Middle Management; lightweight IQ & PR

OK, so I work at a BP service station to supplement my income while I am studying. This is not a line of work that I particularly enjoy or am especially proud of, but it is convenient to my home and provides the all-important $$ I need to complete my course.

Without blowing my own trumpet, I think that I'm a reliable and hard worker, and I put a great deal of effort into amusing/entertaining and providing great customer service. All would be reasonably peachy were it not for a certain individual-let's just call him Cecil, that struts in once a month or so to make everyone's lives miserable.

Every time this 'person' (and I use the word advisedly) visits, he lets fly an exhausting barrage of everything that is wrong with the lay-out, uniforms, application to the work at hand, and anything else his vicious brain can get a hold of at the time. In fact, his ability to see only negatives is quite awesome in it's own pathetic way.

Did he miss 'Human Resource Management 101'? You know, the one that espouses the nutty idea that people will work harder and better for you if you don't consistently treat them like cockroaches? I guess he was ill the day that they were told that a consistent string of insults is unlikely to elicit better performances from erm...ANYONE, EVER.

I know he missed the memo that stated that all console operators and sundry part-time workers are not flaming morons. I would suggest that he looked up his transcript and tried 'Manners for beginners' and 'Smiling-it only hurts when you don't do it' as extension courses that would improve his chances of not being mauled to death by a lowly sales-person who has had just about enough of this tripe -thankyou very much.

I have a sneaking suspicion that Cecil probably spends his weekends in B&D dens, decked out with leathers whips and chains and a perky little pvc hat insisting that people call him 'General' or 'Mein Fuhrer'. Actually, it is far more likely that he is utterly whipped by his unfortunate partner in life and only gets to be a Big Man when he's at work.

I also love the jaw-dropping hypocrisy that states that the company is an environmentally aware structure that is obsessed with 'Great customer service' while making fat profits from errr PETROLEUM (oh, that was in 'Unsustainable resources 101') and charging people triple mark-ups with a smile and a 'Have a nice day'. Look, sometimes we all have to listen to some company by-line that everyone in the room knows is pure bollocks (especially the poor monkey having to try and convince everyone else) but it is too rich to expect them to actually believe this crud on a minimal (err, sorry 'competitive') wage structure.

And while I'm at it,-a competitive wage structure? There are sweat-shop workers in Borneo that get paid less and treated worse,-certainly. And I'm sure they all have their own 'Cecil's' in on the bargain. Yes, I am fortunate in comparison to many, but right now I'm genuinely peeved and not a little unhappy with my fiscal arrangements. Cecil, I genuinely wish you to slip on a banana peel in a board meeting sometime soon. -That, or I hope some nasty little roach snaps your leather G-string to hard this weekend....