I’ve worked for my employer now for around 10 months, and in that time I’ve seen, and been responsible for, a lot of change.

In fact, one of my reasons for being here is to change the culture and working practices to be more customer focused.

So imagine my horror this morning when one of the customer service team slowly turned his chair to face me, looked me dead in the eyes and said, with a face of dread, that things are starting to ‘revert back to the dark ages’.

My heart sank.

The ‘dark ages’ is clearly a reference to the old management regime that caused so much grief and misery.  A regime that was responsible for tears, blood and the undercurrent of mutiny I felt when I first walked through the door almost a year ago.

But that regime ended months ago!  How could we be slipping back?  What could have possibly happened?  I’ve worked so hard to maintain a level of motivation and joy in the business and I can’t believe it’s starting to fall apart like an over-dunked custard cream.  This is disastrous!

I muster the strength and courage to ask the unaskable question; the question I feared the answer to the most in the world at this moment in time.  The only question I could ever ask….

“What do you mean?”

The world goes silent.  There’s only he and I now.  I can hear my own heartbeat and breath, which sounds to me like Darth Vader after a brisk jog.

I wait for his answer; an answer I dread to hear but I know I must hear.
An eternity passes.

He looks me deep in the eyes now, his face contorted with apprehension.  This could potentially ruin my upcoming new year celebrations.

He clears his throat and opens his mouth to speak.  Here is comes…here comes the moment of truth.

“This may need to come from you rather than anyone else Dan”, he continues, delaying the moment.

Oh no, it’s serious.  It’s so serious that I’m going to have to be the one responsible for managing the consequential impact on the entire business.

“What is it Brandon?” I ask, holding back a mix of emotions.

He opens his mouth to speak again.  He we go….

…

…

…

“There are coffee granules starting to reappear in the sugar”