The Beginning of my goof-ups

I was in the Sprint’s back-office process. Being my first full-fledged job, I was nervous, terrified and hesitant to speak much. There was this one guy, my team member, who would taunt me on a continual basis. He would imitate my style of speech and would pass unwarranted comments. He just got on my nerves. After a month, I decided I had it enough. I thought about my plan of action in the event he bullied me again. He didn’t let me wait for long. One day, he interrupted my conversation with someone and mimicked my tone, I paused for a second and retorted back with the choicest of abuses that even surprised me, not to tell about the shock on my bully’s face. The whole team watched shell shocked. He was taken aback by my outburst. He would never again dare to pick on me.

This incident taught me a lesson which stayed with me for the most part of my stay in IBM. You cannot afford to be soft in the BPO industry. This revelation transformed me overnight. Once inside the gates of IBM, I was a different person. I vividly remember how I used to turn on this new me, the moment I entered the gates of the company. This was the survival of the fittest. There was no place for the good, simple and weak. Over the years, this would become my second nature. But for now I had no friends in the new department. I never will.

The training period, in BPO parlance, was considered as a honeymoon but in Aetna it wasn’t anywhere close to be deemed as fun and I didn’t particularly enjoy it. I was attracted to Aman Panwar, my colleague and a team member. She was beautiful, mature, grounded, and intelligent and we instantly clicked with each other. My romance with her was still in the courtship phase when a team member, who too was attracted to her and harbored a secret admiration for her, went and told her a thing which I, stupidly, shared with him over the phone. Next day, in the office, she walked up to me and asked, ‘Did you say such a thing about me?’ I was stunned; realizing that I couldn’t get away by denying the facts, I accepted that I did. Fortunately, she was aware of the intentions of the other guy, so understood that he wanted to sow seeds of discord between us. I do not remember what happened next or whether I apologized, we continued to be friends. This was not to be the last of my goof ups.