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| Glory Sasikala |
“The stars and I have our own space
And we let each other be,” said the Moon,
“But sometimes, I just feel that they
gang up against me!”
---Glory Sasikala
At the onset, I must mention that I worked as a Quality Analyst for language (English) editing in several E-publishing companies. And I had just joined this one…I was the QA. I had my manager, and then, of course, there was the Copyediting Team, led by a young guy, in his late twenties, and co-incidentally leading a team that consisted of ten women…girls…also in their twenties. Young team…giddy team…
Sigh.
Back from a short trip and feeling somewhat rejuvenated, I made my way to the office, hoping for, maybe not a rousing welcome, but smiles surely? and “You’re back! How was your trip?” Instead, terrified faces stared at me. I saw fear in the eyes of all the copyeditors. Oh well….
I moved the fan my way, switched on my computer, signed in, and settled down to my day. Mails....ah.... Happy birthday.... Message for the day.... Hey! What’s this? It was feedback from a client regarding two files we had edited and sent back to them. The client was pretty rude, pretty blunt, and threatened to take back the account.
I got up from my seat and looked across the barrier at the Team Leader of the copyediting team.
“Did I QA the files?”
“Yes.”
“Oh!”
I sat down, shocked.
This was as bad as it could get! Visions of my frantic search for another job. Visions of those days of despair, my May Month of Depression, never to be forgotten. Was I going to be jobless again?
When my boss arrived, I requested to see the error report. And then, I was in for a second shock. I had mentioned more than 10 corrections in that file, and the language editor had only incorporated one of my suggestions. Not one of them had the courtesy to inform me that they were wasting my time!
I looked at my manager for an explanation.
“This is how we work here,” he said, blissfully, “You make suggestions. They can take it or leave it. Most times, they don’t accept it,” he added, dryly. “They don’t like the QA team.”
Then he brightened up, “So now, what you do is go over and fight it out with them.”
“Fight it out with them?”
“Yes, yes, that’s how we’ve been functioning. You suggest, they don’t accept, then you fight it out.”
“But, why would I do that? Will they listen and take my suggestions that way?”
“No.”
I looked at him, even more confused. I tried concentrating on my work, but my mind just wouldn’t work. We all waited for the inevitable.
It came a little while later.
“Come, the Senior Manager wants to talk to us.”
I went into a room full of frowning men, “How could this happen? We’re in serious trouble.”
“You made the suggestions, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“But they haven’t accepted. We need to talk to them.”
“It’s the QA’s fault. We incorporated the suggestions.”
I looked across at him then, the Lying Team Leader of a bunch of Lying Copyeditors.
Round and round it went, the conversation, somehow very subtly leaving me out of the whole thing.
“Can I say something?”
“Yes, of course! We’re all in this now! You have to speak out.”
“I’m deeply disappointed with this office.”
There was shocked silence.
“The copyediting team thinks the QA is the opposition team. I feel like I’m playing a kabaddi match.”
The Lying Team Leader interrupted, “But I allow my team members to be friendly with you. I don’t say anything. I don’t interfere.”
I ignored him and continued...
“I want one thing implemented with immediate effect. I want the copyeditors to take out an excel sheet, copy-paste the errors that they have not incorporated, and give me one of the three reasons. One, that it is not grammatically correct. Two, that it does not make sense. Three, that it is not in keeping with the context. I don’t want to come to office thinking I'm in a kabaddi match and I must win some points.”
The Senior Manager looked sharply at me, “All the corrections you suggest can’t be right. Would you be willing to take responsibility if anything went wrong?”
Taking blame! Why were people so scared of taking blame?
“Yes, I will. I never make corrections unless I am able to justify them.”
“Will you be able to justify your edits in a conference with the client?”
“Yes.”
“Then, from now on, I make it a rule that all the suggestions that you make be accepted, barring none.”
I came back to my seat feeling slightly satisfied but sick at heart.
The next day morning, instead of shamefaced guilty faces, I saw happy faces, and the Lying Team Leader talking to his team of Lying Copyeditors, obviously updating them and laying out strategies. They stopped talking when they saw me. Filled with foreboding, I settled down to my work, wondering what I was in for.
Suddenly, I was flooded with smiles and “Good mornings!”
Happy smiling faces… happy, happy, happy…. Ouch!
It took me a day to figure it out.
They called out to me politely, “Ma’am, don’t you think you’ve made a mistake here? Could you please explain your edit?”
Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!
And what’s more, they were now meticulously incorporating all the edits that I suggested, ensuring, so to speak, that the ball was really in my court. Ouch, and ouch, again!
At the end of the day, I stood up and glared across the barrier at the Lying Team Leader and his bunch of Merry Lying Girls.
“You wait! You will have to go on leave some day. I’ll chuck out the whole team.”
He glared back at me. “You wouldn’t do that. You’re not like that.”
“I am and I will. Which class is your son in?”
“Kindergarten.”
“Does he know his father is a liar?”
“No, but he knows that the QA is the Opposition Team, and you must put up a pretty good fight and win the match.
***
Bio: Glory Sasikala is a writer, poet and editor and publisher living in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. She is the author the ‘Sundays With Glory Sasikala’ series of short stories on Amazon. She is the author of the ‘Glorees Poems’ series on Amazon. She is the Editor and Publisher of GloMag, an International Poetry and Prose Magazine, and she is the administrator of the GloMag Group on Facebook. She is also a published novelist with two novels to her credit: Goodbye Papa (Writers Workshop, Kolkata) and She Spoke In Tongues (Setu Publication, Pittsburgh).
A great write about office politics in which sincere workers suffer while insincere people flourish !
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