The bizarre tale of how I lost my job

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Only a month ago, I landed a job as an aircraft cleaner. Not a very romantic job, granted, but I found it enjoyable and easy enough to do. Or so I thought.

The job advert I read online said that this particular job opening was made to accomodate applicants with a disability/disorder. It's from this frame that I applied for it. I got all the prepatory things done, receiving all the green lights that come with working at an airport, and I also got a job coach to help me out.

Now there are three parties here you have to remember, because it gets a little complicated:
1. There's A., which is the cleaning company that is charged with cleaning the planes.
2. There's T., which is the employment agency via which I would work for a while before being hired by A. directly.
3. There's W., which is an initiative that helps people with disabilities/disorders find work. My job coach works for them.

So the steps between me and work are W.>T.>A.

One other thing you must know is that, besides cleaning aircraft, I also have another job in the morning, serving coffee (different company).

Yesterday evening, I had a fine day at work. The crew leader was cool, I thought I was working well with my colleagues, and I was satisfied with my work done.

This morning, I called my job coach by phone, because I wasn't able to meet her at W. office in the morning. She made an appointment with a colleague of her so I could come there in the afternoon so I could sign my contract (which took a long time coming through and being green-lit and everything). She also told me that, since I had been experiencing some inconvenience at work in the past 2 weeks or so, I could be assigned another task within the cleaning company, something that would perhaps be not quite as high-pressure. I agreed that I would like to give that a try. Please note here that she also told me during this conversation, that the feedback from my team leaders at the cleaning company was very positive, and they thought I was working very well.

So I went to W.'s office to sign the contract (my job coach couldn't be there, because she didn't work in the afternoon, her colleague was taking over).

In the early afternoon, I called T. to suggest the change of my schedule of next week to the new deep-cleaning service, to which they agreed, because they had already been informed. But I wanted to know what the times were for this deep-cleaning job, because I still needed to combine it with my coffee job. They told me this wasn't possible because the deepcleaning is mon-to-fri 9-5 every day. So, I told them this was really inconvenient for me, and asked them to change my shifts back to my regular afternoons of fast aircraft cleaning.

THAT'S WHERE THEY TOLD ME THAT I WAS NO LONGER ALLOWED TO DO THOSE FAST CLEANING SHIFTS.

As any confused but rational person would do, I asked: "Why am I no longer allowed to do those shifts?"
The answer was: "Because you are working too slow. We have to take into account the fact that traffic at the airport will increase in the coming months, and you're too slow to keep it up."
Which is quite a contrast to my job coach telling me this morning that she had been told by the cleaning company and T. that they were pleased with my work.

So I tell them "I'm very sorry, but I can't drop this coffee job in the morning." T%o which the reply pretty much amounted to "Then there's nothing else we can do for you sir."

What the hell? Here I was, fresh from signing my contract FINALLY, only to be told that my association with T. would have to dissolve already. Supposedly because I'M not flexible enough. Even though I had been waiting for weeks for my job coach to move and address the few problems I was experiencing (isn't that what a job coach is for? Especially since this job was assigned to me on basis of my disorder, and there was supposed to be assistance?).

I think it's a very, very strange thing, and I'm still angry about it. Also because the whole deep-cleaning thing was only SUGGESTED to me BY MY JOB COACH just this morning. She never said that it was something I HAD to do, and she certainly didn't say that it was the end of regular shifts for me. The whole 'You're working too slow' thing came as a COMPLETE AND UTTER surprise to me. It just came out of nowhere. It came from left-field. I had trouble constructing coherent thoughts and sentences afer hearing it.

At least when I worked at the factory a year ago, the employers over there had the DECENCY to let me try out for a couple of months, and then extend my contract by three more months to give me a chance. And they had far higher stakes when it comes to profit when compared to this cleaning company. There was NO job coach over there, I was working as an equal to all my other colleagues, no disability leeway, no nothing. They were KIND enough to let me work there for 6 months before letting me go because I couldn't keep up with production there. These guys over here, W., T., A., they hire me in the frame of my disorder, and they just write me off overnight.

I completely understand why you would be upset after experiencing that. I would be very angry too. I can't stand being lied to or being deceived.

On one of my last interviews, while trying to hint of my autism to the interviewers, by answering the idiotic question, "What is your greatest weakness?". I responded by stating that interviews are my weakness, due to my lack of proper articulation and inability to maintain solid eye contact, but I assured him of my qualifications and relevant experience.

