Malcontent

July 30, 2009

I had my doubts about Bling the first time I saw him. He’d arrived with two other Americans who were supposed to relieve some of our burden. Maxx and Dawg and I had all been holding the place together while everyone else was either playing on R&R or recovering from their various illnesses. Bling came in with the usual telltale signs, gold front teeth, gold chains and oversized black shirt and trousers. Everything about him screamed “attitude” but I’ve learned not to always trust my first impressions and so I thought I’d observe him for a while before passing my final judgment.

He came to us as a brand new employee, fresh from the States, who was looking for a chance to say that he’d been overseas for the first time in his life. He’d been working on oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico and had decided that he could get a job working for KBR and earn better money.

He wasn’t a man who liked to avoid conflict. In fact, he seemed to seek it out, right from the beginning. He’d learned that it was all right to use intimidation and bullying to get his way. “Man, I got a bone to pick!” he said to Maxx one evening after the shift change. “I’m workin’ overtime here and I’m not getting paid for it!” Maxx looked at him with disbelief on his face. “How are you working overtime?” Bling was ready for this fight. “Man, I work my twelve hours every day and when it’s time to leave there’s always somethin’ goin’ on that I have to stay for. I ought to get paid for every minute that I work past my regular hours.” “If you’re putting in less than fifteen minutes beyond your time, you don’t get paid for it. Besides, overtime needs to be approved ahead of time.” “This place is encroaching on my personal time. I need to go to the gym each night to work out.” Maxx was soft in his reply, but he was absolutely firm. “You’re not here to work out at the gym. You’re here to work for the military. That mission comes first and if there’s something that blocks you from your ‘personal time’ each evening, then you need to get over it. You won’t ever be paid for every minute of overtime. This is a war zone. Don’t forget that.”

Bling didn’t get over it. Someone had told him that KBR stood for “Kick back and relax” and he didn’t like the idea that this wasn’t going to be a cush job.

I watched him for those first few weeks of work and his attitude was always just a little bit over the top. “Man, I’m watchin’ those guys to make sure they’re doin’ what they’re s’posed to be doin’.” I watched him to see what his idea of ‘watchin’ those guys’ was. He’d sit inside of his air-conditioned pickup truck and read books with an occasional glance at the operation. His frequent gripes about how poorly the drivers were doing began to have its effect on the drivers’ attitudes. I never heard any encouragement come out of his mouth. I never heard him say, “You guys did a good job out there today.” He just seemed bent on crushing their spirits so that they’d be as miserable as he was.

He wasn’t worried about making a connection with the drivers and it was obvious that he didn’t really care about doing his job. He just wanted to collect his pay at the end of the month with a minimum of personal effort.

Maxx had just left on his three week R&R leaving me in charge of the day shift administrative duties. I was to fill in for Maxx. I was to make my observations while he was gone and one of my first was focused on Bling. I drove by the Tank Wash one afternoon and noticed that all of the employees were sitting outside in the heat. Bling’s pickup truck was parked in front of the office and so I decided to stop in and check up on the guys. They all stood when they saw me coming and they all had huge smiles on their faces when they realized that it was me. I parked the truck and stepped out. “Where’s Bling?” I asked. The coordinator nodded toward the closed office door and so I moved toward it. As I pulled the door open, Bling’s head jerked up and his eyes jumped from his lap to full alert. “Did you tell these guys that they couldn’t sit in the office?” I queried. It was my first question since the heat outside was unbearable and I couldn’t imagine anyone making a conscious decision to sit outside while a nice air-conditioned office sat nearly unoccupied. “No, man, I didn’t tell ‘em nothin’! They just chose to sit outside.” “All right, then.”

I told the coordinator that the office was there for them to stay cool in the heat of the day and that they were welcome to go inside. The coordinator nodded, but I could see that there was an unspoken conflict somewhere in what I’d just told him.

