Category Archives: Working Life

Dengue Fever Threatened My Son’s Life

08 Sunday Jun 2014

Posted by in Brazil, Family Life, Working Life

≈ 17 Comments

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Dengue Fever - Aedes Aegypti MosquitoDengue Fever – Aedes Aegypti Mosquito
Photo Credit: WHO/TDR/Stammers

 

When my older son, John, was eighteen years old, he took sick with what I thought was the flu. At the Italbras tannery, my Italian boss had arrived in Brazil for a five-day visit by our largest cut-and-sew client. The day our two visitors arrived, John was bedridden with high fever, headache, and muscle and joint pains. Our over-the-counter medicines for fever and colds only provided temporary relief.

Around ten o’clock, when John called me, I knew that something was wrong. His condition had worsened. After telling my boss that I had to take my son to the hospital, I returned to Fortaleza in a company vehicle. Continue reading →

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Feeling Sick at Work: Unexpected Kindness

30 Sunday Mar 2014

Posted by in Human Behavior, Relationships, United States, Working Life

≈ 10 Comments

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Woman with Migraine HeadacheWoman with Migraine Headache
Photo Credit: Science Daily

 

The female worker was definitely not feeling well. She writhed in the chair placed on the sidewalk outside my local grocery store. A co-worker stood beside her. About half an hour later, on leaving the grocery store, I encountered a commotion outside. A fire brigade and ambulance had arrived. I watched the paramedics lift the stretcher with the woman into the ambulance. Did her family know that she was on her way to a hospital, I wondered.

It’s no fun getting sick at work, especially if you live a long way from home and use public transport, as was my case when I worked at a large retail store in West Hollywood. The journey took over an hour and half, using three buses.

One hot summer’s day with a malfunctioning air-condition system, I suffocated with the heightened fragrances of scented candles in my work area. By mid-morning, my head pounded. By lunch-break, a debilitating migraine struck. In the lunch-room, I slumped over my lunch, sickened by the assault of aromas and sounds. I couldn’t eat. The pain-killer I had taken earlier proved ineffective. Nausea kicked in. In the back of the lunch-room, I made a makeshift bed with three plastic chairs and lay down.

Staff members entered, had their lunch, and left. A few people inquired about my condition. Assured that I wasn’t at death’s door, they returned to work. My lunch-hour ended with no relief. Through a co-worker, I advised my supervisor that I felt too sick to return to the sales floor.

I had to get home. A taxi was out of the question. That could cost an entire week’s wages. My sons couldn’t help. At the time, we had no vehicle. I had to make it to the bus stop.

A woman – the only female staff member who wore ankle-length skirts to work – asked if I needed anything. Owing to different time schedules and work areas, we had never before spoken to each other. When I told her about my predicament, she offered to take me home.

I made it down the elevator to the parking lot. As I sat down in the front seat, a wave of nausea struck me. Removing her purchases from a plastic shopping bag, she gave me the bag. I felt better after emptying my stomach. What an embarrassment!

My rescuer chatted with me on the drive to my residence. Her name was Janice. She was an Orthodox Jew, married with three children. She shared a little about her life as a Jewish-American woman. This personal contact with someone of the Jewish faith was a new experience for me.

After that day, Janice and I were no longer strangers. A month later, she left the store on medical leave. I requested a transfer to a store closer to home. We never met again.

Sometimes, help comes from people we least expect to reach out to us, bridging the divide between us.

The Instigator, Seductress & Vampire: Competition among Women in the Brazilian Workplace

16 Sunday Mar 2014

Posted by in Brazil, Working Life

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Competition among women in the workplaceCompetition among Women in the Workplace
Photo Credit: CulturaMix.com

With rapid growth at the leather company, the challenges soared. More work. More staff. More intrigues. More stress. Wherever women gather, troubles follow. Envy, jealousy, and power become our deadliest enemies.

The Instigator was the Brazilian wife of one of the Italian supervisors in the tannery. She joined the Cut-and-Sew Factory in a supervisory position for which she was ill-prepared. With her incompetence unmasked, she used her Italian connection to belittle the factory staff and instigate conflicts among the female sewers. Tempers flared.

