no matter what, and you also are aware that you are making someone’s whole year or potentially few years by choosing them for the role.

You will never know if you made the right decision because there is no right decision. People change, rethink, and reform their opinions, but most importantly, people lie. It is a dog eat dog world, my friends (such a gross reference, my dogs have never tried to eat each other).

However, you can do your best by rooting for and hiring on the Willies over the Cannies. The Willies are the people who are willing to do the work. Does not mean they are capable, but damn if they do not give it a college-effort every single time.

The Cannies are the people who can do the work. They either went to school for it, or they have been living that experienced life for quite some time.

In my mixed-up world, the Cannies are the people who ruin the whole thing. They show up with their report cards of how they are technical dream-machines, but what they fail to expose is that they are usually not skilled in the butter-soft talent known as Emotional Intelligence. They are essentially robots who have a low amount of human skills. They let anger fester, they take action in a spiteful manner, they look down on those who do not have their intelligence level. They are the people in college who told me I was an idiot, but frowned when I came out on top in Biochem. They are the bullies of the workplace. I should be kinder here, but I am shooting it to you straight, mostly because I have been bullied all of my career by these people, and I think everyone deserves to know how to spot one.

Now if you get yourself a Willy/Canny hybrid – A Wilcan, not to be confused with Vulcan or Wilco (Jeff Tweedy, I see you), is a golden nugget of awesomeness. These diamonds in the rough not only can do the job, but they are willing to do it too. And, get this, they are kind, they communicate effectively, and they know how to empathize. Holy moly, a triple threat. What a wonderful world.

Unfortunately, there are less than 3% of these mystical beings on this gorgeous planet. Wilcans come out of the crevices once in a blue moon, and when they do, we celebrate so hard that Prince would be proud.

Be more like a Wilcan.

Do the bladder-stomp.

Back in January 2021, I got pregnant with my second child. After three and a half years of being in a role, I became bored and started looking for my next adventure. I interviewed for over five positions, and I went bold and disclosed my pregnancy in each interview, witnessing literally slumping of shoulders from the interview panels after I communicated my status of having a bun in the oven.

One interview was six hours away from our home, and they had amped me up to be the best candidate since sliced bread, but when I showed up as a blooming, glowing, sweating seven-months pregnant person, they acted as if I did not know how to read or write. They led me on until the very end, looking me dead in the eye and promising me housing accommodations once the offer was extended, only to find out days later via weak-ass emails that I did not get the role, telling me that I was not “good enough” and that they went with an internal candidate (they never mentioned there was an internal candidate in prior conversations).

What they should have said was this:

“We are not sorry, but we went the easy, less offensive route, and we chose the person who already works here that we were too embarrassed or weak to say no to. We were scared to have to work with this person after denying them a promotion, even though we know you would have kicked more ass at this job than Kim Kardashian can fit into Spandex shorts. We all know you are a rockstar, but we are not emotionally intelligent enough to go with the “right” decision. So we will stick with our lack of guts and continue accentuating this toxic culture by promoting the Cannies of the world until eventually the whole team is brainwashed to believe that this is a good place to work. We will train our people to stay within their small comfort zones. Retention, retention, retention.”

My research concludes the following:

Pregnant women + job interviews = Incompatible for life

Willies + job interviews = Do not get your hopes up

Cannies + job interviews = Offer accepted!

People say they do not discriminate against pregos, but the truth will set you free.

Play the game, Prego.

After consulting with others on my struggles to land a new role while holding in my vomit in between questions, I was told by all other women that I do not need to disclose, nor should I disclose, my pregnancy during the interview.

My response – I do not want to work for someone who would not hire me as a pregnant person. Because these people suck, and they will continue to suck even after they offer me the job.

Their response – Hmmm, good point, but you still need to play the game to get the job.

But I am a Wilcan! I can do anything I put my mind to!

Oh contraire.

Apparently you have to play the game because good is hard to find in this world and shittiness prevails. Ahhh, that makes sense, right?

