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When the exam results come in a month or so later, while I am busy working on Half Year deadlines, I get a fairly expected result. 1 exam passed handily, 1 exam failed by 3 marks, and the tax exam failed by a good margin. Not good, but at least on the resit I'll have fewer exams to focus on and I can just use some annual leave to be in a position to pass. But the email that comes through the next day makes me realise something is amiss. It only references the tax exam, and it tells me a meeting will be held to discuss the result. My work friend leans over from the desk next to me - "That's strange, that looks like the email so and so got when he failed his resit. They might have sent you the wrong one". They did not send me the wrong one.
As it happens there is a minimum mark requirement to get a resit, which I narrowly missed. That's why you read the policy in detail. I begin to realise my days are numbered, but as the date of the meeting approaches my feelings are mixed. I considered my chances of not being sacked to be maybe 60/40, but no higher than that. On the one hand, it is a bad thing to be fired. It pays me money, and it is a pathway to a better life. On the other, I hate every minute of it and I feel spriritually dead. To lose this job could be a blessing in disguise, knocking me off course right before I make the mistake of committing to a miserable career path I have no interest in. Certainly some of that is just cope, but I don't think all of it is.
I am left to stew for a while before a date for this meeting is finally set. My performance manager, performance leader and a HR representative will be in attendance and I am invited to bring along a colleague. Never a good sign. I am helpfully informed that "one possible outcome of this meeting is a termination of your employment". The days tick down. And then it is here. I find an empty meeting room and dial into the call. My performance leader comes round to join me, and we share some jovial banter about the difficulty of finding meeting spaces. But it is made clear that this is a formal meeting. My performance manager does not show, a behaviour he is famous for among people who've worked with him.
I am given a chance to explain myself, and I decide to do so with dignity. I explain that I was under some stress with work, and that, not realising there was a minimum mark requirement, I had decided to accept the tax exam was a lost cause and focus on the other two to maximise my chances on the resit. At one point the HR rep disconnects from the call. My PL turns to me. "You need to come up with a better story and you need to come up with it now", he tells me. But it is too late of course, and when HR lady reconnects there is little time to think of a sob story and even less room to diverge from the tale already told. I am asked a few more probing questions and then am told to wait outside while a decision is reached.
There is no stress at all as I sit out there twiddling my thumbs. I have accepted my fate, and am filled with a sudden confidence that this was meant to be, and that everything will turn out alright. I felt the excitement of the released prisoner rather than the dread of the man walking to the guillotine. Tranquility. After a short eternity I am called back in. My PL has a somber look in his eyes.
But no decision had been taken. They had agreed that due to my PM not showing up it couldn't be a fair hearing. God bless him. The meeting was adjourned until the following week. "You seem honest and like the type of person we want to keep at this firm but you have to play this a lot smarter", my PL tells me. "If you really play up stress and we can get you a health assessment, then maybe we might be able to appeal". He doesn't sound very confident. So I leave, and sit at my desk. I have work to do. After a few seconds I stand back up again. I go downstairs, out the building, buy a hot chocolate from Costa and then sit by the waterfront. It is a warm day, with the sun shining down at me, and I enjoy it.