The Voting Machine

The New Assignment

"I don't understand why you're telling me all this. You're the CEO. You don't have to explain yourself to me or anyone else in this company," I asked. "Why don't you just let me go like all the others?"

"What makes you think I am going to fire you? Why would I bring you up here and take time out of my day if I was just going to let you go?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe because I was Employee of the Year. I was on the TV news with Marcus after the Roland Shavosian murder investigation. I thought maybe you wanted to handle me differently to avoid bad publicity."

Chet laughed. "I see. Well, I didn't call you here to fire you, Temo. I brought you in here for your next assignment."

I was stunned. "Really?"

"Why not? Your talents speak for themselves, Temo."

"My talents?"

"This is a world where the tribes have scattered," Chet said. "We're all uprooted. We're all wandering. But you never had a tribe to begin with, did you?"

Chet seemed to know more about me than he had ever revealed. In this way, he reminded me of Marcus, who also seemed to have easy access and insight into my past experience. They say that knowledge is power. Powerful men know how to get the information they need. Chet had taken some time to study me, the same way he studied the chimpanzees in the Congo.

"You've been wandering since the day you were born. That gives you a head start. I need people like you to take this company into the future. I need people who can thrive outside their comfort zone. And you never had a comfort zone to begin with."

"So what do you want me to do?" I asked.

"You're going to be working with Gina Hill again."

"I thought she was in India."

"She is. You're going to be working with her remotely. It shouldn't matter where you are and where she is. That's the old world mentality. This is the new world of work. I expect my employees to be able to collaborate effectively from any location on the planet. You're going to help me build the tools to make that possible."

"What kind of tools?"

"I am talking about technology. I own a software company in Bangalore. We are developing a platform called The Second World. It's an online workplace, the most comprehensive system ever created for running a multi-national corporation through cyberspace. It's going to have every feature we need: videoconferencing, chat, blogs, social networks, e-learning...we'll even have a virtual office building."

"What could I do to help a project like that?" I asked. "I am not a programmer. I don't know anything about computers."

"That's not what I need you for. You're a call center agent. You know how to convince customers to pay their credit cards. I need you to teach your new colleagues in India how to dial the deadbeats and collect their money. After all, you do it better than anyone, don't you? That's why you got Employee of the Year. I want you to develop the content for e-learning modules. The technology part is easy. You just talk into a video camera and upload the clips to the Second World. The hard part is teaching the agents how to talk with American customers; how to get the accent right, how to put them at ease, how to persuade them to pay their bills. That's what I need you for."

"So I wouldn't have to move to India?"

"Of course not. You can do it right here in LA. I know you have a wife and a young child. What's the point in moving? These e-learning videos are to train call center workers anywhere, not just India. Maybe next year it's the Philippines or Mexico. You could work from home. I am going to lease the lower floors to new tenants anyways. You'll get a company laptop and cell phone. You do your work creating the e-learning materials and check in with Gina through the Internet. She's your new boss. You'll be talking to her during our night since that's when she starts her day in India. She'll set your priorities and manage your work schedule."

After Chet finished explaining my new assignment, he sent me home while a facilities staff member cleared out my workstation in the empty call center. I was saying farewell to the Passion building, but under completely different conditions than I imagined.

As I drove down Normandie Avenue to the one-bedroom apartment I shared with my wife and daughter, I contemplated my mixed feelings about the strange turn of events. On one hand, I knew it was better than getting laid off. I knew many old colleagues from the call center were desperate and hopeless after sending out hundreds and hundreds of resumes without getting a single response.

I was being spared this fate, at least for the time being. I knew how hard it might be to find something else, even if I was the best agent in the call center, even if I was Employee of the Year. That's because call centers across LA were doing the same thing as Passion: shifting jobs out of the city to cheaper locations on the other side of the world.

I knew that if I had to go back out on the job market, employers wouldn't focus on the skills that I had, they'd focus on the things that I didn't have. I didn't have connections. I didn't have a college education. I didn't have any specialized trade or training.

So I was lucky to be able to hold on at Passion from a pocketbook perspective. That was a no brainer.

The reason I had mixed feelings is that I'd be working with Gina again. I thought she was out of my life for good. During the first month she was over there, she sent a few friendly notes from India to my personal Gmail account. I never replied. After that, she tried to friend me on my Facebook page. I didn't check Facebook that often so it took a while before I saw the invite. Even then I didn't accept it. I didn't want to be her friend on Facebook. I didn't want to get updates on her life in India.

Ever since she kissed me, I knew it was better to have her out of my life. I knew that she was a good person at heart, but she was driven by her own needs and desires. And this made her dangerous for me.

Now that I knew we'd be involved in the Second World project, I couldn't shake the premonition that she was going to bring trouble.