Someone called me a S.O.B. the other day and no, he didn’t use the abbreviation. Believe it or not (and if you’ve worked in the staffing industry for any length of time at all, you’ll believe it), I didn’t do or say anything to merit such harsh words, except maybe to pick up the phone and ask the ‘gentleman’ to kindly not contact us again after he had already verbally abused one of our female staffers.

Crazily enough, it all started when he called looking for work. Apparently expecting a “Come on in sir, just because we’re turned on by the forcefully demanding sound of your voice as you dictate to us the job you want and when you will start, we’ll put you on a job right away!” this would-be employee proceeded to harass, harangue, and yes, cuss, our staffer until she was near tears. When she finally escalated it to me, before our ‘conversation’ ended I not only got the honor of being called one abbreviation (what’s up with these people and abbreviations anyway?), but two – S.O.B and P.O.S. And yes, he sounded those bad boys out.

Nice.

Maybe in his world this guy honestly thinks that when the next assembly job comes up I’ll say, “You know, we should really call that guy who called my mother a b_____ – that was funny,” but in most normal people’s worlds, that dog (female or not) just won’t hunt (see what I did there?).

The sad thing is, in my various staffing industry roles as staffer and now as manager, this isn’t the first time I’ve been talked to this way, and I’m sure it won’t be the last. I can understand, to some degree, someone being aggravated over, say, a payroll issue, and letting one slip through unguarded. But when someone wants something from us, nay NEEDS (apparently) something from us and STILL treats us this way, could it be indicative of deeper personal, or even societal problems?

It’s doubtless been happening for a long time, but it seems like the have-it-all-right-now, spoiled-brat, welfare-state mentality is spreading into the employment world at an alarming pace.

Do people really think they can get what they want by being jerks?

I don’t know what they are thinking. Maybe they’ve gotten what they want all their lives from their mommas, from their teachers, and even from the government, but I can tell you one thing for certain – they are NOT getting what they want from me. Besides, if they treat US this way, how will they treat our clients?

There, I feel better now. 🙂