Three weeks ago yesterday I was put in charge of a UK company, thanks to Customs & Revenue and the Metropolitan police. Actually, the police didn't do much but stand around and try and occupy the puppy, whilst the three of us left just sat in the warehouse wondering what was happening. Gibraltars quiet little corner of Hayes was raided by 6 Customs officers and after 30 minutes the boss was gone and so were all of the PCs and the fax machine (minus the phone, they left that on the filing cabinet!).
The owner of the company flew to the UK on the Monday, and some sanity was restored. By the end of the first week, my office (well I was now confirmed as the UK General Manager for the firm) was starting to function, albeit in a dysfunctional way. Slowly the systems started to come back online, the old customs entry system installed onto the new PCs, the fax being run from my 6 year old laptop, Windows Bu sines Vista crashing every time someone decided to breathe.. Nothing unusual then!
This week has now passed. I had a half day on Wednesday to be in the audience of Top Gear (four years on the waiting list and I wasn't going to miss that!) and all hell broke loose again....
I'm not happy about what happened at work on Wednesday afternoon, and it's an issue I need to get on top of. The ex boss turned up to collect his things, and as I wasn't in, decided to pick holes in the staff and start throwing files around the office.... Time for drastic measures. He appeared back on Thursday, and I was the only one left in the building. Now I know my job, and I know what to do (90% of the time), and after a quick and polite chat, things were sorted out. Fine, he hasn't been charged with anything by the authorities, but it's not his job anymore, it's MINE!!!
And finally today. Some normality has restored to the office. Friday being the worst day, and things started to fall into place. The accounting is starting to look easier. The trailers are getting loaded nice and easy, the new member of staff doesn't really know what he is doing but that will be addressed as soon as I can have a quiet 20 minutes to myself and work out where to start training him (apart from the usual "this is a phone, this is a pen, this a piece of paper, write what the person on the phone says down on the piece of paper")....
Gone are the days of finishing at 4:30pm for me. I can't remember the last early finish now (apart from Wednesday). Working weekends, working till 7 or 8 at night, but I know once everything is in place, the work will be easy and back to the old routine, but with me in charge!
Time for me to become a tough, unfriendly, company manager.... Time to show the others that the new boss is in the office, and get things done my way!
