"Life in the office" - chapter 1

Today we meet Mary and Jane. They both work for the “XYZ” company with its headquarters in Orlando, USA and many branches around the world. Mary and Jane work for the Polish branch in Cracow.
8:00 AM

MARY: Good morning Jane. How are you today?

JANE:   Good morning Mary. Good to see you. Have you heard the latest news?

MARY:  No. I was on the business trip last week, so I don’t know anything. What’s going on?

JANE:   We are going to have a new CEO. Everyone has been gossiping about it since last Wednesday.

MARY:  You are pulling my leg, right? What happened to James?

JANE:   He was sacked for breach of contract with that new company we were supposed to merge with.

MARY:  My Goodness! He must have been out of his mind to do such a thing. What’s got into him?

JANE:   Nobody knows but the rumor says that he did that on purpose. Apparently  he believed that this merge was not such a blessing as everybody thought it would have been.  Anyway, James did the right thing and he lost his job.

MARY:   Wow!  Who’s going to be our new boss?

JANE:   Somebody from the head office in Orlando.

MARY:   An American? Does he have a name? I know some people from there.

JANE:   Sure thing! His name is Robert Brown and he used to be an MD there. The company made a huge profit on his last product. I guess, he got this job as a prize.

MARY:   Or a punishment, if you know what I mean. Poland isn’t exactly the best place to do business if you don’t know the realities. And when are we going to see this wonder?

JANE:   Next week and I do hope that he is going to leave things the way they are.

MARY:   I doubt that. You know what they say “New king, new rules”. I hope he is not going to make a lot of people redundant.

JANE:   You don’t have to worry about anything. You’re the head of advertising and that new contract you signed with the Chinese is great. Besides, your department is doing a really good job. On the other hand, I am just a secretary and maybe he’s got his own. You never know. He will need somebody he can count on.

MARY:    Jane, who knows more of what’s going on here but you. You are irreplaceable. Don’t worry.

JANE:   If you say so. Well! I’d better start working. I’ve got piles of mail to read and my computer is having a bad day today.

MARY:   You’d better call Steven then. OK. I’ll see you at lunch.

JANE:   See you then. Bye.

VOCABULARY:

CEO - Chief Executive Officer  
to gossip - plotkować
to pull somebody’s leg - żartować sobie z kogoś (idiom)
a breach of contract - zerwanie umowy
to sack somebody - zwolnić kogoś z pracy ze względu na jego niewłaściwe poczynania
to merge - połączyć np. firmy
MD - Managing Director
to make somebody redundant - zwolnić kogoś bo nie ma dla niego pracy.