Thursday, September 21, 2006

Business As Usual

I attended my first staff meeting yesterday. There must be going on 50 of us crammed around tables shaped into a square. There was breakfast- pancakes, ham, eggs, fruit & juice. There was a lot of apprecations and, hmm, not all that much business.

It was more like an assembly at school where some people get awards and there was a speaker and some free food and you were glad you weren't having to really pay attention in Math class or something.

We had two guest speakers- one from the health insurance company (zzzzz- boring) and one from Aflac. The Aflac fella was hilarious. He was telling us about some claims he had worked on recently and one involved a woman who got an eyelash in her eye. Hold up! An eyelash in her eye?! Doesn't that happened on a daily basis to millions of people and we all survive it without a doctors visit? I really wanted to know more about this woman, her eyeball and her eyelash. But alas, he moved on from there further into his pitch and got a bunch of people to sign up. But not me. Knowing my luck I'll sign up for the accident plan and get cancer. The accident plan can't really help me there unless I can somehow claim that I "accidentally got cancer." Do you think that would fly?

After that was our bosslady. She clearly knows what she is doing when it comes to bolstering morale and keeping staff happy. She gave out Extra gum to those who had been doing "extra" lately and handed out Nestle Crunch bars to those who had, you guessed it, come through in a "crunch." Cheesy + cute + free food goes a long way. THEN she gave each one of us an envelope and told us not to open it until we all had ours. When we did? $100 for each of us as a thanks for all our hard work that fiscal year. I'm so glad mine wasn't pro-rated for the 6 weeks I have been employed there.

But one word to the wise- don't eat the ham. It will make you sick.

10 comments:

Melissa said...

Mmmmmmm. Pancakes and money, hell of a way to start the day, Madam.

Mrs. Ca said...

I want to have a staff meeting like that. It sounds like a lot of fun! At ours we get cookies, but that's usually where the good time ends.

Amy S. Petrik said...

wow. i'm jealous. my staff meeting yesterday sucked. and there was no free ham. no gum was handed out. no free nothing. crap, i'm in the wrong business.

Anonymous said...

Ooooo - what are you going to spend your $100 on?!?!

Anonymous said...

You're lucky, then, that you didn't get the same reward I got at my first post-college job, for my hard work -- a gift certificate for (not kidding) a ham.

Anonymous said...

Wow! $100! And GUM!

Sounds like you chose the right place to work. :)

Becky said...

Wow, that's great that you got the bonus as well. Are you going to treat yourself?

hannahhas said...

Do you think next year perhaps I could come up and get a job about a month before you get your "envelopes" then I can promptly leave?

Just a thought....

Nihilistic said...

Can I come work with you??

Karl said...

Gotta love the big square tables and the free food. It's the only thing that makes meetings even close to worthwhile.