What kind of world are we living in where we cannot share this joyful experience of growing a gremlin with any human being in any scenario without pain, bias, or stereotypes interfering? Why are people hating on the baby mamas of the world? What in the hell did we ever do to you except ask for a chair or for you to pick something off of the floor for us? We are the ones puking in the trash cans, having our bladders stomped on, and having our ribs used like a jungle gym. Just give us a damn promotion and trust that we will come back even stronger after maternity leave. Ignore the fact that we will be gone for three months (still not enough time for maternity leave), and push aside your preconceived notions that we will not be hard workers because we have to care for a team outside of work. Stop discriminating. Stop being jerks. Go get pregnant yourselves and see what it is like, and then come talk to me.

Do not even get me started on the job interviews where the candidate is a Wilcan, is not pregnant, yet still does not get the job. Discrimination happens even when there is not a factor to discriminate against. This scenario is what we define as favoritism, and boy is it rampant in the corporate world.

I chose not to be an ass-kisser, to show my skills and integrity without needing to brown-nose, and that is why I am unemployed.

Transparency killed the cat.

People say they are transparent, they hype up their honesty, and then you discover that at the end of the day, people revert to being selfish and they do what is best for them first and foremost. I do too. You do as well. Please try to convince me otherwise. However, if we can all stop leading people on, the world will be a better place.

The next time you interview someone, I challenge you to do the following: Please do not hype the candidate up, please disclose who they are interviewing against, please let them know what they could have done better, and please share what they did well. Stop telling them they landed the job before you consult with the team. Discontinue choosing the person that your team selects, and go with the correct candidate. Immediately halt on your practice of being comfortable and going with what you know. Be risky. Tell them why you did not pick them, tell them you were too weak to go with the right candidate, and for the love of whatever in the hell created this world, please tell them within two days of interviewing if they did not get the job. Stop ghosting people. Hell, tell them right before they walk out the door if you know, call them that night if you find out you are going with someone else.

Stop playing games. It hurts. It is mean, and it f*cks with people’s minds.

And for those of you reading this who are already hiring Wilcans, hit me up sometime because I would love to come work for you or refer a handful of people your way. You deserve better.

Ladies and gentlemen, this game is called, “Name The Perfect Work Schedule.”  The winner gets a pat on the back to go back to work instead of reading this.  And let’s begin.

I will start this game out in an assertive (do not get that confused with aggressive) manner.   

Can’t Read My Poker Face

Being direct and decisive is my communication style, so it might as well be my playing style – I fondly remember being victorious in multiple poker games with my brother’s friends during house parties (at our home of course), way back when I was an innocent/blind warrior, shortly before I knew that vices were available to me, and prior to me figuring out that I was welcome to try any one of those vices that I was curious about. In poker I would start out sort of safe, observe everyone’s style, and then rock and roll after a few rounds.  I sucked at having a poker face, and I never wanted to stay up late wasting the night playing poker, there was too much else to observe at these parties, so I tended to bow out before the final one or two victims were left.  It taught me patience, which I still lack, and it also taught me that seventeen and eighteen year old boys are not intimidating, and they can get their ass-kicked by a 15-year old girl on any given day.  

This story might not seem fitting for this post, but it was a way for me to let you know I am coming out swinging with how I define flexibility in the workplace.

I Wish For…

If someone came to me a year ago and asked what type of schedule would make me stay in my role, I would instantly choose the option to have a hybrid work schedule.  And let me make sure the people in the back hear this one – I am not talking about a measly one remote day a month setup.  Not a chance.  This could blow your mind, but I am going with a minimum of one remote day per week.  Yes I said it, a minimum.  Meaning your leader would be holding you accountable for taking that remote day during the week.  

Bold you say?  Lazy you say?  I say this: 

Innovation requires incubation.

Our House in the Middle of Our Street

I shall elaborate.  Most, if not all of my best work came out when I worked remotely, It was either that, or  I had to recreate the zone of creativity at work by being shelled up in my office (or shared space) either early in the morning or late in the evening, when my brain was not working at full capacity due to interruptions, demands, venting, supporting, listening, and addressing in all directions, even sometimes in multiple dimensions.  Needless to say, on the office bunker days, my work was sub-par.  As an aspiring director stuck in a manager’s body, I had my eyes set on multiple long-term goals.  See previous post about being able to strategize past the five-year plan.  Working from home was an ability to get into that ambitious headspace and keep the ball rolling.  But people do not want ambition, people do not want you to have ideas, they want the ideas to be their ideas, and if it sounds too weird to them, they will shut your ideas down faster than you ever thought possible.  

