Note from a very frustrated secretary

[baronessekat]

Ok, I'm an Admin. Nitpick.

Backstory: My boss has known for over a month that he needed to go to Saudi Arabia this coming week for a meeting.

I've known for 3 weeks that he was going (though not when) because I had to arrange for his travel visa.

Last week I asked him when his meeting was and he said "March 12th is my meeting. I suppose we should start getting the flight together". No kidding! Dude - International flights to middle east needing connecting flights. Yeah... let me have lead time to work on this.

He tells me dates to book flights. I get flight options. Present them. He tells me to book. I book. Then a day later after booking he says "Oh, we've added a side trip from Riyadh to Jeddah. I need you to look into adding a round trip flight on X day".

I inform him that this will require then changing his flights home. But he says look into the side trip.

I do.

Then he decides since he's in the area, he wants to go do a pilgrimage. This will really throw off the return home. But I start looking into it.

THEN while he's there, maybe he will just take the weekend and run to Pakistan to visit family.

Somehow I pulled it all out of my backside (though he does have to make one ticket change once he gets to Saudi as it was past the deadline for over phone/online changes).

He was supposed to fly to JFK today at 5:05pm. Well, at 9:45pm I get a call from him. HE's still at the Buffalo airport. He did get his international flight changed but needs to get to JFK and Jetblue was sold out. Could I go on line and see if I could find any other flights for him. (I would have just started hitting all the ticket counters there at the airport if I had been in his shoes but what do I know). No dice.

Could I call the car rentals to find out if there is something available for him to rent to get to NYC. (Again, I would have walked to the counters myself rather than call and disturb my secretary on a saturday but that's me).

I find one, I reserve it in his name and call him back and say "Walk down to Hertz. It will cost you X. but you can pick it up now, and return it to JFK when you get in".

Maybe I'm too independent. Maybe I tend to tackle a problem like being stuck at an airport in "OK, what are my options that I can handle myself" attitude. NOt to mention the whole I like to have everything planned, booked and confirmed weeks if not months in advance if I can help it. But still...

Really man, you are at the bloody airport where you could look someone in the face to achieve something where I had to make 15 phone calls.

I just need to say now... please Powers that Be, let the man get to Riyadh for his meeting without any other issues. I'd love if you could ensure the rest of his travels run smoothly and without incident so I don't have to drag myself out of a nice warm bed, where i was snuggling my puppy and reading a book to try to make phone calls again. Thank you

EDIT After all that, he managed to get himself on a flight on standby. *sigh*

Comments

[pafirecub.livejournal.com]

Sigh - you are too good to him. when my boss calls me at home on a sat he usually gets something like "mraaa whaddayawant" and he has called me at home before and gotten exactly that.

[baronessekat.livejournal.com]

Oh he got that this morning when he called at 8:45am (which was still 7:45 by my clock since I had not changed it) to ask me to verify that all his flights were counted towards his frequent flier miles.

I sighed loudly in the phone and told him that in the notebook I gave him he had all the phone number to the airlines and the booking confirmation numbers AND his frequent flier numbers. I did not have that information.

He actually asked why I didn't write that stuff down before I gave it all to him. I said I did. It's in a folder on my desk at work and I did not have that info here at home.

He paused then said "Oh, I'm sorry, I thought it was Monday. Could you look into it when you get into the office on tomorrow then?"

Yeah, waking me up on a Sunday to ask something stupid like that went over real well in my world.

[ladyren.livejournal.com]

Oh wow...BIG hugs!

[meirwen.livejournal.com]

Sigh.
Sweetie--Riyadh. Pakistan. Get it???

He is a man from a certain culture. You have been hired by this man. He has certain expectations. They resemble the expectations of the men in Ad Men more than your usual 21st century man. You may have to decide whether he is worth working for, expectations and all, or whether you need to go somewhere else. Don't expect to change him.

[baronessekat.livejournal.com]

Oh I do understand that it is a cultural thing. I was more griping about it because I had spent a good chunk of yesterday shoveling so was tired and had literally just crawled into bed and was almost asleep when he called from the airport so I was cranky and venting. My boss did apologize to me this morning and thanked me for the sudden pinch hitting which did help a lot.

I also wouldn't have been annoyed as much if my office mate, who used to do my Boss' travel arrangements had given me a heads up that this is SOP for him (the adding of additional side trips) so that I would have been more prepared and not taken off guard by it. It would have been one thing had I been totally alone with the task with no one who had familiarity with the procedures. But when I asked my office mate what I should make sure to ask and what was needed all I was told was "just make sure to ask what date and time he needs to be where for his meeting". A heads up would have just been nice.

[meirwen.livejournal.com]

Bad co-worker. No biscuit.