Page 36 of Besties
“Nah, Richie already started that. Amelia called and told us how amazing the gift was that he sent.”
She shook her head. “No, he’s putting a Band-Aid over what could have become a leaking wound. It’s a temporary stopgap at best. I know it’s trite, but you can’t make a second first impression. Ours was tarnished by a bigot, and it’s going to take more than candy and flowers to make it right again. That’s where you come in. It seems you understand that selling an item isn’t the only responsibility you have. A relationship with the customer is the most important thing we can cultivate. Even if they’re not interested in what we have to offer, they may have other leads we can follow up on. But that won’t ever happen if we alienate them.”
She was putting into words how I’d always felt. My former boss was all about making our quota, pulling in cash by the fistful, even if our customers weren’t happy. I tried to explain to him that if they were turned off by our products or service, they’d go elsewhere and we’d be without them. Try as I might, I could never make him understand. Then, of course, I finally realized that he had his own responsibilities to his bosses and that he was doing what was expected of him. I tried to toe the company line, but my heart was never in it.
“Mr. Ryland is a good judge of people, usually. How Kramer fell through the cracks, I don’t know, but who knows how many other clients he might have turned off?”
Crap. I hadn’t even considered that. I pulled out my phone and jotted a note to myself to go through all his files and contact the clients myself.
“See? That right there shows he made the right choice. You’re thinking like a manager.”
“What do you mean?”
“A lot of people would look toward the future and all the wonderful things they’re going to do, changes they’ll enact, and how they’re going to make their mark. But you? You’re also considering our current clients. Plus, if I’m not mistaken, you’re going to look back and see if Kramer got anyone else angry, only they didn’t complain.”
And that’s exactly what I was doing. If I learned one thing in my years stuck in the trenches, it was that a problem usually hid other ones.
“Tell you what—why don’t you go ahead and start looking.”
“But what about my training?”
“Honestly? I think you’re ready. Anything else you need, your team can show you. You’ve done remarkably well, so you know, and I’ll be telling Mr. Ryland that.”
Her words caused my cheeks to warm. This atmosphere was so much different than my last place. People didn’t work together to solve problems. It was usually “what’s in it for me?”
“Thank you, Rebecca.” I stood as she did. “May I hug you?”
She rolled her eyes. “If you didn’t, I’d be upset.”
She embraced me, and though it wasn’t as good as Richie’s hugs, it was still nice.
“I’m going to miss you when you go.”
It was as if she’d thrown cold water over me, shocking me back to my senses. I was going to be leaving and going back to Milwaukee after training. Everything I was doing, I could do from home. But… what about Richie?
That thought consumed me as I tried to focus on the reports I was combing through. Kramer had started out as a top seller, but a few months ago, he became surly and his attitude tanked. He still went out on calls, but his reports were shoddy at best. I glanced up at the clock. I still had time to make a few calls, even though I was preoccupied. It didn’t matter, though. I was hired to do a job, and I would do it to the best of my ability.
The next two hours passed at an agonizingly slow pace. The more I learned about Kramer, the less I liked him. Several of the schools I contacted had some pretty harsh things to say about the man. He was belligerent when they declined more expensive suites, refused to help them change the services they were receiving, or in one case, walked out on a client who was trying to explain that their children were having problems with the software crashing due to their computers being older models and not having the graphic power to run it.
I made notes, apologies, and offers to make things right. Only a few were steadfast in their refusal to work with us again, and those were the ones that hurt the most, because I knew we’d be able to make things right if we were given the chance.
“You ready to go home?”
I turned to find Richie standing in the doorway. When he saw my expression, he rushed over.
“What’s wrong?”
A deep sigh rolled out of me. “Kramer screwed your company so hard, and he didn’t even use a condom.”
Grabbing the chair from the table, he dragged it over and sat beside me. “Okay, tell me what’s going on.”
I laid it all out for him, and the more I said, the angrier he got.
“How the hell did all this go unnoticed?”
I knew he wasn’t asking me, but I decided I’d answer anyway.
“Because no one complained until recently. They either canceled their contracts or sucked it up, figuring that the quality of service here had dropped.”
