uncertain future

[Originally published on 11/10/20, 9:55 p.m.]

When I came back from my walk, one of the things my boss told me was that he might be on his way out due to yet more bullshit office politics.  Our CEO is trying to appear aloof from it all, but I suspect the man is the quiet impetus behind the campaign to force my boss into early retirement.  My boss—who says that, for years, he worked at this company with no contract at all—accepted being put on a contract over a year ago, and from my point of view, things have turned to shit since then.  While I'm back to working with my boss after a long stint in a different R&D department (where I was no more than a proofreader and scut-worker, doing nothing but minor, brainless tasks that any monkey can do), I should have realized that this wouldn't be a stable situation.  Hearing the news of possible bosslessness after my return from the walk was depressing, but not surprising.  Of course, my boss is at least partially the author of his own difficulties:  he can be loud, boorish, and stubborn, and despite having Koreanized after three decades in country, he's still locked in mortal combat with certain aspects of Korean corporate culture because, at heart, he still thinks like an American, and he isn't afraid to express his point of view.  Forcefully.

We'd heard last week that the CEO wanted to talk with my boss today (Tuesday).  The CEO called my boss earlier today to move the meeting to Wednesday, then he called again to move the meeting all the way to Friday the 20th at 9 p.m., which is the day I've scheduled for an in-office pre-Thanksgiving celebration.  I get the feeling that the CEO is dicking my boss around, purposely treating this meeting as a low priority.  It's unprofessional behavior, borderline childish, yet unsurprising from a Korean CEO.  My boss still seems under the delusion that he and the CEO are somehow simpatico; I lost that delusion the first time around, when our R&D team got displaced to a different wing of our company, and our boss got sidelined for a year, stuck in a quiet, empty office with nothing to do, nothing to work on.  It's as if the company bigwigs don't know what to do with a high-ranking foreigner in their midst, and this is, in fact, one of my boss's major complaints:  Korean executives don't like the idea of a high-ranking foreigner, so they'll do what they can to keep him down.  In this case, the HR department told my boss that, if he renews his contract, he can stay on for half his current salary, which is a deep and deliberate insult.  They obviously want him out of here.  The boss, meanwhile, thinks the CEO believes that the boss won't call his bluff and leave, but my boss says he's prepared to leave if half a salary is all he'll get.

The best-case scenario, from my point of view, is that the boss gets to stick around, at full salary, for another year, allowing us to work our way through most or all of the eight-book series of textbooks we're currently hammering out.  From my selfish standpoint, that'll allow me to work through the end of my current contract, which expires on my birthday, August 31, next year.  I can save a bundle of money up to that point, then decide what I'm doing next.*  In all likelihood, I won't be renewing with this company, which has dicked me around as well.  If I do renew, it won't be for more than another year or two:  I don't see myself growing old and dying while working in this dysfunctional shithole.  No fucking way.  The worst-case scenario is that all negotiations between my boss and the CEO fall through, and the boss leaves at the end of his contract, i.e., this coming December 4.  When he leaves, there'll be nothing to hold our R&D team together, and we'll either be shunted back to the R&D department I'd worked in in 2019 or be scattered to the four winds.  We'll see what happens, I guess.  It sucks not to feel as if the ground beneath my feet is solid, but welcome to expat life in Korea.  Stability is hard to attain even in the best of times.  Unless you're Korean.

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*Leaving this job would mean receiving my twoejik-geum, i.e., my severance pay, which equates to one month's salary per year worked on contract, according to Korean labor law.  For me, that means three months' pay as one lump sum although, in reality, taxes and fees will be taken out, so I won't receive anything near the full amount.  My final payout will probably be closer to two months' pay, all told.  If that.  Always brace for Murphy's Law, and keep your expectations low.  Korean corporations have a million ways to fuck you, so cynical mistrust is the name of the game, like it or not.  Sunny optimism is for suckers.