When I work from home, I have my inspirations surrounding me. I blare vinyls on my record player, the harmonica filling up the room while I bust out a game-changing strategy that will help the team propel into the colorful space of success. I have my home decor around me, pictures of Jimi smoking a J, Beatles being Beatles, Jim Morrison giving me the eyes, pictures of mountains I have visited but not climbed, photos of my bitching wedding day, concert posters, bookcases at every corner, the rows full of Stephen King’s words of wisdom and Neil Gaiman’s views into the world of fantasy. My house is my brain space. It makes me happy, and the work I do in it reflects that happiness.

The Tribe Has Spoken

In my previous role (not all of my roles), I brought this hybrid idea up to an HR executive, and I heard, in the Charlie Brown teacher voice, “You were hired to be in an office.”  Like an animal in a cage at the zoo.  And trust me, I am not as exciting to watch as a hippopotamus taking a dip or an orangutan teaching her baby how to climb.  I also asked said HR bigwig if I could have more support and get a supervisor on my team to receive delegation from the manager, and I was told this:

“We’ve always done it this way.  We’ve tried the supervisor model in the past, and it has not worked.” 

How’s that for innovation and science, folks?  That very moment was when I made my started making my descent into unemployment.  If the higher sector of Human Resources believes in stagnation, than the poison has spread much further than I originally had perceived.  Yikes.

Vote for Hybrid

I am a campaign manager for the Remote Work Act – I firmly believe that people do their best work when leaders are not around.  If you find a way to help elevate your team to where they can do the work without you there, then you have won the game.  Not this game that we are playing right now in this blog, but rather the Game of Autonomy.  If you can trust your people to do the work and not need you to be there at their beck and call, then a cohesive team has spawned, and you have witnessed a damn miracle.  Cohesion and independence are not the norm, and it is difficult and takes persistence to achieve, but my goodness it is worth it.  Those are the teams I tried to create, but I was then snapped back into the office by the tentacle of the business suit.  Can’t say I didn’t try.

People work better when bosses are not around, and people are happier when bosses are not around.  Those are facts that I just made up, but I would bet you a few dollars that if you collected the data, I would not be far from the truth.  Bosses are not necessary, but they are a link to the outside world if they know how to do their jobs right, and sometimes, just sometimes, they are willing to put in the energy it takes to inspire into the room a melody of self-awareness, open communication, and encouragement for people to have brain babies (defined as sparkling ideas that change the world).  Allowing employees do their thing is the most magical experience you can have at work.  When you see someone finally take it to the next level and gain confidence and life skills, well that is what it all is about, baby.  That is the golden ticket.  And if you work in healthcare, you go on knowing that you helped make a happy employee, thus sparking cared-for patients, which then you have met the criteria for your WHY of joining healthcare in the first place.  

But my friend, let us not be so naïve to think that corporate leadership would allow this kind of happiness to run amuck.  This kind of innovative and curious behavior is only tolerated in crevices of the corporate world, where you find leaders who speak the same alien language as you.  That 3% of awesome people who “get it” that I mentioned in my post “Scary Happiness and the Corporate Corpse Revival.”  Those are the leaders who let you choreograph the dance, cheer you on from the sidelines, and bring you flowers afterwards.  I have met those people, I have tried desperately to work for them, I talk with them to this day, and I now know that they did not have me work for them because they knew it would clip my wings.  I get it now, and I am thankful for these people.

If bosses supported, did what the employees told them to do, and also threw in a sprinkle of motivation and inquiry from time to time, the world would be a better place.  Instead, most bosses tell and not ask, respond before listening or understanding, and shy away from the stinky piles of elephant poop found in all corners of the room (not to mention they have not yet said a single word about the actual elephants that left it.  Multiple elephants.).  This is what I have witnessed.  I strive(d) to not be like those bosses.  Told you I was blunt, I hope you can deal with it.

