Response to Stage 1 Initial Notification

Ashland Food Co-op Performance Improvement

First I would like to point out that the incident regarding this Notification took place on Wednesday January 5, 2011 and not on January 6, 2011, as is reported by Elaine Deckleman. Also, much like her reported date, her description of the incident is full of mistakes and misinformation. Here is my response of the events that took place in the late afternoon of Jan. 5, 2011. First let me describe the day's tone leading up to the said event. Sari had called in sick that day, so we were short one person the entire day. Mia was still in training as the receiver, so you could say we were short one and a half people, as far as production was concerned. The day was extra busy with customer service much like it has been of late. Our large NOW order was late that week, perhaps because of weather delays. It arrived at 4 pm that Wednesday afternoon and needed to be stocked that day, as the next inventory and order needed to be placed the following day, Thursday. The order that arrived at 4 pm on Wednesday was rather large and consisted of 17 large boxes. It's our largest order every week and this order was large by any standards. Craig and I were working on the floor, attending to customers, and trying to get the order stocked in the remaining two hours of my shift. I'm scheduled 9-6 pm on Wednesdays, and when I leave, Craig is pretty much alone on the floor to perform customer service, which is sufficient for that purpose, but much of the time doesn't leave much time for putting away orders. So having this large NOW order come in at 4 pm didn't give us much time for getting it stocked and put away by the time I leave at 6 pm. Elaine had decided to spend time, that afternoon, training Mia with her receiving. And as I moved back and forth, from the floor to the warehouse, taking care of the NOW order, I kept noticing that Elaine had Mia engaged in various topics of conversation that had little to do with work, such as family, babies, and life in general. In fact, what I was noticing was that Mia was actually being slowed down in her attempts to count in the products of the orders she was receiving, because she was trying to listen to Elaine's conversation topics while at the same time trying to sort and count the merchandise. I thought to my self, "Oh great, now Mia's efforts are being reduced to a snails pace thanks to Elain's tendency to talk and socialize on the job." There's a place and time for that, and it's allowed, but I might mention that there was quite a bit of other receiving that needed to be done on this day, along with the large NOW order. Now it's worth mentioning that this was January 5th and that there were many cold days around this time with freezing fog being part of the winter mix. That being so, I was drawn to wear my full length, heavy winter coat. This coat was gifted to me and is truly a beautiful piece of clothing. And whenever I wear it, people, without fail, comment on how nice it is. This is the third winter that I have worn it on the coldest days, but when it's not terribly cold, I wear a short length jacket that I roll up and can fit easily in my locker. Back in the warehouse, between the filing cabinet and the shelves that contain my backstock, is an empty space where the wellness workers, usually six or seven of us, excluding Elaine, store things for the day or part of the day. Things like a coat or jacket, a purse, maybe some groceries or a treasure off the free shelf, ect. We have been storing things there for as long as I can remember. Literally years. And it's never been a problem for anyone, not even me whose backstock is located on some of the lower shelves there. After all, if it's a help to others to have a little personal space there, for storing things, then I'm all for it.

On January 5th 2011, I had folded my full length coat and placed it on a box in this space. At one point around 5 pm, I entered the warehouse and saw my coat sitting in a cardboard box, that was sitting on the wellness counter, with the words "Lost & Found" written on the box. I asked Elaine what she was doing with my coat. She says that she doesn't want any employee belongings in the warehouse. I explain that I don't want to hang it up downstairs because I'm afraid that someone might steal it. She asks that I hang it in my locker, to which I reply that it won't fit. (it's a four foot length coat and the lockers are 3 foot) And besides, our lockers are full of other stuff. I open the locker to show her and she says, well it can't stay here, I don't want this kind of stuff in the warehouse. I said, well it's too long to hang in my locker so I put it there to keep it from being stolen. I said I don't want to lose it, it's a three hundred and fifty dollar coat to kill for. I said it's not a problem for anyone for else and that we've been putting things in that corner for as long as I can remember. To which Elaine replies, well it's not ok with me. At this point I take and fold my coat in half and put it on one of the lower shelves where I store my NOW backstock and ask, will it be ok to put it here for now? To which she replies, yes. This series of exchanges is totally different from where Elaine attempts to simplify the event by saying that she asked me to hang the coat in my locker and that I refused. At this point, Elaine starts in with, "did you say you would kill me?" "It's not ok to use that word here or anywhere else at work." I'm in disbelief, at this point, at what I'm hearing. It's been more than five minutes since I said, "I don't want to lose it, it's a three hundred and fifty dollar coat to kill for." And now she's accusing me of threatening to kill her over a coat. I look at her and say to her, "why are you focused on such petty things (pointing to the stacks of boxes needing to be received), when we have all this work to do? At this point, I had made my way up onto the ladder to keep working, which is all I wanted to do anyway. I looked down at her and said, "Are we finished?", at which point the conversation ended. I would like to point out, that in other departments, I've noticed that when the team is buried in work, the other managers jump in and get things done. In our department, our manager rarely offers that kind of help and in this case slowed the production output by socializing in the warehouse. Adding to the frustration was her choice to focus on petty matters and then bring my production to a standstill. Now there's only one person in the department, Craig, who is moving forward, when what we really needed was for everyone to kick it up a notch and get the work done in a speedy fashion. As it turned out, I stayed an extra forty minutes to get the NOW order done, leaving at 6:40 pm instead of my usual 6 pm. And all because my work was brought to a standstill over a coat neatly folded and placed in a corner, which is in no way, in the sight of Elaine's office and has always been an accepted storage space for all our wellness workers. I believe that she wanted to intentionally provoke me by throwing my coat in a box and writing "Lost & Found" on it. I've worn the coat for three years and I can hardly imagine that she wasn't aware that it was my coat. That being so, a kinder gesture would have been to ask if it was my coat and ask if I could I put it in a different place. Not throw it in a box as she did. It was an act of provocation that points to her ongoing passive aggression towards me. And it doesn't make any sense for a manager to keep hassling a good worker in their department, especially when all they want to do is come to work and do their job. I'll talk some more about that later. I want to add that on January 27, 2011, less than two weeks later, James subbed for the first half of Mia's shift and had stored a couple of boxes of groceries and a large cardboard box in the same space where my coat was stored, and Elaine did not mention a word about it to him. When I came into the warehouse, I easily noticed it because he had a couple of bright, white rice cake packages sticking out of one of the boxes, extending out past the front of the filing cabinet. It was easily much more noticeable than my dark blue coat that had been stored there. It seems, that where there's a chance, Elaine will often choose and oftenbe unable to restrain

