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Working Era: OT - Work, Life, Bah!
- Thread starter Oliver James
- Start date
I'm all for this OT. I have a lot of grievances to air. I don't even know where to start.
I have another small thread where I asked ERA some advice on shifting jobs and I made a decision in there. So far I'm still happy with the decision to leave but the shocker..
I gave my two weeks notice and they immediately turned around and showed me the door! After 9 years they are worried about competitive advantage. They are in for a rude awakening, I designed that shit, I can draw a detailed diagram in my sleep
Anyway, had to give the news to my team the last couple days, been exhausting, but excited to start my new career, also terrified.
I have a month, any reading suggestions? I'm currently reading Radical Candor, The Lean Startup, and First 90 days. I really suggest radical candor, I like it a lot.
I have another small thread where I asked ERA some advice on shifting jobs and I made a decision in there. So far I'm still happy with the decision to leave but the shocker..
I gave my two weeks notice and they immediately turned around and showed me the door! After 9 years they are worried about competitive advantage. They are in for a rude awakening, I designed that shit, I can draw a detailed diagram in my sleep
Anyway, had to give the news to my team the last couple days, been exhausting, but excited to start my new career, also terrified.
I have a month, any reading suggestions? I'm currently reading Radical Candor, The Lean Startup, and First 90 days. I really suggest radical candor, I like it a lot.
Yeah, I had that happen before, as well. It went something like this: "Oh, when are you leaving?" "Well, I wanted to discuss that with you. I know there are still some pending projects, and I want to be able to leave with everything taken care of so there's a smooth transition." "I think you'll be leaving today." Okay. But hey, extra vacation!
Also, hello everyone. I'm starting a new job on Monday.
EDIT: Read Competing Against Luck by Clayton M. Christensen.
EDIT 2: Also try to get ahold of and read Netflix's culture deck and Amazon's leadership principles. It doesn't matter how you feel about these companies; you should read these to understand how two seemingly opposing leadership paradigms both work. Personally, I found Amazon's principle of "disagree and commit" really resonated with me.
Also check out the podcasts How I Built This and Masters of Scale.
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I know, right? I was being all nice and stuff, then bam "why don't you go home and just charge overhead for the next two weeks, this nice gentleman will watch you pack your things and walk you to the door." I'm exaggerating a little, they actually gave me two days to tell the team and transition some knowledge, but was shocking and counterintuitive. If you are going to disrespect me don't do it half way. Either kick me out or let me do a full transition. Then people started asking me to continue my actual work. I think it was a pure HR move and management wanted nothing to do with it.
Thanks for the recommendations, I've got some free time (;
Congrats on the new job? You've been giving me advice but I didn't know you were starting something new too!
Thanks! Yeah, most of what I relayed was based on my own (sometimes extremely recent) experience and was pretty much what I did or wished I did.
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Subscribed! I began a new job (my first job) a month ago, and the hardest part has been the amount of reading I need to do.
I'm on a credit rating agency, so I need to read (for example) the laws that regulate the utility sector to be able to evaluate them properly.
But despite everything, its fun. Look forward to sharing with you!
I'm on a credit rating agency, so I need to read (for example) the laws that regulate the utility sector to be able to evaluate them properly.
But despite everything, its fun. Look forward to sharing with you!
Hoping that maybe this thread can help me out, or at least offer some advice.
I'm pretty miserable at my current job (Digital Court Reporter Tier 1 Support), but not because of grueling work or long hours....it's actually the opposite problem, it's incredibly boring and it's left me mentally checked out.
First, let me tell you what my daily duties are:
1. Pre-morning check on the reporters, one floor per day. This averages to 30-60 minutes
2. Follow-up check on the reporters, this takes even less time
3. Inventory check on the A/V equipment (varies based on floors/issues, but rarely exceeds one hour either way)
During the periods between those three tasks, I must sit on my desk and observe the reporters on my PC monitor, making sure they're doing their job. I'm also to be on-call whenever there's an issue. This ranges from simple tasks that come from human error ("Your headset isn't plugged in") to escalated tickets, depending. But for the majority of the time, there are rarely any problems to handle.
