Romans
12:18-21
“If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably
with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it
to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says
the Lord.” To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry,
feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you
will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome
by evil, but overcome evil with good.”
As I reflect on this Scripture it is not my
finest thoughts, I dropped the ball so often, and I did not go out of my way to
not live peaceably with all, in fact I like being thought of in a nice way, but
often the goal got in the way of the relationship. I was one driven person to obtain the
project, get a new product out of the lab, to overcome the lack of desire in
those I worked with who seemed to be obstacles in the way of achieving the
prize, the sale, the order, the project.
Now this confession is going to get very
personal; I was part of a team of four, three salespersons and a great boss,
one who saw my many weaknesses, but only put time into my strengths. One day after many good things had happened
with our group of growing a new business, a market that we had not had in the
past, upper management gave us a new boss, one who at one time I had enjoyed
working with in my role as a Key Account person, helping him with one of our
biggest utilities. While in that role, he
often invited me to his home and I knew the wife and kids and I worked hard to
make him income from new sales.
Now he was to be my new boss, and I was not
all that excited about that for he was known for being a political person who
said and did what upper management wanted to hear, even if it was not in the
best interest of our sales force. Our
first meeting was just he and I and it went like this; “Rice
I do not like you, and if I could I would fire you today, but I can’t and you
are very valuable to the team so I’m stuck with you.” Now let me be clear I was not thinking
about being peaceable, I was shocked, and I thanked him for his honesty and ask
if that was all he wanted to say and I left his office. Now as I reflect back I had never been shy
about sharing what I thought about management who were better at talking than
at doing the job they were assigned, so because he fit that mold, I earned his
disfavor.
I worked under this man a long time and it
was never good, but his dislike for me as a person often clouded his judgment,
and one day he made a mistake so big even upper management would have had to
take action if I called in H.R. My boss
first got me demoted to a role I had done many years before, my pay was the
same, but the role had changed. The goal
was to push me out in hopes I would quit, but I didn’t and it caused this action;
he sent out an email to the sales force asking when I was going to quit, I was
on the copy list. That is a big no, no!
How I could do to him what he had wanted to
do to me, and so I copied that email and wrote the President over H.R., laying
out all that had happened since he became my boss along with my performance
reviews. It was at this point I recalled
the Scripture “Vengeance
is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” As
I reflected on that verse, it was very clear I was never to send that letter, I
was to sit and watch, and wait.
After 40 years I left 3M and the Lord began
to require me to pray for that man, and the more I prayed the more I cared for
him and his family, I have regrets that I dropped the ball during that time in
my career.
From the Back Porch,
Bob Rice
No comments:
Post a Comment