Scenario 02: At Work

As the manager approached me, my heart sank. I had been looking forward to a break from work, but his presence meant more work was coming my way. ‘How’s it going lately?’ he asked. ‘I’m about to get a new job from a client and I’m thinking of putting you in charge. You’d better brace yourself.’

My workload had already been overwhelming, and I had been losing sleep. Then I noticed the message on the screen, indicating my negative feelings during working hours were increasing. I sighed. If my negative emotions exceeded 30% at the time of my regular interview, it would affect my promotion and my bonus would be cut. I reluctantly reached for the tranquillizers I had recently been prescribed.

A month later, the day of the regular interview arrived. I walked into the manager’s room, feeling anxious about the results. He spoke up as soon as we were seated. ‘Well, don’t be so alarmed. You’ll be fine,’ he reassured me. His emotions indicated that he was telling the truth. ‘According to this term’s emotion report, you spent 29% of your time in negative emotions.’ I breathed a sigh of relief. I had made it.

‘However, I’m going to need you to work a little harder,’ he added. ‘This is the job I told you about, starting today.’ I felt frustrated and overwhelmed. I had been working hard, and now they wanted me to work even harder. Before I could say anything, my boss spoke up again. ‘Oops, that’s 31% now. I’m afraid I’m going to have to cut your bonus this time.’ I felt a surge of anger, but I knew that I needed to manage my emotions better if I wanted to succeed in my job.