Corporate Malfeasance, by Gina Harris

In many ways, it is merely luck that I am alive and director of human resources.

Everything is due to my vacation. The timing was most important. True, I was unusually exhausted before I left, but the vacation schedule had been set long before I started sliding downhill, so I can’t take any credit for that. It was also important that the vacation I chose was relaxing and refreshing, but as a single apartment-dweller, that was the most likely option.

Most of my coworkers spent vacations chasing kids or catching up on home improvement tasks. These are worthy accomplishments, but you may return in worse shape than when you left. I spent two weeks reading, lying on the beach, and basically just resting up. When I returned to work I found out there had been three heart attacks during my absence, one fatal, and everyone looked very sickly. I mean, more so than usual.

We’d had cardiac incidents before, but usually more spread out over the course of a year. When you stick two hundred data entry clerks and programmers in a concrete, fluorescent-lit box with candy and soda machines in every corner, it just kind of happens. Of course people look bulgy and pasty. Of course they tend to get listless in the afternoon. Of course they age prematurely. Somehow this time was worse.

So there I was, feeling fully alive and standing among the sitting and typing dead. With my mind alert for once, I was disturbed by the image, and curious about it as well. I had to know what was happening. I began to look around, hoping to solve the mystery before I became a casualty of it.

The first thing I noticed was that upper management all had a healthy glow. This was odd. One would expect managers to face higher pressure, and show a higher toll from stress. They seemed cheerful, well rested, and highly nourished. The only people who seemed to match them at all were a couple of IT guys running around doing system diagnostics.

That was the other thing that was odd. They stated there were some serious performance issues that they needed to resolve, and they were working very hard to do it, but no one was experiencing any computer problems. The network was running fast, the database was stable, and no individuals were experiencing system problems. Also, it seemed like a lot of the things that they were checking were not actually computer-related.

That night I stayed late, catching up on two weeks worth of e-mail. As the building slowly emptied, I could not stop thinking about the lower level of the building. There was one door leading down to the basement (conveniently near my desk), and the two IT guys had been going in and out of it all day. That in itself would not be unusual; all the backup servers and mainframes and such were supposed to be down there. However, the three upper managers had also spent a lot of time down there. As I thought about it, it occurred to me that I had seen the managers go down there almost every day, while no one else ever did. And the regular IT guy, who took care of minor PC and network repairs had never gone down there, at least not that I had seen. In light of this, though I was scared, I had to check it out. I was already feeling my energy level sinking to pre-vacation levels, and it was happening far too fast.

Down I went, first there was a very normal, concrete flight of stairs, then a non-descript metal door which I thought would be locked, yet was not. Tentatively I pulled open the door, and saw no mainframes, no servers, just a bank of video cameras and a distillery.

When I say a distillery, that does not give the full impression. There were various tubes and hoses leading down from the ceiling. Can you imagine a pale liquid light? That was being sucked through them into a large glass globe. Steam from a copper boiler to the side was being introduced into the globe, forcing the liquid down a narrow neck into a smaller tub. One side of the tub had a tube that was apparently used for filling the nearby bottles, and on the other side was a tap. I saw our senior manager fill a mug and drain it with great satisfaction. He smacked his lips and gave an “Ah!” of refreshment, and then he turned around and saw me.

“Well, this is awkward,” he said.

I could have reacted to that, I suppose, but my attention was caught by the video monitors. They showed different areas of the work floor, and underneath the photo image each screen showed the names of the employees who worked in that area. Each name had a human shaped meter, and below the row of meters was the label “Life Force Remaining”. Higgins was the fatal heart attack from last week, and his meter was all black.

“You’re sucking the life out of us!” I exclaimed in disbelief.

My manager ducked his head sheepishly. I guess I had expected some argument or denial, but nothing.

“Well,” I struggled to find the words, “you shouldn’t.” Even I thought it sounded lame.

“You think other companies don’t?”

“Not this literally.”

He shrugged, disturbingly calm. “So what are you going to do about it?”

“I guess I should try and stop you.”

“That’s not very likely.”

I struggled for a rebuttal. If this was an action movie I would have to blow the place up, but even if I had access to powerful explosives, I would probably get arrested, and then locked up as insane when I tried to explain my actions.

“I’m quitting!”

“In this job market?”

“And I would be abandoning everyone else.”

“Do you really even care about your coworkers that much?”

He had me there. Most of them were unobjectionable enough, but we were not a tight-knit bunch, and I had homicidal fantasies about Elliott in the next cube almost daily. Still, it should not have been this difficult to hang on to the moral high ground in an argument against corporate vampirism.

“Allow me to show you some studies. We keep a careful eye on industry benchmarks, and I think you’ll see that our mortality rate is significantly below the standard.”

He then showed me several pages of charts. For the technology sector, it was apparently safer to work at our company than six of the top ten companies. The only reason things had gotten so bad lately was that the energy drain had started leaking, and extracting more than the usual amount. That was the problem IT had been investigating, but things were expected to return to normal next week, leaving my employer less deadly than 270 of the Fortune 500 companies.

“In fact, every five years spent at (a well-known company) takes one year off the average lifespan, whereas you need to spend seven years here for the same effect. I admit we’re far from equal with companies in the athletic apparel industries, but this seems to be due to a more active employee lifestyle, which we don’t believe we would be able to successfully encourage.”

He had a point there.

Plus our benefits are significantly better than half of these companies. You know we have excellent medical, dental, and retirement plans.”

“Do people live to use the retirement?”

“Sometimes.”

I was not comfortable with this, but I was losing the fight.

“I am going to have to take my chances elsewhere.”

“We’ll give you a raise.”

“How much?”

“I’ll raise you to $70,000 a year.”

“Plus an extra week of vacation.”

“Done.”

And so it seemed that I could do more good within the organization than without it. Ultimately, we agreed that the best way to overcome the current crisis was a complete reorganization. Lay-offs were announced and the weakest were let go. Our two surviving coronaries got generous severance packages, and a suggestion to follow their doctors’ advice about working towards a healthier lifestyle.

Naturally the reduced workforce did not last long. We completely refigured and retooled. We took away the retirement plan, and downgraded the medical and dental. Instead, we went with higher pay, discount gym memberships, and scholarships. That way, people came, but they didn’t stay long-term. When we started recruiting again it was with an emphasis on students saving up for college.

They had a tendency to be younger and stronger, as well as less concerned about benefits, and they would usually move on before we used them up. The less ambitious ones would often stay on at their own peril. We tried to discourage it, but I guess there is a point to survival of the fittest. Should I have felt guilty when Elliott slumped over one day? Perhaps, but I had called 911 right away and what more can you do?

You see, the emphasis had been all wrong. With the comfortable, non-stimulating environment, management had been working towards retention of a docile herd. Production was steadily, but generally declining. I recommended the changes for the sake of the producers, but it turned out to be more efficient for the consumers as well. The younger, livelier stock produced at significantly higher levels, and at much lower cost, and then they would rotate out before they died. Sure, they might end up in another soul-killing job, but we were giving them a fighting chance and profits were up. Sometimes you are rewarded for doing the less wrong thing.

Now, I know what you’re thinking, and I can’t blame you. I was had the same thoughts myself. So I did try it, just once. It’s most similar to Mountain Dew, but more effervescent.