Complaints from our clients placed me in a conflict situation with the Instigator’s husband. In defense of her man, she added me to her Enemy List. When the company let her go, peace returned to the Cut-and-Sew Factory.

The Seductress used different tactics to get her way. A single woman in her late twenties, she held a business administrative degree from her home state. Like all out-of-state staff members, she lived in the nearby township of Cascavel. Her sexual encounters became the talk of the small coastal town. Monday mornings began with the circulation of her weekend escapades. The young, local, female staff relished recounting the spicy details.

The Seductress reveled in her conquests and fame. “I have them in the palm of my hands,” she declared one day, smacking her palm. ‘Them’ referred to our company directors.

Instead of focusing on her work, she roamed porn sites, read her fan mail, and flirted with men on the phone. Assured of her privileged status, we were shocked the day she was fired.

When I was appointed manager of the export department and began training my team, the Vampire – a local, young mother in an unstable marriage – became my Achilles heel. She sucked my energies with her jealousy of new team members, especially those with English language skills. Thwarting my attempts to have her train newcomers to use the company’s operating system, she sabotaged their work forcing me to seek help from the technical staff.

To complicate matters, the Vampire started a clandestine liaison with an Italian director. Nothing is secret in a small town. Her affair triggered a chain of intrigues and alliances among the staff within and outside of our department.

She had demonstrated great potential for growth as an import-export professional. With advance technical training and fluency in English, she could one day become the company’s export manager. I had erred in keeping her on the team. Better to have tried and failed than not to have tried at all. Hopefully in time, she would see her folly.

In a small town like Cascavel where jobs are scarce, competition becomes fierce. Women like the Instigator, Seductress, and Vampire transform the workplace into a battlefield. One always has to be a step ahead of the enemy. Always alert. I had to be tough to survive. That I succeeded in meeting our shipment deadlines and attending to the needs of our clients to their satisfaction was no easy accomplishment.

Brazil: Working with Import/Export Agents

02 Sunday Feb 2014

Posted by in Brazil, Working Life

≈ 6 Comments

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Port of Mucuripe - Fortaleza - Ceara - BrazilPort of Mucuripe – Fortaleza – Ceará – Brazil
Photo Credit: Skyscraper City

Strategic partnerships in potential overseas markets can help producers and manufacturers, lacking the size and might of multinational corporations, to sell their products on the international market. The import/export agent is one such partnership.

At Italbras Leather Producer & Exporter Ltd.,* I had the opportunity of working with five competent and reliable import/export agents. All were specialized in working in the leather industry.

When I joined the company, Italbras had partnered with an agent in the United States who represented its finished upholstery leather across the nation. Based on the number of American clients represented, he was our top agent. An expert in leather production, he worked closely with our Production Manager on matters relating to our American clients’ quality control requirements.

For the most part, since our American agent traveled a lot across the United States visiting clients, I maintained direct daily contact with his female office assistant. She handled orders, clearance of shipments, returned goods, and payments. We worked well together. When resolving issues that arose from time to time, I could always count on her quick action.

Later, through partnerships with import/export agents in England and Australia, Italbras expanded its exports of upholstery leather and cut-and-sewn leather covers to England, Wales, Australia, and New Zealand. An Italian agent provided entrance to more markets for our leather in Europe: Denmark, Finland, Italy, Norway, and The Netherlands. Another Italian agent negotiated orders with new clients in Asia: Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, and Thailand.

Each agent brought their own expertise and knowledge to dealing with the challenges of their market. For example, after finding several shipping pallets with bark, the Australian sanitary inspectors impounded our two 20-foot containers for two weeks for fumigation treatment. Our Australian agent took care of the fumigation and ensured the release of our goods as soon as possible. Delays cost money and garner client dissatisfaction.

Thenceforth, not only was the export department required to inspect all pallets before palletization, we also had to arrange fumigation of all containers destined for Australia. This also entailed coordinating Brazilian customs inspection of goods at our factory before fumigation and sealing of containers.

The Asian market required payment terms by Irrevocable Letter of Credit. While Letters of Credit offer more security for both parties, they require extra care when preparing the shipping documents. A simple error can cause delays in clearance and receipt of payment.

