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[This is sort of a rambling memoir of my formative early 20's.  For Part I,go here, for part II go here]

My first “real” day at bank one in Heath was unspectacular.  I’d been waiting for the bank to open, and the tellers opened the bank pretty quickly.  My boss had nearly perfect local bank manager comportment.  Everything was right, from an uncreased copy of a new management book on his desk, to his dapper blue suits.  He was aware of some of the ’stir’ I’d caused, but not al of it.  I was fresh from training–where we had 4 or 5 days of sitting around and reading print outs of power point presentations in a stifling room as someone worked the phones selling her Mary Kay Products with zeal.  Since I’m at least an average reader, I was able to handle 100 pages of 24 point type in less than an hour.  This gave me 7 hours to kill.  My mind went wandering during this time.  I didn’t know that my actions had caused me to be earmarked prematurely, and that people weren’t really hankering for the change that Jamie Dimon talked about.

When I got to the bank–more of the same.  People spoke to me like I was four.  Condescending comments like “you’ll learn,” while simultaneously withholding any useful or  actionable information.    I had a storied (and apparently porn-loving, judging by the computer’s cache) predecessor that had made his way to a closer in suburb of Columbus.  I also learned that there was a girl that had wanted my job, but apparently had not passed her Series 6 licensure test.  For all of the financial services professional licensing tests, if you are literate and have a cursory glance at the material, you will pass.  Unless you’re an idiot that is better suited to operating some type of “register” device. 

The staff consisted of–I think–9 women, the male manager, and me.  There was a crazy Mormon “team leader” that had the mind and mannerisms like Tom Hanks from “Big,” who came in two or three times a week.  His name was Michael Orlando, and is the only person I’ll mention by name her on the blog.  His tenure was only about 10 days longer than mine at the bank.  There was an assistant manager who was a pretty, sturdy, good person for the most part.  A perfect assistant.  She was the boss of the tellers. 

My district manager was in about once every week, and he seemed to be a good guy that trusted my manager.  I met him at the grocery store after the fact and he said hello, more cordial and friendly than necessary.  This was after my team leader’s tenure had ended, and I think he put two and two together a little bit.  My team leader got me fired by having a tantrum worthy of an infant in the middle of a bank.  To this day, I’ve not seen a greater display of immaturity, and I am still clueless as to why it did not work.  I almost sued him for assault, because I believed that he was about to hit me.  Others did too. 

At the training center, I was allowed to dress business casual.  At the bank itself, I had to wear a suit.  Since waiting tables doesn’t lend itself to liquidity, I bought some suits second hand.  They had the second hand vibe to them, but I wasn’t going to open up a credit card to buy a wardrobe.  Besides, I was in a rural part of Columbus, so it wasn’t as if people were going to parse what I was wearing. 

The first day on the job, one of the young women (ah, they were mostly single moms, mid 20’s) interrupted some instructions from my counterpart (the person that also had my job, and had picked through my clients), and said: 

“Hi, Chris, I’m [redacted].”

“Hi, [redacted] how are you.”

“Well, I wanted to let you know that I have attitude, and I won’t be taking any crap.”  She was being both ‘jocular,’ and serious.  She wanted to establish a pecking order, but she wanted to do it in some way that was not hyper serious.  This was how she introduced herself.  I cocked my head, and I said,

“[redacted], is that a threat? “

“What do you mean?”

“I asked you a specific question–is that a threat?  I take threats very seriously, and I can’t see any other way of interpreting what you said.”

She was silent, and my counterpart said, “I think he’s serious.”  She turned on her heel and was apparently crying.  At least that’s what the Assistant Manager had said.  (The assistant manager was the lord over all of the processors.)

Attitude, Indeed.

Having made the staff of the bank an enemy as well as the folks at corporate, I was well on my way.  I was afforded some latitude to do my job, so when the actual selling part started, I did pretty well.  Even though the incentive plan was miserly and typical of regional superbanks, I was excited by it.  $32,000 AND i got to get a check for $500-1000 once a month?  Hell yes.   When I wasn’t selling, I was calculating and recalculating my bonus plan.  $20 for a business checking account, etc. The selling part was straight forward an non subjective.  I sold.

Being 25 at the time, I wasn’t blessed with the judgement I have now, 7 years later.  So I would telemarket (pre DoNotCall), and say, “Hi, this is Chris Johnson from Bank One, I need you to call me back regarding your account right away,” on people’s work voice mail.  This worked marvelously, and when I informed them that no, their money wasn’t stolen, they were so relieved that they would be very compliant towards my sales pitches.  This got me to sell a ton of loans.  About 3 times what the plan was. 

Still–I craved the approbation of the mothers of the bastard children that worked at the bank, and was sad that I didn’t have a lunch buddy.  I tried to befriend the people, but when Survivor is the pinnacle of what they can understand, and I am an odd for not owning a TV, there was nothing doing in that department.  The bank manager was wiser than me and didn’t even begin to fight that battle.   Not until the degenerates bound together and decided to make some sort of apparent complaint on his managerial style.  Les Miserables, Indeed.

Another bit of instructions that we were to make was regarding some IRS reporting rules, and structured transactions.  Any time someone was to get more than $10,000 in cash, they were to be reported to the IRS.  Likewise, if someone was structuring their transactions to avoid this, that activity had to be reported to the IRS.   So when my company had repeated requests from the same person for $9,900 bucks (they had it in their account), I was curious.  I asked–without hostility, “How is this not a structured transaction.”  What I was aiming to know was how this didn’t need to be reported, who approved it, and what to do if I was in this situation. 

This question was taboo.  Something like questioning the veracity of Kim Jung Il’s golf game.  I wasn’t questioning anyone’s integrity, it was in fact, a procedural question. My last sort of ally at the bank was gone.  The manager knew that there were some ‘issues’ with me, but regarded me with cautious optimism.  The news of me exceeding my plan by 50% in the first month, as well as the news of my complaints to corporate hit at the same time.

So I’d: made some single mom cry, peed all over bank one, and sold a lot of stuff.  My demise would come swiftly.  While on paper, it was a plausible resignation, in reality it wasn’t my choice.  At the time, I was too obtuse to know that this isn’t the way you do it.

Presumably Related Posts:

• Pretty Girls, Jamie Dimon, and More (Part II)
• Jamie Dimon, Pretty Girls, And The Days Before
• 5am will come early.