The Ultimate Request

Getting back to the remote work/perfect work schedule game.  Here is what I would ask for:

1. A minimum of one remote day per week.
2. If the day presents with more virtual meetings than there is downtime, this automatically becomes a remote day.
3. The ability to leave early whenever shit came up.  Guilt-free.  Seriously, please stop making me feel like I am doing something wrong here.
4. The ability to come in late whenever shit came up.  Guilt-free.  Seriously, please stop making me feel like I am doing something wrong here.
5. The promise that my remote days will not be revoked if a deadline is missed or if a mistake happens.  Instead of revoking, inquire on my state of mental health, because I do not normally miss deadlines.
6. The openness for leaders to admit that people in the office do not work a full eight hours.
7. A Working-Mom program.  This is the mother of all asks (no pun intended).  As a working mother, I had to quit my job in order to be with my children.  I was paying $30,000 in childcare.  Read that again.  I was paying to not see my children.  My idea of a working-mom program would be to allow the moms to put their children in daycare part-time, be able to watch them on certain days, and allow the moms to work on the evenings or weekends (remotely) to make up the 40 hour week.  This idea needs to be fine-tuned, but I would have paid for part-time care in an instant if it meant I could keep my full-time gig and still see my kids.  (People would define this as “having your cake and eating it too,” which is frowned upon).

Your turn. 

I quit my effing job…

The year is 2022, the month is May. Enter me, Jamie, an eager, energetic, seasoned for seven years manager in the healthcare industry. A female leader who put 110% into developing people, thought beyond the five-year plan, stressed the importance of psychological safety, and valued transparent communication.

Enter the other 97% of zombies in the business world: People who put 110% into staying themselves and being correct, made decisions based on personal benefit, thought only within the week or month, avoided conflict, talked smack behind backs, and valued keeping secrets from the underlings.

I say 97% because the other 3% are the people who “get it.” The 3% are the people I stay in touch with. The 3% are the people I treasure and are the only people who probably could (if they wanted to), talk me into returning to this fiery furnace of nonsense.

No need to read between the lines here – I became and am fed up with the corporate world.

I am being very direct in saying that I was sick of the BS (aka bullshit) that comes with working for “the man.” I would dare to call myself a cynic in this current stage of life, or perhaps growing older naturally brings on skepticism. Cynic or not, I did what I had to do – I quit, and I did it in a blaze of glory. I quit for my understanding and adapting husband, Frank. I quit for my two out of this world daughters, Carmella and Colette. I quit so I could see them more than four hours a day. I quit so I could be a teacher for my children, I quit so I could bask in the sunshine of LIFE.

I even would say I quit for my dog, Rigby (named after the sad Eleanor Rigby, since this dog is a healer of all doubt). And I definitely quit for our first dog, Scout (named after Jean Louise Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird). Scout was our first baby who I recently had to euthanize in February due to an invasion of bone cancer. Bone cancer, or any other cancer for that matter, can go straight to hell and then further down to the depths of the core of the universe. A large piece of my soul was lost when Scout went into the ether, and I am still searching for it to this day.

Retirement = Ass-backwards thinking

Quick rant – I recently read a survey about what benefits people wanted more of in my workplace. The majority said they prioritized retirement benefits over flexibility, better pay, better vacation benefits, better healthcare, so on and so forth.

Read that again. Here is my translation: People prioritize living their best in the second-to-last and final parts of life over living their best in the earlier parts of life.

Call me crazy, but is this not the most ass-backwards thing you have ever heard?! People pound out thirty or more years of hard work, only to retire and have a limited window to live their best life before they have aches and pains and really only want to relax and spend time with the people they love.

When you retire, you are entering an era of rest and relaxation, at least that is what I hear from the retirees of life, but what about the time during your thirties, forties, and fifties? And hell, what about the twenties too? Are we supposed to work fifty hours a week during those decades, when we are in prime shape and physically can handle just about anything? This makes zero sense to me. Is there a way we can live our full lives twenty through sixty-five, all while working and making enough money to enjoy life, so that when we “retire” we can look back and say, “Job well done, my friend! You have successfully gotten to experience what life has to offer, you maintained financial stability, you did not work yourself to tears, and now you rest, also with financial support!.”

