Introduction

Executive leadership, fellow colleagues, esteemed guests: my name is Mickey Hadick and I'm here to give a new employee perspective on the Accident Fund. I am a candidate for this as I was hired just over six months ago.

There are five states that employees experience when starting a new job: #1) gleeful hope, #2) cheerful optimism, #3) rude awakening, #4) paranoid delusion, and #5) grim resolution. This is actually my fifth job, so I've gone through these states four previous times. Those of you who have been here a long time may not recall going through these states, but you did, and some of you may not have been at your job long enough to experience these states, but you will. Again, they are gleeful hope, cheerful optimism, rude awakening, paranoid delusion, and grim resolution. Coincidentally, these are the same states of mind you go through in marriage, so if you have been married more than seven years, you should be familiar.

Gleeful Hope

The Accident Fund is particularly adept at inducing Gleeful Hope by it’s reputation. When you're on the outside looking in, the Accident Fund is a notoriously wonderful place. Especially at night, when the lights come on inside the atrium, and I'd think, my God, what are they growing in there? Money? It must be a cash crop of some kind. So at the beginning, when you're actually paid to go inside that building, everything is great at your new job.

Very little bothers you in this state of mind. When you arrive in the morning and you drive in circles through the parking lot, going higher and higher, turn bump-bump turn, go real fast, turn bump-bump turn, go real fast, you think: "Someday, I'll be an exemplary employee and get to park on the first floor, and won't things be swell then."

You don't sweat the details in this state, either. When the presenter at a lunch and learn tells you that Retained Premium is down because of a soft market, great. The loss ratio could be better, but what do I care? They bought me lunch, so I'm sure someone will figure out that soft market thing.

In this state of mind, you think you won the lottery by getting this job, so you aren't even annoyed when you forget to play the Mega-Millions lottery. That's gleeful hope.

Cheerful Optimism

If you are happy to take on more duties and responsibilities, even though you are not sure how you're going to do it, then you have reached the state of cheerful optimism. You still think it's only a matter of time before the company realizes what a great decision they made in hiring you. During this state, if someone told you that the next all-employee meeting was going to be like one of those Oprah shows where everyone in the audience gets a bag full of valuable products, and a Buick, you believe them.

It's also during this state that when people ask you where you work, and you try to explain the ins and outs of workers compensation, you realize there's more to this than you thought before. When I tried to explain it to my son, he wanted to know why we didn't advertise on TV like Geico, State Farm, and All State. For my son, as with many Americans, if it's not on television, it's not real. I suggested to him that the Accident Fund is the kind of an insurance company that would sponsor a TV show, like "Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom."

Rude Awakening

I'm pretty sure we have all had the experience of going to the bathroom and discovering, too late, that there is no toilet paper. That's a rude awakening.

Around the office, you may notice that whenever you want a cup of coffee, the pot is empty on the burner, or the umbrellas are always gone when it's raining, or the person in front of you trying to exit the parking garage can never quite get their card to open the gate. Again, it's the state of rude awakening.

There is no denying you're in this state if you realize you've made a mistake in your job, something that your boss is not going to like, and your solution is to buy $100 in lottery tickets during lunch.

Undoubtedly, your work load is increasing at this point, which is why you made a mistake. Don't work harder, the experts say, work smarter. They have something there, because attempting to do everything at once, the coffee pot, the lottery tickets, the toilet paper, is what leads you out of the rude awakening, and into paranoid delusions.

Paranoid Delusion

When you reach paranoid delusions, the interesting thing is that you can no longer be trusted to judge what state you're in. That's why it's useful to have a spouse or coworker that is willing to tell you that you are crazy.

Agreeing to speak in front of all the employees, and thinking everything will be fine, may be a symptom of this state, but I don't really know. I would buy some lottery tickets, but I think my wife stole my wallet. If she knew that I suspect her there'd be hell to pay.

Grim Resolution

At all my previous jobs, I realized, at some point, that things weren't going to get much better, and that it wasn't just me. For those jobs, it took grim resolution to get up in the morning and show up. The highlight of the day was the trip to the liquor store for a lottery ticket.

Well it doesn't have to be that way. Not every job is like the others that I've had, not every marriage ends in divorce. Sometimes people stay married because they want to, in spite of, and not just because of, the kids.

I am pleased to report, ladies and gentlemen, that I am happy to come to work in the morning. I have found all my coworkers engaging, friendly, and dedicated in their duties. My lottery spending is under control, and I am yet to use the restroom when there wasn't plenty of paper.

Mickey Hadick

January 2006