By expanding our exports overseas, our import/export agents added value to our company. For their part, import/export agents earn a commission, usually varying between 12 and 15 percent over the FOB value (excluding cost of freight) of every shipment. Money well spent. Money well earned.

Where there’s mutual trust, confidence, and integrity, it’s a partnership that works well for both parties.

* Fictitious name

Brazil: Visit of Cut-and-Sew Client – The Other Side of Outsourcing

12 Sunday Jan 2014

Posted by in Brazil, Working Life

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Stitching on Leather ChairPhoto Credit: Indigo Furniture Company – UK

 

We live in a globalized world in which outsourcing production or services to another country has become a way of doing business. For those who have lost their jobs to lower-paid, overseas workers, outsourcing is a painful reality. For workers in an emerging economy like Brazil, outsourcing offers an opportunity to rise out of poverty.

At Italbras Leather Producer & Exporter Ltd.,* I worked with a number of furniture companies worldwide that outsourced the production of their upholstery leather covers. My first and largest client was the Canadian Furniture Company* with factories in Canada and the United States. Italbras had secured this contract owing to its well-equipped factory, with emphasis on worker safety, and fair labor practices: remuneration in accordance with Brazil’s minimum wage plus additional benefits of on-site meals, private bus transport, uniforms, and a medical doctor on duty.

I had direct contact with three representatives at Canadian Furniture in purchasing, production, and quality control. They were friendly, attentive, and responsive to our needs for information and in resolving setbacks.

Production Manager Brandon* and a senior sewing instructor were our first visitors from Canadian Furniture. They came to conduct a two-week training program for the production of complete sets of two new upholstery models. The sewing instructor was a small Asian-Canadian woman in her forties. With Mr. Leonelli,* our Italian Commercial Director, and Brandon walking a little distance behind us, I escorted her to the tannery where our Export Department was located.

After asking her about her trip and hotel accommodation, I said: “The supervisor of our cut-and-sew factory is happy that you’re here. She has lots of questions for you.”

“I didn’t want to come,” she said, smiling sheepishly. “The women in my team said I shouldn’t teach everything… They’re afraid of losing their jobs.”

What could I say? Until that moment, I had not considered the consequences of our cut-and-sew operations for the sewers at Canadian Furniture Company.

The training program was intense and exhausting. Mr. Leonelli assigned me the task of acting as the English-Portuguese interpreter. I learned a few new sewing terms. I’m no professional interpreter. Occasionally, in the rapid back-and-forth exchanges, I switched the languages. I gained an appreciation for the sewing skills of our female staff. Matching up the numerous notches was tough, painstaking work. They made sewing straight line, topstitched seams look like nothing. The instructor emphasized the importance of paying attention to every detail. A tiny error could create problems when mounting the covers on the furniture frames.

Were sewers laid off at the Canadian Furniture Company as a result of outsourcing some of their production to Italbras? It was not my place to ask Brandon such questions. Besides, I was in no position to criticize a system that was working in our favor.

Until corporations change the way they do business to create value for their shareholders, workers will continue to suffer the adverse effects of outsourcing.

* Fictitious name

Christmas in Brazil: My “Secret Friend”

15 Sunday Dec 2013

Posted by in Brazil, Festivals, People, Relationships, Working Life

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Christmas PresentPhoto Credit: nopatio.com.br

 

At Christmas time in work places around Fortaleza, the exchange of gifts between co-workers is common. A popular practice is to select the name of your amiga secreta or “secret friend” from among the undisclosed names of all participating co-workers.

During the years I worked in Brazil, one amiga secreta stands out from all the rest: Angélica,* my nemesis.

Angélica and I started out on the wrong foot. She was responsible for the control of all incoming and outgoing merchandise. I made the unforgiveable error of pointing out discrepancies in the product codes. Other related questions about stock control resulted in a rebuke from Angélica’s boss. I was meddling in matters outside of my job description, he told me.

I paid the price in full for questioning Angélica’s competence. Her subsequent covert attempts to discredit and sabotage my work turned my work environment into a quagmire. Over time, I harbored resentment and anger towards her. When I pulled her name as my amiga secreta, I knew that it was not by chance. I was being forced to take action, to take another path.

