My first job out of highschool: overnight loader/stocker at a hardware store. The guy who ran the big forklift in the lumber section was a bit of a cowboy. At

My first job out of highschool: overnight loader/stocker at a hardware store. The guy who ran the big forklift in the lumber section was a bit of a cowboy. At the start of the night there would be a big pile of lumber, and he had to sort it and get it on the shelves. We couldn’t really run two lifts at the same time due to aisle width, so he did the job solo, and ran the equipment fast to get it done in time. Start of shift one evening an upper manager came down and said they reviewed security camera footage, that he was driving too fast, and needed to be more careful. But how do I get it done in time, he said? She emitted the verbal equivalent of a shrug, and left. Because, of course, she doesn’t want him to be slower, she wanted him to be more careful. To be on record as having issued a warning, so that if something happened, her ass would be covered. She couldn’t solve the problem but she could certainly apportion blame beforehand. A formative experience for 19 year old me.