The Ascendant

Chapter Nineteen

All in all it’s been a most confusing week and I had to familiarise myself with my job description before arriving at work on Monday morning. What I was not prepared for were the different personalities and scenarios which I have so far encountered, not to mention the different representations of how my job should be done.

In terms of the management, Hobbs has not been as overbearing or intimidating as I might have expected such a senior executive to be, but he seems sharp and clever and is probably playing his cards close to his chest. I have no doubt he has a ruthless streak and I can’t expect any favours from him if I don't display some initiative and a good understanding of what is expected of me. The trouble is, I can’t display one without the other, and it's an understanding of how to perform my role which I find most confusing of all.

Mike’s approach of doing the barest minimum amount of work he can get away with, but doing it well, is commendable in its own way but he knows the job inside out so I can hardly follow his example.

Rob on the other hand has been a picture of honest toil, misery and stress, working through the night for little recognition or thanks, and too polite to make an issue of it. Rob’s problem is that while Mike makes everything look so easy, Hobbs can barely be interested in Rob’s plight: he’s being paid handsomely, and the company obviously expect a return on their investment. I assume he gets through his workload and produces the results eventually, but as Mike says, at what cost to Rob?

Angela seems to adopt some of Mike’s philosophies whilst applying a greater degree of professionalism, outwardly at least. I haven’t yet seen her methods out in the field but I get the impression from her telephone technique that she likes to keep everything under control. Well organised and highly presentable in every way, Angela has been the person who has impressed me the most of all this week.

I am yet to meet David Govender, who runs the Surrey and Kent regions but judging by Hobbs’ tone whenever he refers to David, I get the impression he is very well thought of. It will be interesting to see if he has any tips or pointers for me if and when we ever meet.

In terms of the contractors, for the time being I think I shall take Hobbs’ view on the matter: they work for us, and so it is up to them to worry about what we think of them and not the other way around. I have far too much on my mind as it is, without worrying about aggressive, servile or downright dodgy businessmen with their own greedy agendas.

Hobbs has already started setting me tasks of my own, and things are only likely to get more complex and strained from this point on. I sense he is upping the ante to ascertain whether I will make the grade or not. This morning he gave me a confusing set of figures together with a sample template, and asked me to produce ‘some analytical number crunching,’ to gauge my progress so far.

Thankfully Angela was on hand to provide me with some invaluable tips as to what I should be looking out for: cost trends, any alteration in the duration of average claims, number of claims where costs exceeded estimates, that sort of thing. Money and time are the key issues. I tried not to ask her too many questions, and maximised my fairly limited knowledge of spreadsheets to ensure that whatever the quality of information I actually presented Hobbs, it looked good.

I have to say Hobbs didn’t look as impressed as I thought he might have done, but he is a very busy man, and he told me he would take a proper look at it before coming back to me on Monday morning. In that respect it’s just like being back at school, except the rewards are much greater and it’s far easier to get thrown out. I fear that possibility may become painfully real at some point next week.

Thinking positively however, I have survived a full week, so my adventure in the highest tax bracket will continue for at least another few days, including the weekend of course.

And that, in my new life of mostly calculated risks, has to be cause for celebration.