In 2019, I was looking for my first job after college. It didn’t go as well as I hoped, and after months of searching, I was getting desperate. I finally ended up taking a one year contract position at a small health nonprofit for horrible pay.
The contract said that I was supposed to officially start in a few months. In the meantime, I got a bit of training from some staff, including the guy who last had my position. He had some concerning advice for me:
“Billy, listen… the boss is going to have some extremely unreasonable demands for you. There will be deadlines that there is no way to meet. You have to be strong and be able to say no when he says these things or asks you to take on a bunch of extra work. He doesn’t trust easy… after a few months, he’ll start to let up, but until then… he’s going to watch you like a hawk.”
Again, I was desperate, so I just accepted it. I still hadn’t officially started.
In the meantime, I was considering medical school. I applied to volunteer at a large hospital on the weekends. When the clinic manager found out I was working at the small health nonprofit, she lit up. We talked about the possibility of collaborating and I said it would be cool someday, maybe months down the line, when I had been working there for a while. I still hadn’t started.
From then on, the clinic manager kept bringing up the possibility of a collaboration. I kept going “maybe someday, but again, I just want to volunteer…”. She began to pressure me for my new boss’ contact info as well. Finally, she started hitting me with excuses to waste my time, like “oh no! Well, it’ll take soooo long to process your volunteer paperwork. Looks like you can’t volunteer for at least six months! I guess we’ll just have to start the collaboration in the meantime!” This went on for a while.
Finally, I got fed up and said “look, I know I said that a collaboration would be cool someday, but I have no date in mind for this. I was thinking that something like this would be nice hypothetically down the line. It was never a guarantee, especially right now. I didn’t even officially start the job yet and don’t feel comfortable with this. I really just want to volunteer. If that’s not alright, maybe I should apply to volunteer at a different clinic.”
The clinic manager stopped responding to me. Instead, they forwarded our initial email chain - where I said I’d like to volunteer and we were talking about how a collaboration may be cool someday - directly to my soon-to-be boss without my permission. They told my soon-to-be boss that I thought this was a great idea.
I was appalled and felt really taken advantage of. I was just a kid trying to volunteer at a hospital… why was this so complicated? I also felt like this person was predatory. I remembered the old staff member saying how distrustful my new boss was going to be, and panicked. I sent a reply all email back saying that I was not ok with this, did not want to even talk about this until I had been working there for a few months, and that this behavior was coming across as predatory. I also emailed my boss asking them to ignore that email and profusely apologizing for getting this person involved.
I made a mistake here. Without context or explanation, it looked like this lady had just sent a friendly introductory message and I had freaked out/been rude for no reason. I also should not have been rude regardless.
I thought that I was avoiding setting off the boss by making it clear that I did not authorize some collaboration before I even started the job. Instead, the boss was set off by me rejecting the clinic manager without permission. My new boss called me immediately. I apologized a lot and told him that I understood the mistake I made and would not do it again. I was fired on the spot, before I even started the job. He was pretty harsh about it, going as far as telling me that I was not an ally to the health community.
I was devastated. And terrified. My girlfriend told me that the whole situation was so wild that it had to be meant to be.
She was right. About a month after this incident, I got a job offer from a much larger company for a much more valuable role. My office is awesome - perfect for me - and my coworkers are great. My boss is smart but also kind, funny, and understanding. I have gotten to do a lot of important work and networked with amazing and influential people. My career has skyrocketed because of this position.
And the kicker? I did end up getting a volunteer position from the same hospital… just from a different clinic manager. It took a few days to get me set up and then I was in. The clinic manager taught me so much and is an amazing boss to this day. The people in said clinic are also wonderful. The work I did for this clinic ended up getting me another high-profile position a year later.
Sometimes life just works out.
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