How about the fact that you are responsible for teaching your children how to live during your “working years?” Ahh, I see, so we are supposed to be superheroes. We are required to work 50 hours a week in our thirties and forties and educate our children, all at the same time, expected to be top-notch teachers after a rugged 10-hour day, be present for our kids, and love them unconditionally….but only for 4 hours a day, since we are working said 10-hour days and get home only for a wee bit of time to hang out before bed time. That is the limit we give ourselves.

Let me say this loud enough for the people in the back: This is all bullshit.

But what do I know? I am merely a 34 year old complainer and quitter.

I have only had two months to acclimate to live outside of the office, and I can honestly say that on this very hot day in August 2022, if I had to identify my thoughts on my past life in leadership, I am stuck between the second and third stages of grief , which is ANGER and BARGAINING, and the needle is dancing more towards the former rather than the latter.

Why is this lady so angry, you ask? Well, I am mostly angry because of the time that was wasted with people who prioritized toxicity. I was bullied. I was the target of someone else’s stress and unhappiness. I was taken down by the soldiers of the dark side who had nothing better to do with their time than control and suppress my creativity and my craving to innovate and empathize. Evil monsters are in my “room,” and I WANT THEM OUT. But they will leave when they are damn well ready.

Not even $90K could make me stay

You see, I left my job, that was underpaying me around $90,000 a year. To many, that would look like a dumb decision to give that money up. In reality, I was being paid (underpaid might I add) to be overworked, overstressed, and limited with the time I could allocate for my magical family. 100% NOT WORTH $90K, 100% NOT WORTH MY TIME. Although I did meet some living gems that I still keep in touch with (remember the 3% I mentioned earlier?). Alas, allow me to be the forever optimist and throw a positive spin on my past jobs in the leadership department – the entire experience was a growth opportunity, I learned great skillsets, I saw the inner workings of a large corporation, and I learned how to empathize, yada, yada, yada. Spoken like a true businesswoman.

Giving up something you are good at

Oh, and get this – I was pretty damn good at my job.

Notice how I said “job” instead of “career.” Yes, I was a manger for almost ten years. Yes, I had as many as 75 direct reports. Yes, I was climbing that ladder to the top, and damn if I wasn’t good at it. That is the hardest part of all of this. I had to quit something that came fairly simple to me, just because people tried to suffocate me. But breathing is a requirement of life. This job was no career, it was a way to suck out my soul and leave me depleted and down on the ground day in and day out. It was a way for my company to put others in a social stranglehold where they were not paid fairly nor given time to really live. I had to escape the madness, and that is exactly what I did.

I once read Michelle Obama’s Becoming, and in it, she talks about how she gave up her kickass lawyer role that she excelled at for a lower-paying job in philanthropy where her passions were living. Now, I am no Michelle Obama, nor am I wed to and have the intellectual or financial support of Barry the Beloved (Frank is a good substitution, though), but I do believe that she speaks truth with this life transition, and I listened to her very closely.

I’ve escaped the corporate underworld. At least for now.

Now that Love is the number one priority, many decisions have become easy to make. I am at the point where I feel so content and present that I am worried there is a dark cloud waiting to encapsulate my world and take me under again. I call this feeling “scary happiness,” although I am certain I will come up with a better name moving forward. Scary Happiness might be coming to eat me alive, however, I have trained myself to ignore that nagging shadow and immerse myself in the present. Life will still have downs, and those downs will be appreciated, Now that I have a stronger sense of purpose, I can endure those rides to the bottom knowing that they will make the high-flying times that much more exciting.

This corporate corpse has been revived! And it is no longer a corporate body, it is a family-driven soul.

I write about this journey not to slam anyone or burn any bridges, but rather to tell my story. For some reason, I have a sneaking suspicion that others have gone or are undergoing something similar, and I am here to tell you that there is life after death, but you have to be determined to resurrect.