My husband got "The Devil Wears Prada" DVD out of the library for me last week. Although I had read the book when it first came out, I was reluctant to watch the movie out of deep-seated fear that it would cause further nightmarish flashbacks of my ex-bosses. I'm thankful to report that enough time has passed where I am now, officially, flashback-free. I'm also embarrassed to report that it felt somewhat tame, to me.
One of my least favorite bosses was highlighted this spring on Gawker's online poll entitled, New York's Worst Boss. I didn't bother to enter my comments given they had so much disturbing fodder already; however, since she didn't win, I'm regretting my omission.
On my first day at this horrific firm, my boss looked me up and down and ordered that I get my hair cut and colored at her salon and that her assistant take me out shopping for new clothes. It was as if I interviewed well and then arrived at the office looking like Jerri Blank.
After I was hired, I was never directly spoken to again unless it was over the phone. Literally. She would relay messages to me through people while we all sat in the same room . It's almost comical if it wasn't so demeaning!
Lunches were free and catered daily. I had access to a car and driver but preferred to walk to work every day. However, we were expected to be at work from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 a.m. five days a week and to be "on call" all weekend. One Sunday, after an early morning conference call, I went to hang up and head off to church. My boss' comment? "If I had known you were a Christian, I would never have hired you." What a shocker.
After hours, the housekeepers would walk around with a tray of wine -- but everyone was forewarned to drink only the white in case, heaven forbid, any spilled. The owner, meanwhile, was out every night with famous politicians, luminaries and celebrities and would arrive home night after night stinkin' drunk.
This company had zero processes in place and employees were literally expected to be mind readers. The staff were supposed to pack the "briefcases" of the leadership team with information they may find useful -- even if they didn't attend the meetings and had no idea what any particular project entailed.
The owner would scream at people in the office if she got an incoming call and she didn't have information at her fingertips about the caller. "Why didn't someone run up here and give me a file on George Fisher?" Perhaps because we didn't know he would call? Maybe she should have hired Nostradamus . . .
One night she had dinner with two women from New Jersey as a favor to a client. The next day, she couldn't stop marveling aloud at their idiocies like the fact that they a) wore nude hose (how embarrassing!) and b) put an actual tape recorder on the table (vs. discretely using a miniature recorder). Needless to say, she was mortified to have been in public with them.
The company was a revolving door -- mainly of wealthy, young socialites. One really funny woman that I worked with (and who went to Switzerland on weekends to ski, as one does) kept vowing to "take her down." She had a plan, she claimed, that would ruin my boss' life for ever. It finally amounted to her FedEx'ing a package to one of our clients with damaging documents. Nothing ever came of it except, I found out months later, that I (me!) was framed for the act and my boss was, in turn, trying to take me down. No one remaining on staff had the guts to stick up for me, at the time, because they were worried that she would read between the lines and know that the entire company knew about "the plan."
When I finally resigned, my boss threw my resignation letter on my desk and stormed out of the building. No one would look at me for fear of what I could possibly have done wrong. Later that afternoon, I got a call from HR. "I understand that you attempted to resign but your resignation has been declined."
What? Nice try!
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