So in maybe 5 of the 8 hours I'm working, I'm sitting at my desk, looking at my monitor.
I'm not allowed to look at my phone, browse the web, read a book, read a study guide, not even listen to music. I must observe them at all times.
I know it sounds like first world problems, but it's a different kind of mental exhaustion to be literally staring into space for most of my shifts. If I was at least given something to pass the time, it wouldn't be nearly as bad. The rare moments of mercy are whenever my boss steps out or when he takes the day off. A couple of weeks ago he took a week long vacation....I looked at my watch and holy shit it was Friday before I knew it. And I still did my job, it wasn't like I slacked on my duties that week either.
I used to be able to look at whatever I wanted to pass the time, but somewhere along the line he changed policies, so I'm at a point where I almost get panic attacks having to go to work. It's a literal struggle to keep my eyes open, and I have to obsessively stretch out my time like someone rationing his last loaf of bread ("in 20 minutes go use the bathroom, in 40 minutes do your follow-up, in one hour make an excuse to go next door just to walk around...").
I don't know what to do. My boss is a very nice and patient guy....I know he isn't doing this to torture me. He says he's aware that I need more duties, which is something he's discussing with his boss, but one thing I've learned when it comes to government jobs is that things do not move in a steady pace, if at all. Rather than wait around I'm just applying to anything I can online, but more than once I've been tempted to just quit while quickly talking myself down (I need the steady income, it would be incredibly foolish to drop my job under the assumption I'd get a new one right away).
I don't want to bring this up with his boss either (who in turn would be my...mega boss, or whatever), because it could make me look bad and potentially damage my relationship with my boss.
I'm pretty miserable at my current job (Digital Court Reporter Tier 1 Support), but not because of grueling work or long hours....it's actually the opposite problem, it's incredibly boring and it's left me mentally checked out.
First, let me tell you what my daily duties are:
1. Pre-morning check on the reporters, one floor per day. This averages to 30-60 minutes
2. Follow-up check on the reporters, this takes even less time
3. Inventory check on the A/V equipment (varies based on floors/issues, but rarely exceeds one hour either way)
During the periods between those three tasks, I must sit on my desk and observe the reporters on my PC monitor, making sure they're doing their job. I'm also to be on-call whenever there's an issue. This ranges from simple tasks that come from human error ("Your headset isn't plugged in") to escalated tickets, depending. But for the majority of the time, there are rarely any problems to handle.
So in maybe 5 of the 8 hours I'm working, I'm sitting at my desk, looking at my monitor.
I'm not allowed to look at my phone, browse the web, read a book, read a study guide, not even listen to music. I must observe them at all times.
I know it sounds like first world problems, but it's a different kind of mental exhaustion to be literally staring into space for most of my shifts. If I was at least given something to pass the time, it wouldn't be nearly as bad. The rare moments of mercy are whenever my boss steps out or when he takes the day off. A couple of weeks ago he took a week long vacation....I looked at my watch and holy shit it was Friday before I knew it. And I still did my job, it wasn't like I slacked on my duties that week either.
I used to be able to look at whatever I wanted to pass the time, but somewhere along the line he changed policies, so I'm at a point where I almost get panic attacks having to go to work. It's a literal struggle to keep my eyes open, and I have to obsessively stretch out my time like someone rationing his last loaf of bread ("in 20 minutes go use the bathroom, in 40 minutes do your follow-up, in one hour make an excuse to go next door just to walk around...").
I don't know what to do. My boss is a very nice and patient guy....I know he isn't doing this to torture me. He says he's aware that I need more duties, which is something he's discussing with his boss, but one thing I've learned when it comes to government jobs is that things do not move in a steady pace, if at all. Rather than wait around I'm just applying to anything I can online, but more than once I've been tempted to just quit while quickly talking myself down (I need the steady income, it would be incredibly foolish to drop my job under the assumption I'd get a new one right away).
