Rjt Compuquest review: Bad To Do Business With

So let's be real. You have some Black folks that scream racism at the drop of a hat. Every single time something happens its because it's race related.
I'm NOT one of those people. I'm guilty of using the N word and hell am the most critical of my own race.
However I'm also a realist and know that racism does exist. I've been discriminated before, we all have. But it is something we deal with everyday, and break on thru to the other side.
I started my firm, The Seven Bridges Group in 2008. No need to go into a lot of detail there do I will give you the URL www.sevenbridgesgroup.com and look around. I want to keep on point here.
One of our disciplines is our Management Consulting practice.
I've been in this discipline for 20 years and have been quite successful at it. Management Consulting has been very good to me, hell it even paid for my Masters and Law School.
I've had articles published regarding my experiences at www.erptips.com and have consulted for outfits such as NASA, Dolby Laboratories, Nissan and Celgene.
Celgene. Yes now we get to the heart of the matter. You see, I came to be a Global Project Manager for Celgene thru a consulting/staffing company RJT Compuquest based in Torrance, CA.
This was a great engagement almost 11 months in duration in 2011. Not much to complain about there.
Fast forward to June 2013.

On or about June 28, 2013 I was awarded a contract as a SAP Project Manager for
the ERP consulting company RJT Compuquest to perform duties at the client, Altman Plants located in Vista, CA.

I had previously completed 10-month engagement for RJT in 2011.

This was to be a 7-month engagement commencing July 2, 2013 to be performed on-site 4 days per week. On July 2, 2013 I arrived on-site at Altman Plants and met with one Mark Roberts, Rod Baine, Matt Altman and eventually Ken Altman.

Also in attendance from RJT were Greg Clarke, Alan Gaddis and Ketan Gohil.
I had previously spoke with the team from Altman via the phone and all seemed well. However, during the initial meeting, a bad feeling came over me the moment
I met Ken Altman. The look I received was one of shock. You know that ‘ I wasn’t expecting a Black person’ look.

As the weeks passed, it became evident that I was not wanted as a Project Manager on this engagement initially with the constant sabotaging by Mark Roberts, who was an individual who I was instructed to evaluate to see if in fact he was a fit to lead the project from the client perspective.

On numerous occasions, I would hand him documents and clearly ask that he review them before handing them over to the client but he would take said documents and forward them to the client without my knowledge knowing that they were incomplete.
This happened on more than one occasion despite my continued efforts to work with him in spite of the pending ‘evaluation’.

Because of my extensive travel, I became ill. With what started out as a cough and sore throat soon became a respiratory infection. This condition immensely affected my breathing and disrupted my sleep pattern but I continued to show up to perform my appointed duties.

During this time, Matt Altman, COO began verbally accosting and abusing me. In the midst of the performance of my duties, Matt would attempt to invalidate my efforts to explain the processes of the implementation. The most egregious occasion happened on July 23rd, 2013. During a presentation to the Altman Plant project team members, Mr. Altman constantly interrupted my portion of the presentation with the excuse that ‘the team didn’t need to know that’.

Later that day, the verbal abuse escalated when Mr. Altman in front of at least 6 people became loud, belligerent and accusatory.
He then accosted me for not being around on a Monday when 1) it was my day off and 2) I was at the hospital tending to mu medical condition. When I responded to him that he was trying to get hold of me while I was at the hospital his response was, ‘Well, you can use that as an excuse’.

Regarding the previous Monday, which was an off-day. During a conference call in which I revealed that I had been to ER, Mark Roberts asked if my condition was contagious and Matt Altman asked if it was going to affect the project. Both were uncivil, uncouth and hostile.

Later after the meeting had adjourned he ‘apologized’ but the damage was done. I knew that my time there was not going to be long as the emotional damage, verbal abuse combined with my medical condition had taken its toll already.
He even accosted me for being late to a meeting, which was out of my control. While I admit I was indeed late, however the circumstances of me meeting another party at which time I was to receive a disk for download had been previously arranged but that individual was 45 minutes late, which in turn delayed my arrival.

Still, that doesn’t give an individual to yell, or dress down another individual in front of others in an attempt to shame and disgrace.

The comments about’ look at the dark skinned people out in the fields. You don’t see them in the offices, you see them out there planting, etc.’

The volunteering of ’There’s really no discrimination or racism here, maybe in LA but certainly not here’.

And of course, there was the all too common, ’ I have this Black friend, he’s a great guy and one of my best friends.’

Now an apologist for this type of behavior will say, oh that’s not that bad, what are you complaining about? You need to learn to be on-time and don’t blame others for your mistakes. I invite you to re-read the above and come to an objective, clear conclusion.

Okay, whatever. But the tipping point arrived when Mark Roberts actually put hands on me!

I can't remember the exact date but it was the 3rd week of July 2013. Mr. Roberts was to leave early that day to drop his vehicle off for servicing. We had some exchanges during the day about deliverables, due dates, etc.. Nothing too serious as after 20 years you don’t agree on everything during a project lifecycle.

So, I was sitting there trying to finish up the day myself and focused on my tasks.
All of a sudden I was struck from behind on my back and shoulder with such force that an individual clear across the room looked up in shock when he heard the impact.

Mr. Roberts then said, have a nice evening, sir and walked out. It took me a second to realize what had happened. To this day I still can’t believe he hit me!
Furthermore, the force of the blow was so hard; I had a headache for 3 days.

So, I knew then, I needed to get out of there. I’m by no means paranoid and certainly not a drama queen but the signs were evident. Having THAT client, in THAT town was NOT conducive to my health, physically or emotionally.

I tried to get an audience with Greg Clarke from RJT but him being from South Africa and also chasing that almighty dollar he had ZERO interest in what I had to say.

So, after all of the above and their ‘concerns’ about my ‘abilities’ I got the hell out of there and back to my home in Newport Beach. I then drove overnight to my condo here in San Francisco, as I wanted to get as far away as possible.

I can’t begin to tell you how adversely that experience affected me. I went into a deep depression, became withdrawn, sullen and very erratic. My performance at the core of my business suffered as a result but I’m working to re-engage.

This is painful for me to write, painful for me to admit. All of my adult life I’ve been there for others, whether it was in the USAF, a father, husband legal professional and/or agent.

Those that know me will tell you, I will go out of my way for them. Anyone actually.
But this misadventure was a wake up call of sorts. I can no longer ‘turn the other cheek’ and chalk it up to, "Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity."

To everyone whom I interacted with the past few weeks and was less than my normal self, I apologize. This is the world we live in. Racial insensitivity, racism, bigotry exist. Anyone who says it doesn’t is either living in denial and/or a contributor to the problem. We’ve all been on both sides of that line. But when you put your hands on me; ### just went next level.

I’m sure the good folks over at SAP America, SAP AG, would be interested in knowing how one of their ‘Partners’ are treating people in the field. I’m sure the Lowe’s and Home Depots of the world would love to know how their suppliers are treating people.

I think the world needs to know……………….