Angry editor: How not to run a newsroom, Part Six of Six.
“I’m beginning to wonder if I made a mistake hiring you.”
The managing editor of the Phnom Penh-based news website said this just a few days after employing me – well short of the three-month probationary period in the contract. Oddly, he was not wondering this because of the quality of my work: He would, in fact, soon admit I was “very good”.
Instead, his reason for pondering my dismissal (as I took this to be) had something to do with me being Canadian. My nationality, as he explained in vague terms, conferred upon me some kind of inherent “attitude” that he did not like and vowed to rid me of. Only if he was successful would I become the editor he needed.
Not entirely understanding what he was talking about and disconcerted by his eagerness to stereotype (which would emerge when he spoke of various nationalities), I said nothing.
Even at that early date I wondered something of my own: whether I had made a huge mistake leaving a stable job to gamble in Cambodia. I clearly should have dug deeper and asked more questions about this opportunity that seemed, on paper, to be exactly what I desired: being the editor of a small, but growing news website. The managing editor seems to have concluded the same about me, after having hired me based solely on the extensive and broad writing and editing experience described in my (quite accurate) curriculum vitae. He did not interview me. Maybe if we had spoken beforehand he might have detected my undesirable Canadianism and I his uncontrollable temper, saving us both a lot of grief.
Unfortunately, we chose each other sight unseen and we both soon regretted it. The managing editor hinted he might let me go or he outright threatened to fire me a number of times.
At first I took him at his word: that he was genuinely disappointed with my attitude and my work performance, but gradually I perceived he might habitually use talk of dismissal as a way to control his staff. Since he lacked their respect and had created a toxic workplace, he needed some way to ensure they remained.
As Niccolo Machiavelli, the great-grandfather of realpolitik, advised leaders more than 500 years ago: “…it is much safer to be feared than loved, when only one is possible… fear preserves you by a fear of punishment which never fails.” Perhaps if a boss realizes that his employees were liable to quit without notice, keeping them unbalanced with the threat of imminent dismissal might be a calculated attempt to retain control. If they are worried about losing their jobs they might be less likely to leave on their own accord.
I was not the main recipient of this tactic, if tactic it was. Perhaps the managing editor could not find enough wrong with my work to justify more threats of dismissal, or maybe he sensed the threats were not having the desired effect. They puzzled and annoyed me; they did not intimidate me.
Sadly, another employee received far more threats than I did and, by all accounts, had been getting them regularly as part of a generally abusive approach since she started working in that newsroom. If the managing editor was indeed following some calculated worker-cowing strategy (rather than just being the proverbial bull in the china shop), he finally carried things too far with his favorite target. One day, at the climax of another loud anger fit that she had (to his mind) invited with what was probably a minor mistake (or none at all) the managing editor threw her into the street and tossed all her belongings out after her.
The reporter wisely returned to her home country where she was safe, but the managing editor – like an abusive husband who begs forgiveness for the umpteenth time – somehow managed to both coerce and convince her to return to Cambodia. She explained afterwards – like an abused wife – that she thought she could change him. Maybe she could, but I have my doubts.
For my part, the more threats of firing I received, the closer I got to taking him up on the offer. As the noise spewing from the managing editor rose and the work conditions deteriorated, one thing held me back from leaving: the practical need of getting the wages owed me. From my coworkers I learned that my predecessor had endured a similar situation. During a violent argument with the boss he finally lost all patience with him and quit about half-way through the month. In retaliation, the managing editor declared he would not pay him for his weeks of work, but my predecessor did not care. He stormed out of the office, apparently considering the lost money a small price to pay for his freedom.
I knew my own sudden departure was inevitable, but I did not want the managing editor to keep my hard-earned wages. I resolved that if I made it to the second half of a month I would hold on until I got paid, but if I was subjected to any abuse in the first half I would follow my predecessor’s example and leave.
What would have been my second full month of work lasted less than two hours. It ended with a stream of invective the managing editor texted to me over some miniscule offence. Feeling overwhelming revulsion at the thought of ever again going into the office to face him, I decided he did not deserve formal notice. I simply texted him back to say I was claiming the many hours of overtime I was due and then I cut off all channels of communication.
My day immediately improved.
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