The Promotion
Posted: Sat Jun 05, 2021 10:54 am
Chapter 1 - Assistant Manager
Working for minimum wage was hard, Niya decided. She'd had that thought often but this shift was being especially challenging. She'd nearly broke composure, pulled down her thick glasses to glare and shout rather creative expletives after the fifth customer had complained the coffee was too cold. And of course, once she had fufilled the request to heat it up, the customer had then fussed that it was too hot. The only thing stopping Niya from losing her mind was her stunningly commendable sense of professionalism.
Niya had worked in customer service in this nation-wide coffee store for only a few months but already that unshakeable competence had gained the admiration of the store manager. Most people quit after a couple days if they made it through their first shift. Even the assistant managers he'd been going through like toliet paper. He watched as Niya pulled her frizzy hair back, gave a polite smile to another insuffrable customer with an innane complaint and did her best to fix the issue. Yes, he decided. She might be underqualified for the role but he expected she could do it better than anyone else.
The shift had just ended and Niya put her apron back in the staff room, unbuttoning the top of her shirt and laid lazily down on a nearby chair exhausted. She was only 25 but at this rate she was worried she was going to be getting stresslines before next year. Joe walked in, grin on his face; for what reason, Niya had no idea.
"Ello, Niya," He said, his odd accent coming through along with a smug tone, "Good news for ya."
"Hm?" She responded, hurrying to make her posture more practiced while in front of her boss.
"Well, it took a bit to convince the higher ups. Ah said ah'd take the heat if anything went wrong... But..." He grinned, "You're gonna be getting double the salary from now on, Assistant Manager."
It took all her willpower to not squee happily and hug Joe. But she attempted to remain composed, though a smile creeped onto her face, "What duties does that contain?"
"Ah, you'll just be helpin' to train new staff. And when ah'm gone for whatever reason, you gotta deal with the higher ups," He paused, "Good thing ah got them to agree. Guess ah'll be able to take my vacation this year after all..."
Niya's betraying smile grew bigger, "You deserve it. Thanks for this opportunity, Sir."
"Ah, we're both off duty. Just call me Joe, aight?" He paused, before shrugging, "How about we get a few drinks to celebrate?"
Normally Niya wouldn't bother with going for drinks, she would rather spend the time catching up on Netflix and lazily lying on the sofa relaxing. However, Joe was a legitamately nice guy. And she was very giddy from the promotion. So she decided, why the hell not?
And in the end, her reasoning turned out correct. She had a good time, Joe gave her some of the details of the role. She'd be having to face her first major challenge as assistant manager soon. She'd be running the store by herself for seven days with her only help being the new hire who hadn't even done their first shift. She nodded, her dark cheeks a bit flushed from the alcohol and promised Joe that everything would go well. And she intended to keep that promise.
---
It was the first day of Niya's solo week and everything had already went wrong. She'd had an appointment over video call with the regional manager she'd had to delay at last minute due to the new hire being a hour late. So she'd took over duties at the front of the shop making coffee and dealing with customers who seemed to be especially rude today. When the late newcomer eventually arrived, Niya sighed in relief.
"Oh, thank god you're here, Eliza." Niya didn't even wait for the inevitable excuse of the short girls latecoming, just glad that she made it in at all, "Can you take over here for ten minutes? I'll be back to help soon, I just really need to do something in the back."
Niya found herself rushing towards the backroom where a video call awaited. She didn't even bother to change out of her apron. With a check of the time, she realised she was one minute late for the meeting and gave an unsatisifed curse. After checking she made the call and the face of an unhappy older blonde woman appeared on her screen. She reminded Niya of some of the most obnoxious customers she'd had, almost with frown lines from all the scowling she probably did and despite her eyes focused on Niya she seemed to be ignoring her, as if she was simply decoration.
"It's rather unproffesional to be late to your first meeting," The lady who after a brief glance at the screen Niya realised was called Mrs Williams, "I do hope Joesph made the right call by hiring you."
Niya found herself taken aback by how forward this lady was, "I apologise Mrs Williams. It won't happen again." She said hesitantly, trying to keep your face unreadable.
"Naturally," She said coldly, "I'm calling about the Promotion."
Niya nodded hesitantly in response, "Well... Things have been going well so far. The store is running at capacity and the new trainee seems to be..." Niya found herself rudely cut off.
