All is fair in love - Part 1

Sonia and Neeraj were both amongst top performers of my team. As their manager, I felt proud to have someone that competent. I was the manager and all three of us were in same team. Neeraj was a typical geek and would know the systems like he would have designed it himself. He could resolve issues from the client even in his sleep. Sonia was also good, though not to Neeraj's calibre. She was more easily recognized for another reason. She was stunningly beautiful but given the typical male Delhi colleagues stayed away from them. She would dine alone in office cafetaria, girls stayed away from her due to jealousy and she herself stayed away from boys.

One fine day, there was huge buzz around the floor. Money- that we all want- was there...there almost for free. How? Wait, first things first. A deadly virus had struck the computers of our client in USA. And client wanted all issues resolved as fast as possible, even as virus continued to spread creating havoc. Seeing the potential business loss of client, it made sense to pay a bit more to trained employees to do extra bit, and limit the damage and recover business. Quickly enough, the management designed an innovative scheme.

I called the the project team to announce it.
"Ok guys (in a gender neutral way). Daily minimum 50 tickets resolved, with customer satisfaction (C-SAT) score of 4 and above on sacale of 5 and with a turnround time of 30 mins for 90% tickets - Do it and Rs 2000 cash per day, over and above salary . Money to be accumlated and paid at end of month" Now, that was cool. It meant extending beyond 8 hrs daily to may be 10-12 since we solved about 25 tickets per head per day. But potentially 50-60k per month was like doubling the salary!!! Chance of a life.
Neeraj took it up. He started dreamig of a bike.
Sonia took it up. She wanted to buy an iphone.

Day 1- Neeraj clicked his numbers easily. Sonia did 12 hrs, 50 tickets, but missed CSAT.
Day 2 - Neeraj clicked. Sonia 12 hrs, 50 tickets, missed CSAT.
Day 3- same as Day 1 and 2.
Day 4- Neeraj clicked. And..........Sonia clicked too...wooooaaaawww!!!
Day 5 wow wow
Day 6 wow wow wow
...happily ever after. Hmmm..well, almost!

Next week, in weekly report, Quality Monitoring team reported to me that Sonia fudged the C-SAT scores from Day 4-6 and it was not customer who rated the code but the rating was done by an IP address from within the team, on the work-floor itself. And Sonia's iphone crashed before it came. Well...again.....almost.

I summoned Sonia and confronted her with the data. In her early 20s, she behaved like the just-out-of-teens kid she was. Unstoppable in letting her tear ducts to flood and drown the data, she refused to agree. I said its not something difficult to see, why someone would do fudging and who is the beneficiary. "Story is over dear!" and not just her daily bonus, fudging meant loss of job. She continued to be in denial.

Next day, it was my turn to be summoned and being shocked. Deepali, the HR lady called me and demanded in an authoritarian tone as to what business I had to allege against an employee's character without proof. Whattt???? Excuse me! I was raging like anyone in the situation would. "Look- I am not answering this , okay! I should be the one seeking answers from Sonia." HR would have none of it. Sonia had been to HR the previous day and said her integirty was being doubted. I left the HR room with clear thoughts- you want proof- so be it. And if earlier it was any mercy for Sonia, because of her past, now it was none.

I asked the technical team for more details of IP address, time, edit of the CSAT score and next day the report came. It was yet another shock- finger of suspicion pointed to .....no, not Sonia, but Neeraj! Neeraj was the only common logged-in employee at the exact time of edits in CSAT, on all three days.

"I love her" said Neeraj when asked as to the reason for fudging Sonia's CSAT. He didnt lie or try to cover up in any way.
Okay! I said. Your love could mean the company the business ..or it could mean your job. Better be the latter, if it was to be any justice.
I started feeling in the midst of a live Bollywood movie.  Ok buddy- but still, what about Sonia? She would know how her fotune changed and if their was a foreign hand if not overtly colluded with you. It is hard to believe otherwise. And started the story that only became the gossip story of the company for long long time to come.

Sonia adamant. Neeraj resigned to his fate. HR and I discussed and under the circumstances we had no option but to terminate Neeraj despite his cooperative nature and forgive Sonia, despite her intransigence. After Sonia's iphone, Neeraj's car also crashed without being driven.

Neeraj left the Company. Sonia became very reserved and confined to work. She improved her performance, may be hurt by the entire episode. But lost her iphone.

Neeraj lost his heart. And job.
In due course, I also left the job too and all three of us were in different companies. Someone called me after about a year and asked,
" Were you Sonia's manager last year?".
"Yes"
"We are considering her for promotion. And we hear she was involved in an unethical incident of fudging. Your comments?"
"Well, yes there was this episode but it was another guy who fudged her account and based on evidence I would say she was innocent then and we shouldnt hold it against her."
We talked few more minutes and I hung up.
Sonia called me later to thank me.

Time passed. Sonia and I used to exchange occasional mails on occasions of importance. Till one fine day...I received her wedding card. I opened it to read...

"Sonia weds Neeraj"

I read again...words didnt melt away no matter how often I read or how hard I stared at them. And only got cemented when I read full names including surname. My reactions and thoughts are unclear to me even till date....

To be continued......
(Based on real-life events. Names changed to protect identity. Incidents and settings suitably adapted without loss of fidelity of the known human behavior and spirit of the real-life events)