Seumas MacManus
Henry, a PC support specialist three months out of work, agonized. He called the bank and, mentioning no names, explained his situation. No help. They liked his background but had more people to see, should they remove his name from consideration? No, he told them, to keep his options open.
"A bird in the hand...," Henry finally decided, and took the job with the law firm starting the following week. All the department heads gave him a welcoming lunch.
At the beginning of his second week, however, the investment bank asked to see him again. He made a lunch-hour appointment and stepped across Broad Street in downtown Manhattan to the bank's offices. He didn't mention that he'd taken another job.
A week later, the bank offered him their job and he agonized again. What to do? Three weeks at the law firm, a commitment here, how will it look on my resume? I can leave it off. Can I get them to bid against each other? No, I might lose both jobs.
He opted for the bank's higher salary and accepted their offer, to start the next day.
Henry waited until after hours to catch the law firm's administrative partner alone and explain that he was resigning and why. Unfortunately, the partner had, for once, left on time.
Another quandary! Start there tomorrow; resign here tonight, but nobody to talk to. The glow from the PC monitor caught his eye, and he decided to type his resignation letter on the partner's PC, explaining how important the extra money at the bank would be to his family. The printer was out of paper, and worrying that someone would ask what he was doing in a partner's office at that hour, he just left the letter on the screen where the partner was sure to notice it.
But the partner was out at meetings all the next day, and everybody else just assumed Henry was ill and hadn't called in.
Only at 7 pm when the partner returned did he find Henry's resignation letter. He was furious. "Didn't have the guts to tell me himself!" the partner raged. "Worked for us for pocket money while he looked for something better!"
He picked up the telephone and dialed the investment bank's managing director...at home, without looking up the number.
"Seymour, how are you? Good, Frances and the boys, too? Wonderful Look, Seymour, I'm sorry to call you at this hour, but I wanted you to know about one of your new employees...."
Henry was shocked when the bank's personnel director told him the next day that certain cuts had to be made to trim expenses, and he was being laid off. He'd get three weeks' severance, of course, even though he'd only been there two days.
Henry learned too late that the bank was the law firm's largest client - for the past 60 years. Ironically, his three-week pay checks from the law firm and the bank arrived in the same mail. After deductions, the net was almost the same.
