Tuesday, August 05, 2008

Sorry for the neglect

Let's get honest here. It's hard to come up with a bunch of rants and post them all the time, although I do get quite a bit of good fodder daily at work. But there's a reason I haven't been posting. If people I work with see this, they may or may not be able to identify me. That's fine. I think it's more important to come out with the truth and at least have a sounding board for it, rather than spending every day silently pissed off.

See, a few months ago, Corporate decided to replace a pharmacist with a new one. Corporate has been doing this all over in our chain, and it's getting ridiculous. For the first month, our new pharmacist was great -- a charmer, funny, nice, and great with the customers. But after the first month, things went absolutely downhill. The new pharmacist became some sort of monster. For the first time in my years at my store, things weren't good at all. There are fights, requests to keep employees apart, and a lot of drama. This pharmacist has also brought taboo subjects (such as sex, religion, poltics, etc.) into our workplace, and this is something that we frown upon, and our ethics department in human resources would have a huge issue with if we decided to pursue calling them and letting them in on just how hostile a work environment it is becoming.

I have front store employees expressing disgust for this pharmacist, I have customers calling ahead to ask what pharmacist is there so they can specifically avoid the new pharmacist, and I have coworkers expressing fear that their jobs could very well be on the line. I have been told to watch my back by my other pharmacists. The new pharmacist has no say in whether I stay or go, for the most part, and I am not really that afraid, but I will say this -- we have made a pact that if one of our Core Group goes, and it fucks things up for the rest of us, that we will leave, too. There are about 10 of us (give or take; I'm not positive anymore since people are in an out) that work in our pharmacy, and there's a good 5 or 6 of us that have agreed to seek other employment should one of us be tossed.

It's funny, because one of our pharmacists, and a close friend of mine, has been having trouble sleeping because of all the issues in the pharmacy, and lately, I notice myself having more and more trouble. I'm unable to sleep, I wake up in a bad mood when it's the new pharmacist's day to work, and I spend my day wishing I'd've taken a vacation day rather than drag myself out of bed.

Our main supervisor has been informed of some of these issues, and there's a tentative sit-down meeting planned between a few of my coworkers, myself, and our supervisor to really discuss some of the major issues at hand. I'm not opposed to bringing other higher-ups into this. Everyone tells us that this new pharmacist is one of Corporate's Sweethearts, but if they could see what a week in the lives of any of us is like, they'd quickly rethink that proclamation they've seemed to make.

I truly love the pharmacy profession, and I know I want to spend my life in retail pharmacy practice. But I can't do my job under the conditions we're under right now. I've been offered a job in our front store by the managers for my hard work, but it's not worth it to me. I want to be in the pharmacy helping people, and I get a teensy bit more respect back there than I ever did in our front store. But it's becoming more and more enticing as things keep deteriorating.

So, to anyone reading this particular rant -- any ideas? We all are struggling, and it looks less likely every day that Corporate will do anything about this. I don't want to have to leave, because it was our home long before it was this pharmacist's. But we are all sick and tired of being miserable. So, help!