Back at the office a little later, Lumpy and Grumpy were sitting at their desks holding a little conference between foremen. Bling walked in because it was time for him to finish up his day. I wanted to make a point, but at the same time I didn’t want to raise tensions and so I decided to make Bling the subject of a hard time. “You guys need to keep an eye on Bling,” I commented with a smile on my face. “I opened the door at the Tank Wash this afternoon and his head popped up from a nap.” Bling jumped right on it with a full frontal attitude. “Man, you think I was sleepin’? I don’t sleep on the job! I was playin’ a video game! You didn’t see the game in my hands? And what was that thing about tellin’ the guys that they couldn’t sit in the office!” The conversation had just become unproductive. “Bling, I was just giving you a hard time. As far as the question goes, it’s based on my past experience because of someone who used to lock the employees out of the office while he sat inside and read.” Bling retaliated once more to make sure that I got the point. “I don’t sleep on the job, man! I was playin’ a video game!” I don’t know whether he realized it or not, but it was the wrong thing to admit. I walked out of the office. I thought to myself that if Jim-E had given Bling the same hard time, it would have been funny. It was undeniable that Bling looked at me and Jim-E with different eyes.

Grumpy followed me outside. “Lumpy and I heard what went on in there. If you want us to write statements, we will.” I gave it a moment’s thought. “No, that’s all right. I can talk to Bling about it. I don’t see any major harm and I don’t think we need to bring H.R. into the equation.” I regret that answer. I wish now that I’d had them write their statements.

Bling seemed to be out of control a few days later on June 6^th when one of our bus drivers, Lalith, came through the office door in tears. “What’s going on, Lalith?” He stood there at my desk and sobbed, “Sir, Mr. Bling not like me. He telling me I go home. You like my father but Mr. Bling yelling at me, tell me I going home.” I was wondering what had really happened because of the language barrier, but I felt like the truth was there in Lalith’s eyes. “Bling was yelling at you?” “Yes, sir.” “What was he yelling about?” I inquired. “Sir, bus stop very bumpy. Bus rocks this way and that way when I drive in. Mr. Bling tell me I speeding but I not speed. Bus not good. Bus rocks when I drive slow.” I tried to give him some consolation. “It’s all right, Lalith. I’ll have a talk with Bling.”

Bling walked through the door just minutes later. “I just had a driver come to me in tears because you were yelling at him.” The attitude came back with full force. “Man, that’s bull sh__! I didn’t yell at him!” “Bling, I’m not trying to place blame here, I’m just trying to understand what happened to make him so upset.” Bling grew slightly quiet. “He was speeding through the bus hub. His bus was rockin’ back and forth until I thought he was going to tip it over.” “Did you drive the bus to see if the problem was mechanical?” “Naw, man. He was speedin’.” It was obvious that Lalith was terribly upset when he stepped into the office and I knew that there was more to the story that Bling didn’t want to admit.

I followed up that evening by driving Lalith’s bus through the bus stop. He was right. No matter how slowly I drove the bus, it rocked violently back and forth. A terrible grinding noise was coming from the passenger side front suspension as it rocked. The bus needed to go to Maintenance for a check up. I thought it might be well for Bling to go somewhere for a checkup, too.

Five days later, on June 11^th, Aslam complained that Bling had ordered him to remain in the office during the day and that he was not to go out inspecting the Porta-Johns. I was surprised by the complaint because Bling didn’t have any authority to work with either the Porta-Johns or the office staff but Bling had arrived at the conclusion that he was now in charge. “I’m sorry, Aslam. I’ll talk to Bling about the situation and I’ll let him know that it’s a part of your job to check P.J.’s during the day.” I sent Bling a kind e-mail explaining that Maxx and I had given Aslam the responsibility to inspect a number of Porta-Johns each day so that we could spread the work out between those of us who had been given the responsibility and inspect about 180 every day. There was no response to the letter and Bling didn’t bother Aslam again about it.

The next morning, though, Bling attempted to pull another member of the office staff off of his appointed duties to have him clean buses at the main bus stop. On June 12^th the temperature was 103 degrees in Tal Afar and cleaning the buses would have been like working inside an oven. Again, I talked to Bling about pulling people off of their regular duties. Again, there was no response, but there were no more attempts to pull people from their regular work. Bling had become quiet.