I resisted the temptation to exchange my selection with another co-worker. I knew that I had to resolve my enmity towards Angélica.

On the Saturday evening of our Christmas staff party, Angélica and her husband were noticeably absent. The opportunity of presenting my gift in a safe and festive atmosphere did not occur as I had planned.

Some situations are never as easy as we would like them to be.

The following Monday morning I found the courage to go to Angélica’s office with my gift offering. I had discreetly found out what she most wanted for Christmas. I made my peace with her. That’s what Christmas is all about, isn’t it? Peace and joy and goodwill towards all.

She was open and responsive. We cleared the foul air between us. I freed myself of all those dark emotions. I became lighter and joyful.

In the New Year, I became a part of Angélica’s small group of friends. We shared many enjoyable Happy Hours on Friday evenings after work. Over glasses of Brazilian light beer, the four of us made plans for our future.

Then the bombshell fell.

My amiga secreta had secrets of her own. She was embezzling the company. I don’t know the details of her scheme. I didn’t want to know. I could not gloat. I could only lament that she had lost her way.

The Christmas my nemesis became my “secret friend” changed the course of my life as well as hers. This Christmas, wherever she may be, I hope that the star shines brightly atop her Christmas tree.

* Fictitious name

Brazil: Working with Finished Cow Leather Covers for Upholstery

17 Sunday Nov 2013

Posted by in Brazil, Working Life

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Leather Recliner SofaLeather Recliner Sofa

 

While I was enjoying the quiet working environment in the Finance Department at Italbras Leather Producer & Exporter Ltd.,* new developments were underway in the Italian-Brazilian joint venture company. At the newly completed Cut & Sew Factory, about a brisk five-minute walk from the tannery, over a hundred young women—from Cascavel, Ceará, where Italbras was located—were being trained in the operation of German-made industrial sewing machines.

When Mr. Leonelli,* our Italian Commercial Director, invited me to be part of his four-person export team, he made me the contact person for our English-speaking clients, including our first Cut & Sew client. Thus began my involvement with the Cut & Sew Leather Factory and its subsequent development to include clients from Australia, Canada, United Kingdom, and the United States.

On my first visit to the factory, I was surprised to see that the sewing machines were mounted on high tables requiring the women to work on their feet. The factory manager, a leather industry expert from South Brazil, explained that this practice reduced injuries and health risks. Using plywood patterns produced by the factory’s digital cutting machine, young men worked at large tables dissecting hides into the pieces needed to make the covers.

Sewers worked on different sections of the sofa covers. The woman responsible for sewing together the various sections had the heaviest load to handle.

“How do you manage with the weight?” I asked her.
“It gives me pain in my shoulders and back,” she told me.

They were simple, intelligent, hardworking women, many of them married with children. I discovered on subsequent visits to the factory that some of them were illiterate.

After quality inspection of the finished leather covers, a team of young men took care of packing the covers on pallets for shipment. Our Cut & Sew Leather Factory produced covers for ottomans, chairs, love seats, sofas, reclining sofas, and sectionals (the most complex design).

Brazilian leather exports of hides and skins to date have already shown signs of an increase over last year exports. In their Analysis of Brazilian Exports of Hides and Skins for October 2013, the Brazil Center for the Tanning Industry (CICB – Centro das Indústrias de Curtumes do Brasil) reported that exports in October 2013, totaling US$236,908 million, exceeded exports for the previous month by 6.8 percent and 28.3 percent over exports in October 2012. Finished leather comprised 55.5 percent of total exports.

Ceará ranked fifth among Brazil’s states with the largest leather exports: São Paulo (20.3%), Rio Grande do Sul (19.8%), Goiás (12.5%), Paraná (11.6%), Ceará (7.9%), and Mato Grosso do Sul (6.4%).

For the period January to October 2013, the top three destinations for Brazilian leather exports were China/Hong Kong (35.7%), Italy (21.2%), and the United States (10.2%).