herself from attacking me in some form or fashion. And she often misconstrues the facts in such a way as to make me look like I'm being defiant, threatening, refusing orders, being disrepectful, argumentive, teasing, and bullying, just to use some of the words that she uses in this Notification to descibe her view on my behavior. Now I would like to respond to something else in this Notification where I am being falsely accused of "talking about wanting to kill somebody in an interaction with Rosie Dunaway in 2009". This is totally false and a very bad thing to be accusing someone of. On the day that I was given this Notification, I finally submitted my response to the incident with Rosie and the written warning that I was given. This response to the written warning is availabel to anyone that would like to read it. I would be happy to provide it. In this response, I mention that Rosie had reported to management that I had said to her "I warned her not to go to war with me". What I had actually had said was, " If it were me, I wouldn't go to war over something like this." This is in reference to her giving me a written warning for telling a sexual joke. (something that people do at the Co-op on a regular basis) I was suggesting to her that I didn't think that telling a joke was something to go to war over. War being a descriptive reference to the act of giving someone a written warning. At no point do I mention the word "kill", or refer to "wanting to kill somebody", as Elaine has written in this current Notification. I had waited almost two years, about a year and ten months, before handing in my response to that written warning involving myself, Josh, and Rosie. I don't come to work looking for drama or any other adrenaline filled encounters. I have enough work to do each week to keep me busy, with little time for anything else. In fact, I didn't hand in my response because I thought things would settle down and that the hostility towards me would stop. And here I am forced to say, that for several months I attended the Board of Directors meetings, after my last written warning, because it was the only place that I felt safe. I was being attacked for unfair and bizarre reasons and I felt that my job was threatened. Once again I feel that my job is being threatened and I am yet to be shown any support, except for Ric Sayre, by the management. I have to say that I enjoyed the mature and functional process of the Board meetings, but the main reason I was there was to find a safe haven under times of severe distress. As it is, I like my job. I like the Co-op. I love the customers and the opportunity I have to help them. I like the people I work with. I even like Elaine, even though I'm concerned with her ongoing aggression towards me and others and her mental state. In this coat incident I believe she has gone way over the top. In my response to the written warning given to me for telling Rosie a joke, I clearly present 5 incidents that I believe show a pattern of hostility and unfair disciplinary actions that Elaine has taken towards me in the last few years. This incident with the coat would be incident number 6. And this incident and her presentation of it is no laughing matter to me, because her pattern of hostility and aggression keeps increasing in its intensity, accusations,and suggested consequences towards me. And as I have pointed out, in my response to my last written warning, the accusations she has used against me are incorrect and the charges trumped up. For instance, where she has asked me for my opinion and I gave it, and then has written me up, is insanity. I admit that I give a clear statements of how I feel about things, but I do not swear and talk disrespectfully to Elaine. In the coat incident I may have shown some frustration, but when one is provoked, as I believe I was, then anger is an appropriate and natural response to such provocation. I would like to close with a deeper assesment of what I think is going on. In the past, on one occasion, Elaine confided in me that her mother had a poor view of her father and that she had taken on some of that view in what I would call a "Father Wound". It's been my observation and the observation of the other Wellness workers, that Elaine, because of this "Father Wound", has difficulty working with and communicating with men. It's my observation that her borrowed hostility, from her mother, towards her father, keeps manifesting as hostility towards the males in her department, especially those that dare to have a voice or opinion, and especially if that voice is not in agreement with her opinion or position on a matter. And it doesn't have to even be a big disagreement. It can be seen that even the slightest difference of opinion can be enough to upset

and throw her emotions off balance. Not an easy thing for her workers to deal with on a daily basis. What worries me in this coat incident is her wording in the Notification (in capital and bold letters) under the section entitled CONSEQUENCES OF NON-COMPLIANCE: where she states: "Because this issue and similar issues have been addressed repeatedly through coaching, evaluations, and three separate Performance Improvement documents, noncompliance may result in probation or dismissal." It's my firm belief that I am being victimized by a psychological condition that Elaine suffers from in relation to her family and personal history. And at this point in time it has not been effectively addressed by the General Manager or the Human Resource manager. I'm not sure if they are not qualified enough to be aware of her problem or are just too busy to connect the events over time. I know that many people, over the years, have complained about concerns that they have had with Elaine's behavior. As I said, I like Elaine, I think that overall she has many good qualities. But this particular hostility towards men with opinions and I would have to include even women who have strong opinions (as expressed by other female workers in our department) has become too much of a problem, especially when the problem threatens a good worker's job. And not only does it threatens one's job, but it has a drastic effect upon the moral of the person and the Wellness department. Thank you for the opportunity to Respond, P.S. I would like to add that Mia Cohen who was present for this entire incident is my witness and has confided to me on more than one occasion that she in no way ever heard me threaten or say that I would kill Elaine Deckleman.

Joseph Tokarz January 30, 2011