Just a Good Ol' Boy

My friend has been battling a difficult employer for years...

The director of the library where she works is an ego-maniac who can do no wrong in his own eyes and has been a thorn in the flesh of many employees for quite some time.

A county library is run by the county commissioners and the county manager and the hiring and firing and employee complaints and such must go through them through a maze of protocol and hierarchy... once you are hired through the maze of red tape in a county government situation it takes almost an act of God to get un-hired!

Employees have complained for years about the mismanagement of the library, but much of their words have fallen on deaf ears... it's a "good ol' boy" way of life and if you're on the "good ol' boy" payroll you can get by with a lot before anybody listens.

Somebody finally listened! Good Ol' Boy library manager has been offered a position as assistant manager at a library halfway across the continent. Apparently not enough "evidence" to out and out fire the man, so he must have been offered an ultimatum... "move on and save face, they've got the goods on you, buddy!"

I'm just speculating here, I have no facts to back up my thoughts, but I've seen how local government can operate, I was in the newspaper business in that town for 10 years... I observed much of the "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" mentality that exists in a small town... and even in a larger town...

Politics doesn't seem to be much different, whether it's a local school board, a church committee, or a nation... it's not always the most qualified people who run things, it's the ones who kiss the most butts and scratch the most backs! Most of the time it's not WHAT you know, it's WHO you know that gets you up the political ladder.

Sad really...