Flirting with the HR Girl

Chapter 13

The next morning, Jennifer arrived at work early again hoping to get ahead of her paperwork before her new hires started flooding in. She knew that Cynthia would be in the office that morning because she had emailed Jennifer five times overnight about her plans for the sexual harassment training on Monday. Cynthia wanted to have everything in place before Todd even got a chance to look at it. That way she could go above him to his director and her director to get the training approved. Jennifer shut her door, began to work, and didn't notice that she almost missed the morning meeting until someone was loudly pounding on the door. She jumped up to find Ralph the shoe manager looking annoyed that he had to come get her.

"Manager meeting," was all he said. Jennifer grabbed an opening report off the desk. The meeting was small because the one-day sale didn't start until Friday that week. Malorie was the only other manager there with Ralph. Todd looked like hell. He must've stayed out for more than wings the night before. Austin wasn't there. According to the schedule posted on the wall, he was closing. She was a little relieved that when he got to the store Cynthia would already be there and Jennifer would be too busy to spend any time with him. After a good night's rest, she decided she was making too much of Austin's attention towards her. He was just a nice guy. He didn't really have a thing for her, and she needed to get her thing for him under control.

"Jenny, how are we doing on openings?" Todd asked not bothering to get up from behind his worn desk.

"Since yesterday, we have filled one," she said internally rolling her eyes at the idea that the openings report would change that much in one day. But she decided to take mercy on the managers sitting next to her and make things sound more optimistic if only to get Todd off their backs. "But a lot of managers have calls out and interviews this weekend so I think they will all be filled by Monday."

"Awesome!" Todd said with a fist pump.

If Jennifer had known lying to him would make him so happy, she would have started months ago. She spaced out through the rest of the meeting on yesterday's sales and credit numbers. Selena was also closing so Jennifer wouldn't get roped into going down to the morning meeting. As soon as Todd stood up, she went back to her office and closed the door again. Her first new hire was in half an hour, and she needed to get Cynthia's training information gathered up before then. Her morning went by quickly and before Jennifer knew it, she had two new hires signed up for orientation next week and Cynthia was rolling her suitcase down the hall. Her boss was barking orders at Blanche. Jennifer looked at the clock and decided it was time to get out of the office. She moved to give Cynthia the desk and reached for her jacket.

"And just where do you think you're off to?" Cynthia asked as she hung up her own jacket and pulled her laptop out of her rolling briefcase. "We have plenty of work to do before I can present this to my boss, and I need you here now."

Deflated, Jennifer hung her jacket back up next to Cynthia's and slid in across the desk. She watched her boss pull out stacks of folders all labeled with different trainings for sexual harassment. As they went through the stack, it dawned on Jennifer that this might be taking up her weekend. Not that she had a major weekend on the books anyway. Other than taking Zach Morris to the vet, she had planned on relaxing and resting up for the busy season. But now she knew she would be typing up itineraries and training documents.

"I have the outline on the desktop for you in the folder marked SHT," Jennifer said keeping it simple for Cynthia. Computers weren't her boss's thing. "The info I pulled from the corporate documents is in there and I think you should be good to present it to Valerie."

"Yes, but now I have learned that we are changing the corporate policy and they want to make sure we have the new one from New York before we start the training on Monday," Cynthia said not even bothering to click on the desktop folder. "So, we're going to have to redo the entire thing today and tomorrow. You don't have to work over the weekend because we are still in no overtime."

"Great." Jennifer sat down across from Cynthia and felt her eyes glaze over.

About an hour later, there was a brief knock on the door before it swung open. Only Todd had the audacity to open the HR office without an invitation. He sauntered in, shutting the door behind him. He looked from Jennifer to Cynthia before apparently deciding it was acceptable for the assistant to stay.

"What's this I hear about new sexual harassment training for managers on Monday?" Todd asked leaning against the wall casually even though Jennifer could see his fingers fidgeting. It was something he did when he was agitated. Across the desk, Cynthia slid her red bifocals down her nose.

"Yes, Todd, I told you we would be doing new training this fall and corporate has decided that this store should be the first one in the Midwest region to do it," Cynthia said, carefully not giving away how she felt about the training one way or the other.

"You want to conduct manager training on a Monday less than a month before Thanksgiving?" Todd asked his arms flying out at his sides. "I need my managers on the floor. Getting ready for Black Friday and the holiday season!"

"A month is plenty of time to get ready for Black Friday." Cynthia didn't play the sales are more important than HR game. In most Peterson's stores, the HR manager was only there to file paperwork or tell someone when they smelled bad. They weren't considered important to the store. Sales were above all else. Cynthia did not take that approach to HR. Jennifer didn't know if it was because Cynthia didn't need the job, or if her boss loved a challenge, but Cynthia did not back down. "This is important training for this store and what they've been through the last three months."

"What they've been through?" Todd's voice went up and Jennifer knew that she should have tried to escape when he first came in. "They haven't been through anything. We lost the best menswear manager in the Midwest region all because some girls didn't like the way he talked to them. If you're going to work retail, you need to toughen up. Can you give them that training?"

"They already have that training from you, Todd," Cynthia said removing her bifocals and setting them gently down on the desk. Jennifer had seen her boss and Todd get into it before, and while he liked to yell, she liked to be the calm one. Cynthia had to know it made him even angrier. "We simply need to state what is allowed and what is not allowed in our store. The managers will appreciate it and so will the employees. We want our internal surveys to show that we tried to change the culture after we had to let Mike go."

"We have a culture of kicking ass!" Todd said leaning over the desk. "That is the culture we need to focus on not more of that 'me too' bullshit."

"This 'me too' bullshit is what's going to take your career down if you don't watch yourself, Todd," Cynthia said the words and then immediately glanced at Jennifer as if she had forgotten she was there. She looked contrite as if she'd said too much in front of the lowly HR assistant. Jennifer quickly looked down and began to shuffle papers so that neither of them felt the need to acknowledge her. "The training will smooth things over with corporate and will show that management really cares about the associates. That you really care about the store. That can only do good things for your potential."

Todd must have been properly chastised as well because he took a step back from the desk and wandered the room for a minute. Jennifer could feel his eyes on her but noticed he went back to Cynthia, having decided not to worry about the HR girl either. He went and leaned against the wall casually, his confidence was back.

"Fine," he said crossing his arms over his chest. "You do your little training, and I will do my best to enforce the rules. I don't want any more time taken off the floor for this."

"With our new manager trained properly, I don't see us needing any more time from the sales floor," Cynthia said returning her glasses to the bridge of her nose. "Now if you let us get this training sorted out, I will be happy to share it with you for your approval before Monday."

"Fine," Todd said not looking happy that he was the one being dismissed. He looked at Jennifer and she made the mistake of making eye contact. "Why don't you just make sure that Jenny here keeps Austin out of trouble?"

And before either one of them could answer, he sauntered out the door and slammed it behind him.

Without raising her head, Cynthia said, "It is not your responsibility to babysit Austin." She snorted and went back to work. Jennifer didn't know if Cynthia considered that conversation to have gone well or not but she planned on being out of the office for the next one.