One of the interviewers repeatedly assured me that I was doing "fine", "great", and so forth (all while he smiled). But I noticed that he didn't bother to write a single note on his papers, as if he had already made up his mind not to consider me for the position. I reluctantly thanked him every time he gave me an assurance over my interview performance, 'cause I knew he was lying. I felt my blood boil each time he smiled and assured me I was doing fine, yet I maintained my insincere smile.

I'd readily welcome constructive or practical criticism over polite lies any day. NTs are master liars and deceivers!

BTW, I wasn't offered the job.

I would call your regular job coach and tell her what happened and make it very clear you would like your previous job back.

Tell her you feel you feel you were wrongfully mislead and let go, that no one had ever indicated to you in any way that your work speed with insufficient, quite the contrary, you were told your superiors were very pleased with your work, and so you were never given the opportunity to increase your work speed, which you are quite able to do.

This job sounds like it was created by the government paying companies to hire disabled workers. Many companies that don't really want disabled workers, will take the gov money provided through these special hiring programs, and will temporarily hire people through the pragram. Then they will make sure to find some excuse to terminate each of these people before they have been on the job long enough to get signed up for company benefits. They will then "hire" more disadvantage/disabled people and terminate the new ones also, before they can sign up for benefits. These companies will keep doing this over and over again, to get the free gov money, without having to provide any company benefits to these new hires. Companies that keep "flipping" such new hires should be barred from participating in such programs. Remember, it is the tax payers who provide the money that the gov uses to fund these programs, so the gov should protect the tax payers and the new hires from getting ripped off. I won't hold my breath waiting for the gov to insist on accountability from these companies. The gov itself won't even be accountable to the tax paying citizens for all the money the gov wastes on things that the gov is not supposed to be paying for. But wait! Congressman X wants the entire country to fund some job program in his state, instead of having his own state fund it. And Senator Y has a poor, poor, wealthy friend, who needs a gov hand out for his company. I'm sure that Mr. Wealthy will show his gratitude with a generous campaign contribution when re-election time rolls around again.

Thank you for the kind and useful advice you guys.

@Aardvarkgoodswimmer and Chronos: Yes, I will do exactly that tomorrow morning, call my job coach and get some clarity on this whole situation. Another peculiar thing happened just yesterday morning, when the temp agency called me up to ask if I could work at 6 in the evening, doing a regular cleaning shift (because, in his own words, 'they needed people'). I was a bit upset about the audacity of this, and told him I had other plans for the weekend; I forgot to grab the opportunity to work that evening and make a bit of money/ more practice and experience to show them I can handle this job.
The same guy from the temp agency calls me up a short while later, because he was going down his list of reserve employees, and -get this- he had FORGOTTEN that he had already called me earlier. Also, when I told him "But I thought you guys said I was too slow for these shifts?" He said he wasn't informed about that. I think he honestly didn't know. Is that a comedy show or what? That's some pretty severe incompetence and bad communication on the temp agency's part if you ask me.

@questor: It seems cynical, but it makes sense. At the very least, this has given me a teensy bit of experience in the field of cleaning, so that I have a bit of a stronger position when I apply for cleaning jobs in the future now.

I'll see what happens tomorrow.

Oh, that's rich! The left hand knows not what the right is doing. So they call you back needing people.

Maybe you could just tell your job coach, if they want fast, I can go fast. And your morning coffee serving job, I would keep that for now. That's your bird in the hand, at least for now.

I have also been criticized at several different jobs for being slow. And this, after being preached to during training about the importance of quality work, good customer service, etc, etc, etc. The only thing I can think of is this analogy: The diet advice "eat less fat" might be good advice for the average person living in a western culture eating the standard diet of affluence. But it's not good advice for the person who is anorexic.

And so, on the topic of jobs, I'm kind of the far end of the chart as far as thoroughness and quality. So, the preaching about doing a better job, etc, for me, it's all misdirected and misplaced.

As a person on the spectrum, my general experience is that an "easy" job is hard and a "hard" job is easy!

that sucks

i have experienced all this before..........
sad

"She also told me that, since I had been experiencing some inconvenience at work in the past 2 weeks or so, I could be assigned another task within the cleaning company, something that would perhaps be not quite as high-pressure. "

What inconvenience did you experience in the past 2 weeks? Did it have anything to do with the speed you were working?

After reading through the story it seems like the complications of having three different companies involved in your employment could be the problem. The chain of communication presents problems in itself.

But it sounds odd that you were dismissed straight away.