For readers interested in learning more about Brazil’s leather industry and its major producers and exporters, more data is available on the CICB website, as well as the names and contact information of their associate members.

 

* Fictitious name

Be the Solution Not the Problem

27 Sunday Oct 2013

Posted by in Brazil, Working Life

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Export Team with Visiting ClientExport Team with Visiting Client
In the rear: Window overlooking leather factory
Cascavel – Ceará – July 2001

 

When I joined the Export Department at Italbras Leather Producer & Exporter,* I was the oldest woman on the team. The much younger and well-qualified Brazilian export manager put me to shame. She was fluent in three languages: her native language Portuguese, English, and Italian. What’s more, she was adept at navigating the factory’s electronic system for control of production and shipments.

After experiencing the vulnerability of MS Excel spreadsheets for controlling foreign exchange contracts and payment receipts, I proposed the development of a program specific to our needs. Fernando*, the handsome, young newcomer to the Finance Department, was assigned the task. To facilitate collaboration, his desk was aligned with mine, facing each other. His presence unsettled my female co-workers.

“Watch out, Rose. He’s after your job,” one said.
“He even listens to your phone conversations with the banks,” another added.
“Don’t teach him everything.”

How could he develop the program if I didn’t explain every small detail to him? Italbras was a year-old company preparing to take off. Now was the time to put sound systems in place for increased performance and accuracy. If Administration intended to hand over my work to Fernando, they must have other plans for me. I hoped.

Be part of the solution, I told myself. Don’t create any problems for Fernando. Perhaps I was being naïve.

Weeks later, when the Finance Department was moved to a large spacious office on the top floor of the Administrative Building, Fernando and I joined them. Oh, blessed reprieve! No more noise of rumbling drums and battering machines. At last, I could think straight.

In the beginning, the export manager forwarded clients’ payment details by e-mail. Soon thereafter, Mr. Leonelli,* our Italian Commercial Director, instructed all clients to forward payment details directly to my e-mail address. With the addition of new clients and increased exports, I began working with several banks in Fortaleza and São Paulo. When Fernando completed each phase of the program (Access), I tested it for errors.

At lunchtime, I joined my import-export co-workers in the company’s dining hall, located on the first floor of the Administrative Building. All was well between us.

Then the bomb fell. A Friday afternoon. Our export manager was fired. I was summoned to an emergency departmental meeting the next day.

Why was she fired? We could only speculate. Leaving earlier that day, she did not return to Fortaleza with us on the company bus. Her qualifications, hard work, and dedication were not enough to secure her position. When we become a problem—for whatever reason, within our control or not—we lose our value to the company. It was a lesson I could not afford to forget.

At the meeting that Saturday, Mr. Leonelli formed a new three-person export team. Each one of us was directly responsible to him. On Monday morning, I handed over my workload to Fernando.

Back again to the rumbling drums.

 

* Fictitious name

Drawing on My Guyanese Work Experience

13 Sunday Oct 2013

Posted by in Brazil, Guyana, Working Life

≈ 18 Comments

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Georgetown - GuyanaGeorgetown – Capital and Chief Port of Guyana
Photo by John Greene from MeGuyana.com

My fifteen-year work experience in Guyana played an important role in my success as an international trade professional in Brazil. This was especially the case in the tough work environment at Italbras Leather Producer & Exporter Ltd.*

In Guyana, I had worked in both the public and private sectors: high school teacher (geography and art), university assistant librarian trainee, and executive secretary (equivalent to today’s executive administrative assistant) at local Head Office branches of a multinational oil company and bank.

My teaching skills at simplifying difficult concepts in a step-by-step process came into play in identifying bottlenecks in work processes. At the end of my ill-fated, three-month probationary period at Italbras, my proposed flow chart for a more effective and time-saving control and record of foreign payments and export finance contracts saved the day.

Working in the private sector, I had observed that knowledge was power to guard for one’s own personal advancement within a company. This appeared counterintuitive. My inclination to share know-how appeared ingenuous to some of my colleagues. But my teacher-mentality and training skills paved the way for my professional growth.

