Magnus Marketing Blog

A colleague/friend decided to stop speaking to me. Like gone cold turkey. I enjoy the Christmas season working in my favorite place - Kohl's! This 28 year old "mature" woman now passes by me with nary a word, acting like I am invisible. She also answers simple questions with rude, hostile, single word sarcastic remarks - Hey, J, did you fold all the tables on this side. She replied, "Yeah. Don't they look folded to you" dripping with hostility. For the life of me and my other colleague (who is also made her "invisible" list) we cannot figure out what set her off - this time. J pulled the same grudge-holding, invisible, not speaking to anyone act earlier this year. It started with the same issue; the way I sort clothing on a garment rack. Was it because of the way I sort clothes? Is it jealousy due to my happy times with our colleague S? Is it because I, D, and S planned a "Santa and the Elves" store event and she wasn't included? I have no idea because J won't communicate. She won't communicate in a professional and civil manner. S and I can't work with her, because she won't talk or work with us. Yes, the management was informed. Her hostility and anger is somewhat frightening, if you hear of an incident where some blonde chick pulled a gun in a Kohl's and shot up her teammates - you will know it is J.

Happy New Year - J needs to be terminated. Immediately. And get some desperately needed mental illness counseling.

This made me think back to my last job. The 25 year old inexperienced marketing associate who worked on sales intelligence reports. The incident was as follows: The team had to produce 3 reports that would be demonstrated for the VP of Higher Ed at Sun Microsystems. The account executive sat down with me and told me, under no uncertain terms should these reports be less than "A" quality because it was an opportunity to showcase our capability and get a lot of business from Sun. One of the reports was assigned to a junior analyst who I supported for her incredible insight and smarts. She was a superstar analyst in the making. I had a promotion in mind with more money for her. Anyway, she had one major problem - she could not take criticism and got defensive to the point of freaking out. Well, you can imagine what happened. She produced a very, very substandard report - half finished, poorly written, terribly researched. I called her in to a closed door office meeting and did the "U" compliment, critique, compliment. Halfway thru, she walked out, just got up and walked out without a word. When, on instructions from my boss, I went to get her to finish the session - a screaming match ensued - high pitched shrill shreiking against getting any feedback. Another colleague intervened to calm her down. She ended up with the feedback. A week later, she and I were called into a disciplinary meeting, my "helpful" colleague stabbed me in the back (claimed I was a bully and intimidating. Considering that I openly favored the girl and was not a fan of his - consider the politics here, I was warned he was "sneaky" and was out for my job), and we both were suspended. Ultimately both of us were dismissed from our positions, she quit and I had many issues (divergent views, honest communications, high standards on quality, etc). Within six months of my departure, the team was gone. Everyone agreed that it wasn't worth it.

Happy New Year. This immature girl who couldn't handle criticism needed to go. I heard she is in a marketing job. I am sure she will not go far in any career, especially marketing where criticism is a daily occurrence. PS: The backstabber who wanted my job quit and is sitting in a low level government job. He never got anywhere.

Employees who are negatively disruptive, unproductive, immature in action need to be terminated. In addition to the deadwood, as mentioned in previous posts, consider unprofitable clients and processes that don't work - and get rid of them. Because in the end - it isn't worth it.