Destructive E-mail Routing

My first screw-up at SNEF… on the 10th day of work…

It all started when I drafted an e-mail to send to one lady from the Training Department, asking about the attendance of an upcoming workshop & requesting for permission to make a short presentation to the workshop participants.

My e-mail was directed to another lady in that department & this lady replied to me, ‘cc’ to her manager. Unsuspecting of me, I ended up with a harsh e-mail sent to my supervisor (i.e. Andy) from that manager, complaining that I have to ask permission from her before intending to give a briefing at any workshop being conducted.

Andy replied to her e-mail to explain the situation & tried to ease the situation, followed by a short verbal warning to me, that I should be careful about crossing their tuff, coz this department is very sensitive about it.

I explained that it was just a simple question to that lady whom I sent that e-mail. I didn’t know that my e-mail would end up being routed to another person, before ending up in her manager’s mailbox! I mean, what’s this? Why all this e-mail routing? I’m just asking confirming about a workshop, so that I can make plans at my side for the briefing, if allowed. And I did request for permission in my first e-mail too. What’s wrong with them?

Andy quietly whispered that these are some of the things which we have to learn to be careful of. Fine… so I learnt a hard lesson, but thankfully at the early stages of my job at SNEF, so I will be reminded not to tread too closely near their tuff, coz I don’t know when the next e-mail might be shot at my supervisor.

My department colleagues were very curious when they heard about this news, asking me to explain what happened, so I let them read that e-mail trail from my PC. Yet in my heart, I was wondering whether they are being ‘kaypo’ about my unfortunate incident or they are really concerned about me. Or maybe they are just interested in knowing more about the happening, so that they won’t make the same mistake in future. It’s difficult to discern others’ intentions at times…

It’s really all about politics. So irritating! I don’t even know how I can really trust. It’s very sad. Nonetheless, I will bear this lesson in mind & not make this mistake ever again.

Shortly after lunch, my team & I made a trip down to Fujitec to watch how my supervisor would present & explain the ‘ADVANTAGE! Grant’ to the managers at Fujitec. It was an interesting meeting, with a tour around their manufacturing factory, giving my team & I a really good eye-opener to what goes on inside such factories. Mr. Teo & Henry are quite nice people (i.e. uncles) too.

I met Rebecca, Cheryl & Colin for dinner at Orchard in the evening, looking so worn out & tired from this incident, as well as the trip down to Fujitec. We ate at this place at Takashimaya called ‘Pepper Lunch’. There wasn’t any pepper in the dishes (or at least I didn’t taste any) & we weren’t there to eat lunch (it’s already dinner time)… strange name.

It was nice time of frank sharing, which I believe Cheryl & I bared our true thoughts & feelings about church issues, work & others. Colin & Rebecca were quieter than us, but they shared at some parts of the conversation too.

Apparently, we realized that we were actually feeling the same negativity about church & finally concluded that we would re-start our CG at Cheryl’s house, every alternate Friday. This time we need to seek the church leadership’s approval in a timely manner. As for our more senior adult person in-charge for accountability purposes, we will leave it to God to direct to us…

It was a very tiring day, with my eyes feeling very worn out & a bit ‘biting’ while I was waiting for them at Orchard MRT station. But oh well… this is how life is sometimes… I better go sleep now… Gdnite!