Last week, as was my habit, I sent out meeting minutes from one of the projects I serve on; one that has been ongoing since January and admittedly one of my favorites. I enjoy this particular project because substantial site leadership also serve on the team and my dedication and extensive preparation does not go unnoticed; a critical back-pat to an up-an-coming pharmaceutical guru. This was how I became acquainted with one of my favorite team members, the Biological and Chemical Quality Director, and an extremely affable and intelligent person of India heritage. After sending out the minutes I immediately received and email that this persons' message could not be delivered. I had gotten this bounce-back at previous jobs for one of two reasons:
- The person's inbox was full and couldn't accept any more incoming messages
- They had been canned, or had otherwise unceremoniously left the company
Vs.
Surely it couldn't be the latter, I had just seen them the day before and nothing of consequence seemed amiss. Thinking that this person may be missing more important emails than my own, I walked down to their office to inform them to clean out their inbox or contact IT about the issue. THe office was closed up, but I thought nothing of it; instead, I meandered to one of his manager's offices and asked it this person would be in today. The manager replied that they wouldn't be there that day, then awkwardly said they thought this person would be out all of next week as well. Since awkwardness is this guy's forte I thought nothing of it; told the manager about the issue and asked them to convey my message if they saw their supervisor before I did.
Supervisor's often go out on extensive vacations, so again, I thought nothing of the situation. Then, at today's meeting, my own supervisor gave a sly smile and said she'd noticed the bounce-back and asked the rest of the team about getting a replacement. I was confused, and told them what I had done in remediation of the bounce-back, and what the manager had said; our guy would be back from vacation next week. They each gave me a pitying look as it dawned on me that this person was no longer with us, and I was crushed with sadness. My boss said, here, there's only one reason for that bounce-back, 'oh' was my only reply, I felt dirty somehow. Our Regulatory team member shared their tale of one fateful morning they shot a quick email to their supervisor and got the bounce-back of death; no warning, no clues, just gone.
This got me thinking, for whatever reason a lot of these instances have been happening lately. High-level personnel dropping like flies without any warning, clues are tips as to whether is was a 'canning' or a 'I'm running from a burning building'; though I heavily suspect the former. It makes me feel insecure, who will be next? I've come to care about these people, and enjoy working with them as well as for the company; it makes me feel a bit abandoned and I'm not sure who to be pissed at, HR or the person for leaving. But shit, I may show up one morning and discover that my card won't let me in the front door.
I really, now more than ever, need to watch my mouth at work.... and lock-up my tendency to sexually harsh my co-workers.
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