"Not that Promotion," She sighed, "The Au Natural Promotion. You should've seen it in your email?"
That'd been the first time Niya had heard about it. Unsurpisingly because she hadn't even been given an employee email yet (which Niya noted, wasn't her fault as she was still waiting for the IT team on that), "Er... I don't have my email set up yet, Mrs Williams."
She somehow scowled even larger, with her frown now taking up half her face, "Really? The Promotion is two days away. You won't be able to hire models in that time." Then the unthinkable happened; she smiled. Mrs Williams smugly continued "I suppose you'll have to just use employees. It's happened in the past."
"Could I have some details about this Promotion?" Niya said, face scrunched up. She was barely running the shop without putting on a promotional show.
"Of course," The lady was suprisingly forward and happy to share the information, "We like to prove that our coffee is 100% natural without any chemicals and nothing to hide. For that reason, we do a bit of a publicity stunt. We show that our employees don't hide anything either. They come to work wearing nothing but a confident smile." She said it naturally, as if what she'd just spoken wasn't completely insane.
Niya took a stunned second of silence to respond, her glasses ascew, "Y-You mean, naked? At work?" Her professionalism had officially broke, replaced with the embarrassed squeakings of an insecure woman.
"No, of course not." She replied smugly, "You'd know all this if you read the email. You'll have an apron on. You'll be outside the coffee shop too at a small table; offering samples."
"B-But," Niya desperately scrambles for a way out of this, panicking at even the thought, "W-We only have two employees in store including myself!"
Mrs Williams shrugged, the smallest sense of humour now gone from her voice, "You only need one to do the promotion. The other can stay inside the store, fully dressed. You should know that this promotion came from above me. All I'm supposed to do is make sure it is done," She frowns, "I assume there won't be any problems?"
Niya thought. She'd just got this job paying well and as much as she sometimes hated it, she felt it was rewarding; she'd got promoted after only a few months and was informed by Joe there was a major possibility for her to go further. Speaking of Joe, he would get into trouble for going on vacation and she'd promised she wouldn't let him down. And... Well...
She was a professional. This wouldn't be an issue. She'd get it done.
"No problem, Mrs. Williams. Anything else?"
Working for minimum wage was hard, Niya decided. She'd had that thought often but this shift was being especially challenging. She'd nearly broke composure, pulled down her thick glasses to glare and shout rather creative expletives after the fifth customer had complained the coffee was too cold. And of course, once she had fufilled the request to heat it up, the customer had then fussed that it was too hot. The only thing stopping Niya from losing her mind was her stunningly commendable sense of professionalism.
Niya had worked in customer service in this nation-wide coffee store for only a few months but already that unshakeable competence had gained the admiration of the store manager. Most people quit after a couple days if they made it through their first shift. Even the assistant managers he'd been going through like toliet paper. He watched as Niya pulled her frizzy hair back, gave a polite smile to another insuffrable customer with an innane complaint and did her best to fix the issue. Yes, he decided. She might be underqualified for the role but he expected she could do it better than anyone else.
The shift had just ended and Niya put her apron back in the staff room, unbuttoning the top of her shirt and laid lazily down on a nearby chair exhausted. She was only 25 but at this rate she was worried she was going to be getting stresslines before next year. Joe walked in, grin on his face; for what reason, Niya had no idea.
"Ello, Niya," He said, his odd accent coming through along with a smug tone, "Good news for ya."
"Hm?" She responded, hurrying to make her posture more practiced while in front of her boss.
"Well, it took a bit to convince the higher ups. Ah said ah'd take the heat if anything went wrong... But..." He grinned, "You're gonna be getting double the salary from now on, Assistant Manager."
It took all her willpower to not squee happily and hug Joe. But she attempted to remain composed, though a smile creeped onto her face, "What duties does that contain?"
"Ah, you'll just be helpin' to train new staff. And when ah'm gone for whatever reason, you gotta deal with the higher ups," He paused, "Good thing ah got them to agree. Guess ah'll be able to take my vacation this year after all..."
Niya's betraying smile grew bigger, "You deserve it. Thanks for this opportunity, Sir."
"Ah, we're both off duty. Just call me Joe, aight?" He paused, before shrugging, "How about we get a few drinks to celebrate?"
