Trouble In A Bubble.

The Shawshank Policy

“From now on, I’m telling you all, I won’t be able to adjust your schedules for toilet breaks.”

Everyone was silent. Wait, what? “What are we, in prison?” I said. Welcome to Shawshank.

“I’m serious. It’s not so much the toilet that gets me, it’s going to the kitchen, hanging out and chatting, getting water… It takes too much time out of your schedule. There is no allowance in your schedule for toilet breaks.”

“Panini… Straight up. If I need to take a shit, I’ll take a shit.” I saw from the look on Panini’s face that he instantly recognised my logic was irrefutable. “So how does that apply to me?” I said.

Bright said “Do you have to say ‘shit’? How would you guys like it if I started talking about that time of the month?”

“To be honest, I don’t care. I’ve had girlfriends; I know the score.”

“Bright, please. I’m sure you’ve all heard it before. We can be mature about this. Now, as I’ve said, there is no allowance for toilet breaks in your schedule. Inbound consultants require many skills, and, unfortunately, bladder control is one of them. If you don’t find that suitable, perhaps you would prefer moving to an outbound role where it is an allowance.”

“But sometimes I get really intense diarrhoea…” started Al. “What am I supposed to do then?”

“If you’re sick, let me know, and we can deal with it on a case-by-case basis. As a general rule though, no toilet breaks.”

I’m not sure what Panini said after that, but somehow he managed to explain it in a way that made it seem perfectly rational, and I didn’t bring up my shit argument again.

After the meeting, Al turned to me and said “Remember in training when we were told we would be allowed toilet breaks, and that SalesWorld is a reasonable employer when it comes to that?”

“Yeah… In fact I remember Laphroaig’s exact words. He said that if you’ve had a dodgy vindaloo the night before, that’s fine, you’ll be able to use the toilet if you need it. Quite a turn-around.”

I told a couple of my friends outside of work on Panini’s Shawshank policy. They said the same thing, that he was obviously an inexperienced manager, and that how allowing your staff to have toilet “privileges” was really a basic tenet of management. I wondered how such a manager who was normally so rational would institute a rule that was obviously so irrational, and even impractical. Even if it was as Panini said, that there were people who were abusing going to the bathroom, then those individuals should be dealt with personally. A blanket rule is very inappropriate, and impractical.

During our entire team meeting, it was obvious that Panini had had his superiors come down on him… making demands from their ivory towers. So he had come down on us.

A couple of weeks later, I finished my shift at 5:30. I went to the toilet to lay down the brown, unwavering log of the law. Both of the stalls were full.

I waited there for about twelve minutes. Then Panini came out of the first stall.

“You could have gone upstairs you know,” he said.

“I would, I didn’t realise you were building the Taj Mahal in there.”

“Mate… It’s the only place I can get a break.”

I laughed for a second… Then I stopped laughing.

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