You're Fired

They say what goes around comes around.

Leah Donavan entered the conference room, coffee cup in hand and tablet at the ready. It was her time to prove that the company had picked the right girl for the expansion project. She sat her cup down and loaded the slide show onto the screen, or she tried to. Not only would her tablet not connect to the flat screen, it wouldn’t turn on. Leah took a deep breath and turned to her colleagues and Mr. Francis. She was prepared to give the presentation without her usual visual aid. She was about to request a white board when her boss asked what the problem was. It was technical difficulties. But she could still draw the charts on a white board. Her boss wasn’t having it. Mr. Francis said that she should have checked the connection at least two hours before the meeting. The problem with that was that the office wasn’t open two hours prior. And Leah had checked the connection the night before�"it worked fine. Before she could apologize further, Mr. Francis spoke up. “You’re fired,” he said, “Pack your things and go.”

 

Mr. Francis stared at the wall of his cubicle, still not accustomed to not being the CEO of a Fortune 500 company. As he picked at a spot on his tie, he wondered why his company bottomed out. Frankly, he blamed it on that lazy assistant of his�"Leah something. He was halfway through brooding over his loss of fortune when he was summoned to the CEO’s office. He’d never met the owner of the new company, but had heard many great things about him. Mr. Francis almost fancied getting a promotion with his background. When he reached the office door, it opened to reveal the receptionist carrying a stack of papers. She told him that Mrs. Donavan was waiting for him. He thought the woman meant to say Mr. Donavan. He was wrong. When he entered the office, he saw a tall, blonde woman in her early thirties standing at the window�"almost twenty years younger than he. She turned to speak to him and explained that she reviewed the reports of every employee each month. Mr. Francis’s performance was well below average. Leah Donavan interrupted him as Mr. Francis tried to explain why his performance was lacking. “You’re fired,” she said, “Pack your things and go.”