Thank you very much for all of the great stories, complaints, and debates about this truly reprehensible company. I too was one of the clueless dweebs who got sucked in with this lowly lot. It's a long, sad, and cruel story... But like the best stories, this one has a happy ending.
This past February, I submitted my resume to a group known as KSL Concepts here in Atlanta. They immediately contacted me and set up an interview. Yay! I exclaim. I can run my own business in 12 months? Where do I sign?
What followed this moment was 6 weeks of the worst hell on earth imaginable. KSL Concepts' cozy-but-elegant front office revealed nothing but a drab and ugly 2-room no bigger than my apartment. Being a gentleman, I kept my true feelings about these. Eccentric... individuals and their lot in life. Honestly, I felt nothing but pity for a few of them. As a fledging amateur screenwriter and hobby filmmaker, I couldn't make some of these people up.
In this sad parade, we had people like Sedrick, who claimed to possess a degree in Public Health and once did work at The Carter Center. Rodney, whose previous claim to fame was photographer for the Detroit Red Wings. Al, the UCLA law school graduate. Brad, former male model and father of 2. All in all, these people weren't bad by any means - they were reasonably friendly, down-to-earth, and extend a hand.
Hell, Rodney even gave me some of his ties! On the other hand, my mind wandered... If these people had such a wealth of life experience and positions of semi-prominence... Why were they working door-to-door? Was Sedrick implicated in the McMartin case? Did Rodney steal Sergei Federov's Rolex? Did Brad's acne derail his modelling career?
Enough about them, though... I have bigger fish to fry. Namely, one Kenneth Samuel Lear.
In my time at this company, I doubt I have ever (or will ever) deal with a more pompous, arrogant, deceitful, conceited, and loathsome individual as Mr. Lear. After a few days of these goons labelling me as "untrainable" and sending me off to do D2D for BellSouth on my own, I threw their lameass script and rules out of the window and achieved success in that field on my own terms.
I made up my sales pitches as I went along. I got BellSouth customers to cancel bogus charges they didn't need. I broke the D2D cardinal rule and went inside people's houses when invited. I had beers and ate pizza with my customers. I would tell the consumer that the guy I worked for was "a f*ing prick.")
However, I looked at the changes that had appeared in my personality with disgust. My life was changing by the day - My normally long and curly hair was being reshaped into a Metrosexual Queer Eye For The Straight Guy coif. I lived on french fries and lost 25 pounds (you can do it too!). My family and friends were a bizarre afterthought.
My girlfriend became addicted to methamphetamines and I was too focused on success and money to even notice.in short, I was becoming just like my co-workers in appearance and attitude and more like Ken in terms of my complete oblivousness to the world around me. Like Rodney once told me, "Look in the mirror every day and say. David, you are the f*ing man!".. I was finding myself looking into the mirror and saying "David, you sold phone service to a deaf Chinese woman yesterday. You are a piece of shit."
I wouldn't be so angry about these guys IF... And I must repeat IF... They hadn't gone through every possible means to not pay me for my time, effort, and productivity. After 3 weeks of nonpayment, I became infuriated. As hard as I tried to adapt to their way of thinking and their viewpoints, I couldn't help but notice that everyone at the company seemed to really dislike me.
Was it that I wore glasses? Did they not like the cologne? Maybe it was the glasses - for all of my efforts, Ken Lear looked upon me with nothing but disgust. Maybe he had a sense of what would happen next. Maybe he knew my friends and I would use office jargon like "Posi-Neg" and "Work the 4's, 5's, and 8's" as jokes. Maybe he knew that I could see past his act. Maybe he knew that I would walk out of his office, never to return, with all of his company's info, invoices, and even my old company badge.
Nowadays, I'm back in my old position as GM of my mentor Mr. Hong's liquor store while finishing my degree in Accounting. While I still turn in 13-hour days, I know exactly what I'm working for this time and it fills my heart with joy. I can look at my face in the mirror and feel good about the person I am again.
If any of the people named (aside from the contemptible Mr. Lear) happen to read this and are offended, I am deeply sorry. You guys are good people who, for some reason or another, found yourselves stuck in this abyss. I'm sorry I never returned your phone calls, but unlike you guys... I had the means to escape.
To anyone who has received an offer of employment from KSL Concepts or any other branch of Cydcor, my advice is this: By all means, don't subject yourself to the same self-loathing and physical duress I went through. You may find it great in the beginning, but trust me... You WILL learn to hate yourself.
And last, but definitely not least, if Kenneth Samuel Lear himself happens to read this message, I have this bon mot to offer: The day I left your sham office, I went to visit my family friends at the Kilpatrick Stockton office on Peachtree Street. Unlike you, they were quite kind, considerate, and down-to-earth. Also unlike yourself, the BMWs, Mercedes-Benzes, and Jaguars they drove were real.
One more note... The money they made on 2 weeks' worth of trial was more than you and your worthless "Overrides" pull down in a year. I hope you wake up in your double-wide this afternoon and stare hard into the toilet instead of the mirror. A reflection of you, your "mentor" Michael Sessions, and every other trash bag lying scumsucker who profit from the exploitation of others will stare right back at you.
In short, Mr. Lear, Go f* yourself. How's that for a "Posi-Neg"?
DavidConyers, Georgia
U.S.A.
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