|
Sacramento
Bee
March
27, 2000
MANY
EMPLOYEES FEEL THEY WORK IN DEN OF THIEVES
The homemade cheesecake with its "Happy Birthday" message
was placed in the office refrigerator to await the festivities
planned for later in the day. But when the party for the
cherished co-worker was to begin, the worst was discovered: The
cake was no longer there. "It had simply vanished. It
has never been seen since," said an employee of a downtown
Sacramento company who recounted the exasperating incident. Such
tales of pilfering from the communal company refrigerator are
common. It is a sad but true fact that in many American
workplaces, one's bologna sandwich is not safe from one's colleagues.
Take the case of Donna's tub of chocolate chip cookie dough. She
put the tub of cookie dough she bought as part of a school fund-raiser
in the office refrigerator with the intention of taking it home
that night. But when quitting time came, the tub had vanished. Infuriated,
Donna fired off a lengthy note of indignation that said, in effect:
"I hope you are enjoying my cookies. My children were looking
forward to baking these cookies over the weekend. Now you've disappointed
them." She couldn't have been more angry if it had been
her grandmother's brooch that had been stolen, one of her friends
recalled.
Donna's name has been changed for this story. For that matter,
all who were interviewed for this story requested anonymity for
fear that their offices would be forever branded as hotbeds of
stolen yogurt. They all spoke with deep disgust, however.
These crimes of the stomach are not soon forgotten or easily forgiven.
People steal from company refrigerators, according to the victims,
because:
"This just rationalizes and justifies their behavior. It
doesn't mean it's right. It just gives you your own reason for
doing it," said Frank Bucaro, the author of "Taking
the High Road: How to Succeed Ethically When Others Bend the Rules."
"It's
just nuts. People feel their turf is being violated. If my name
is on the bag and the bag is gone, I am being violated here,"
he said.
"Part of the problem is they don't realize what the effect
is on those around them," he said. "I equate the decision
(to steal food) to throwing a rock in a pond. No matter how small
or big the rock is, or thus the decision is, it makes ripples.
It affects other people." And if someone is brazen enough
to steal a banana, what else is he or she taking? Bucaro asked.
"I think what happens is that the ultimate consequence is,
if we know you are stealing pop, then we wonder what else you
are stealing," he said. "That's what I call the "moral
spiral.' One issue leads to another, leads to another leads to
another, leads to another."
A 1999 survey from Michael G. Kessler & Associates, an international
investigative and forensic accounting firm in New York, turned
up some pretty astounding facts on office theft of all kinds.
About 79 percent of employees steal from their employers to the
tune of more than $120 billion a year. In fact, the study
concluded that "not only do employees steal, they outsteal
shoplifters."
Nan
DeMars, an office ethics expert, columnist for OfficeClick.com,
and the author of "You Want Me to Do WHAT? When, Where and
How to Draw the Line at Work," asks how much is too much?
"We all know that we take pens. We use the telephones for
personal calls and the fax machines and the copy machines. I go
down to two words: "reasonable use,' " she said. "I
think most companies are putting in their (employee) handbooks
the simple statement that all of these things can be "used'
by personnel if it is "reasonable use." But taking someone's
croissant is even too much for her. "Stealing somebody's
lunch probably isn't reasonable use. Just common courtesy tells
you you should at least ask the person," she said.
No one asked Lisa, an administrative assistant for a Sacramento
non-profit company, if her Snapple could be taken. That happened
several times. And one day, someone swiped two bottles of Snapple.
"I'd write my name on them but people were still helping
themselves. It would happen during business hours, which meant
it was one of my co-workers," she said. She stopped
short of insisting on random Breathalyzer tests or dusting the
refrigerator for sticky fingerprints.
"When you go to grab one in the afternoon and it is not there,
you get a little upset," Lisa said. "I put a note up
on the refrigerator: "Whoever stole it, no questions asked,
just please replace them. You don't have to tell me who you are.
Just leave them on my desk.' Of course, I got no response."
The types of things taken without permission from the office fridge
are quite baffling: At one downtown office building, a worker
brought in some muffins only to later discover that someone had
eaten all the tops. One woman partially ate one half of her
sandwich before rewrapping it and putting it back in the refrigerator.
Someone unwrapped it, took the uneaten half and rejected the nibbled
portion. Another worker was looking forward to the won-ton
soup he brought in for lunch. But someone drank the broth, leaving
the noodles behind. One person even sent out an office e-mail:
"Would the person who keeps stealing my lunch out of the
office fridge please let me know if you need the money. I'll be
happy to pay for your lunch. Just leave mine alone."
|