The five years I had worked as an executive secretary to top-tier managers—four Guyanese and one Jamaican—prepared me for anticipating the needs of clients worldwide. In viewing a company as interconnected units working together for a common goal, I could appreciate the importance of each person’s role, including my own. Aware of the company’s plan for expansion, I knew that the export department would need restructuring for optimizing the control and flow of information.

Over the years in the workforce, we also pick up people skills. We learn how to work with others, to be part of a team, and to relate with demanding bosses and clients. With each conflict, with each mistake, we learn. We grow. Sometimes, our bosses throw us in the deep end, expecting us to know how to stay afloat.

My first experience of this kind occurred during the year I worked at the government secondary school in Guyana’s hinterland region. After the first term on the job, the headmaster announced his transfer to another school district, leaving me in charge as the acting headmistress. No time for understudy. The Ministry of Education showed no concern for my predicament. His replacement never materialized.

Criticism, opposition, and obstruction came from several fronts. I floundered. I was not up to the task.

The lessons learned during those months of struggle and eventual failure prepared me for rising above Italbras’ company politics and co-worker schemes to undermine my work. When our performance stands out, we can become a threat to our supervisors and co-workers, insecure about losing their promotion or their jobs.

Problem-solving and people skills don’t develop overnight. They are born of risk-taking and putting ourselves out there, of innumerable gaffes and mistakes, of ridicule and failure. It’s what gives the edge to older workers who often lack the high technological skills of our younger colleagues.

* Fictitious name

Brazil: Adapting to a Tough Work Environment

29 Sunday Sep 2013

Posted by in Brazil, Working Life

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Inside Brazilian TanneryInterior of a Cow Leather Factory in North Brazil
Photo Credit: Otavio Araujo Blogspot

When I began working at Italbras Leather Producer & Exporter Ltd.,* I did not think that I would survive the three-month probationary period. My body had a hard time adapting to waking at 4:00 a.m. After oversleeping one morning during the first week on the job, I started waking every hour to check the time. The stress took its toll. Before my probationary period ended, I had suffered two bouts of the flu.

Never before had I worked in such a noisy office environment. The Export Manager, her assistant, and I shared a spacious, open office with the Industrial Director (a paulista from the State of São Paulo) and his two production assistants, and the Import Manager. We occupied the top floor of a three-story building constructed within the leather factory. Half-walls of glass gave us a view of the factory floor.

The incessant rumbles of giant, rotating drums, blended with the cacophony of other machinery, disrupted my concentration. The constant movement and chatter of factory staff compounded my distress.

The company’s two cultures presented a graver challenge. The one-year-old company was a Brazilian-Italian joint-venture. The Italians provided the machinery and technology for finishing cow leather for upholstery. The Brazilian meat processing group, based in São Paulo, supplied the hides. The ‘wet blue’ tanned hides used at Italbras were tanned at another location.

In addition to being part of the export team and working under the watchful eye of the Industrial Director, I had to answer directly to two external bosses. Mr. Leonelli,* the Italian Commercial Director, supervised my control of payment receipts from overseas clients. For my control of export financing through Foreign Exchange Contracts (Contratos de Câmbio de Exportação), I worked closely with the Brazilian Finance Director in São Paulo.

Every three months, Mr. Leonelli—with whom the Export Manager maintained daily contact by phone—visited our factory in Cascavel, Ceará. Our first encounter was a disaster. I had committed some grave error in handling the account for our major American client. He had a fit. In a loud, agitated voice, he reprimanded me—in Italian.

Everyone tuned in to witness my public whipping. Seated still and attentive, I kept my eyes on him. When his tirade ended, I asked the Export Manager, fluent in Italian and English, to interpret what had just transpired. Knowledge of Italian was not a prerequisite for my post, but it became clear that I would need to learn the language.

I never got used to his verbal outbursts in Italian. Inevitably, in spite of my diligence, mistakes did occur. In assuming responsibility for my mistakes, acting on his criticisms about my work, understanding his vision of our goals, and learning new ways of handling a task or problem, I succeeded in establishing a productive, professional relationship with him.

Over time, I came to appreciate Mr. Leonelli’s excellence as a global commercial executive. Under his tutelage, I became a ‘top grain’ international trade professional.

* Fictitious name