Normally Niya wouldn't bother with going for drinks, she would rather spend the time catching up on Netflix and lazily lying on the sofa relaxing. However, Joe was a legitamately nice guy. And she was very giddy from the promotion. So she decided, why the hell not?
And in the end, her reasoning turned out correct. She had a good time, Joe gave her some of the details of the role. She'd be having to face her first major challenge as assistant manager soon. She'd be running the store by herself for seven days with her only help being the new hire who hadn't even done their first shift. She nodded, her dark cheeks a bit flushed from the alcohol and promised Joe that everything would go well. And she intended to keep that promise.
---
It was the first day of Niya's solo week and everything had already went wrong. She'd had an appointment over video call with the regional manager she'd had to delay at last minute due to the new hire being a hour late. So she'd took over duties at the front of the shop making coffee and dealing with customers who seemed to be especially rude today. When the late newcomer eventually arrived, Niya sighed in relief.
"Oh, thank god you're here, Eliza." Niya didn't even wait for the inevitable excuse of the short girls latecoming, just glad that she made it in at all, "Can you take over here for ten minutes? I'll be back to help soon, I just really need to do something in the back."
Niya found herself rushing towards the backroom where a video call awaited. She didn't even bother to change out of her apron. With a check of the time, she realised she was one minute late for the meeting and gave an unsatisifed curse. After checking she made the call and the face of an unhappy older blonde woman appeared on her screen. She reminded Niya of some of the most obnoxious customers she'd had, almost with frown lines from all the scowling she probably did and despite her eyes focused on Niya she seemed to be ignoring her, as if she was simply decoration.
"It's rather unproffesional to be late to your first meeting," The lady who after a brief glance at the screen Niya realised was called Mrs Williams, "I do hope Joesph made the right call by hiring you."
Niya found herself taken aback by how forward this lady was, "I apologise Mrs Williams. It won't happen again." She said hesitantly, trying to keep your face unreadable.
"Naturally," She said coldly, "I'm calling about the Promotion."
Niya nodded hesitantly in response, "Well... Things have been going well so far. The store is running at capacity and the new trainee seems to be..." Niya found herself rudely cut off.
"Not that Promotion," She sighed, "The Au Natural Promotion. You should've seen it in your email?"
That'd been the first time Niya had heard about it. Unsurpisingly because she hadn't even been given an employee email yet (which Niya noted, wasn't her fault as she was still waiting for the IT team on that), "Er... I don't have my email set up yet, Mrs Williams."
She somehow scowled even larger, with her frown now taking up half her face, "Really? The Promotion is two days away. You won't be able to hire models in that time." Then the unthinkable happened; she smiled. Mrs Williams smugly continued "I suppose you'll have to just use employees. It's happened in the past."
"Could I have some details about this Promotion?" Niya said, face scrunched up. She was barely running the shop without putting on a promotional show.
"Of course," The lady was suprisingly forward and happy to share the information, "We like to prove that our coffee is 100% natural without any chemicals and nothing to hide. For that reason, we do a bit of a publicity stunt. We show that our employees don't hide anything either. They come to work wearing nothing but a confident smile." She said it naturally, as if what she'd just spoken wasn't completely insane.
Niya took a stunned second of silence to respond, her glasses ascew, "Y-You mean, naked? At work?" Her professionalism had officially broke, replaced with the embarrassed squeakings of an insecure woman.
"No, of course not." She replied smugly, "You'd know all this if you read the email. You'll have an apron on. You'll be outside the coffee shop too at a small table; offering samples."
"B-But," Niya desperately scrambles for a way out of this, panicking at even the thought, "W-We only have two employees in store including myself!"
Mrs Williams shrugged, the smallest sense of humour now gone from her voice, "You only need one to do the promotion. The other can stay inside the store, fully dressed. You should know that this promotion came from above me. All I'm supposed to do is make sure it is done," She frowns, "I assume there won't be any problems?"
Niya thought. She'd just got this job paying well and as much as she sometimes hated it, she felt it was rewarding; she'd got promoted after only a few months and was informed by Joe there was a major possibility for her to go further. Speaking of Joe, he would get into trouble for going on vacation and she'd promised she wouldn't let him down. And... Well...
She was a professional. This wouldn't be an issue. She'd get it done.
"No problem, Mrs. Williams. Anything else?"