The First Day on the Job.

The First Day on the Job.

Being the new guy on a job is always an uncomfortable state to be in.  The integration process into a new group with meeting all the new people, learning the new processes, the paperwork, and trying to figure where you belong is very unsettling.  Some organizations have all kinds of support to smooth the transition; others simply throw you to the wolves armed with only with 20 pounds of paper.

Some days start worse than others, here is one that had me staring at the sky and asking if God himself was testing me.

It was my first day with Siemens.  The office was goodly distance away, and across many a winding and unfamiliar routes.  But as my role was as a regional Field Service Engineer, trips to the office were going to be infrequent.  The trip should take about one and a half hours, and I left two hours early to give myself a margin of error. 

I was traveling down route 252, a road I was not comfortable with, and I was paying painful attention to the sides of the road, looking for any street signs to avoid getting lost.  I spied an old lady walking the along the side of the road, when she suddenly collapsed.  I immediately pulled over to render what aid I could.  This was in the age before everyone had cell phones, so it was a miracle that the man in the car behind me had one.  He called 911, but did not stick around.

The lady was breathing, and didn’t seem to have a life threatening condition, so I cradled the woman’s head, going more for comfort and awaiting help.  All the while the back of my brain was being very unchristian.   

You are going to be late for your first day at work!

You are going to get fired before you start!

No one is going to believe this story!

I looked in the sky, and wondered if this was a test. 

Within a very few minutes, a Pennsylvania State Trooper arrived and behind him the Emergency Medical Technicians.  Both queried me for information, of which I had next-to-none, and I then took up a role as a traffic warden till she was safely loaded and the ambulance departed.

And it didn’t matter.  Most new jobs start on Monday, and truth be told, the integration of a new employee is not usually on anyone’s top five list for Monday Morning.  So, a suggestion to all you managers out there, start you new hires a bit late on Monday, both you and them will breathe a little easier.