I don't want to bring this up with his boss either (who in turn would be my...mega boss, or whatever), because it could make me look bad and potentially damage my relationship with my boss.
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Do you mean within the department? Not an option, unfortunately: if I want to move up, or towards something else, I have to wait for a job opening. Being in the system already doesn't benefit me whatsoever.
The workplace itself is quite chill. There are rarely any major stressful situations. The stress comes from self-stress, in that I wonder what I'm doing with my life where most of my time is spent struggling to stay awake cycling through security cameras. Again, if I was allowed some external distraction to pass the time, it would be so much more manageable.
I constantly wonder if I'm just being a whiny child: I know there are way worse jobs out there, and plenty of people have told me they would kill to be able to work for the state. Even so, there has to be better things I'm suited for. This can't be where I end up in my life.
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SOLDIER just because people tell you that you could be doing worse doesn't mean you should settle. What you described actually does sound mentally torturous, and is actually subject to a lot of science fiction stories, so it's definitely not just you.
Well if being inside the state doesn't benefit you and you could wait for an opening elsewhere, what's stopping you from looking say, in a private institution for the meantime?
Well if being inside the state doesn't benefit you and you could wait for an opening elsewhere, what's stopping you from looking say, in a private institution for the meantime?
Believe me, settling is the last thing I want to do.
But I need a steady source of income. I'm applying to other places, whatever job openings sound like something I could conceivably do. But until I actually get a response, I can't just quit my job under the assumption I'll get something sooner rather than later. That's just foolishness.
It doesn't help that I still don't know what I want to do career-wise. I'm focusing on getting into IT and studying for A+ certification, but again, who knows when that will bear fruit. I know I'm being impatient, but that's because I want my situation to improve.
When you say private institution, so you mean a company?
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SOLDIER oh, so you're indeed applying to other places. Yes, don't quit, especially you need the steady source of income. I was vacant for two to three months and people were acting like I wouldn't be able to find a job anymore. You should really just tough it out until you've signed up on another place. Never quit until you've signed somewhere else.
The great thing about IT is that it is ever evolving, and even though there are tons of people in the IT field, the skills aren't actually all there, so you really need to work hard on that. Great things start from small beginnings, don't ever lose hope because every day is a new day and nothing is ever too late.
Yep, a company.
The great thing about IT is that it is ever evolving, and even though there are tons of people in the IT field, the skills aren't actually all there, so you really need to work hard on that. Great things start from small beginnings, don't ever lose hope because every day is a new day and nothing is ever too late.
Yep, a company.
Thanks for the support. I know that's all it comes down to, I need to be patient and I need to just keep applying now while I'm less desperate to do so (or rather, less desperate than I think I am).
Oof SOLDIER that sounds rough. A light at the end of the tunnel (new job) might be able to push you through this but it doesn't sound sustainable at all.
Last day for me tomorrow! Packed up my office this afternoon. Feels really weird. They've been scrambling the last few days trying to figure out how the hell to replace me, has been fun to watch (;
Last day for me tomorrow! Packed up my office this afternoon. Feels really weird. They've been scrambling the last few days trying to figure out how the hell to replace me, has been fun to watch (;
lt519 and Septimus Prime wishing you much luck in your new positions.
LunaSerena glad to hear your new job is going well and I'm sure you'll be an expert in no time!
LunaSerena glad to hear your new job is going well and I'm sure you'll be an expert in no time!
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I wish you all the best! Keep us posted :)
@Its519 something similar happened to me as well, I feel schadenfreude whenever they try and ask me for help because the person they replaced me with is clueless. The thing is, when I replaced the person before me, I didn't need to call or ask that person about anything but this person who replaced me even went as far as calling me the whole day.
I can't stand co-workers who vanish for extended periods of time causing things to get out of whack and leaving me and others to pick up the slack.
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Have any of you got any tips in regards to having an appraisal at work? I've been working for nearly 13 years but only ever really worked for franchises run by cowboys who run the show however they can get away with, and I honestly can't remember ever having a proper appraisal. I've been at this job since September and most of my colleagues (with a different line manager) have been having their appraisals lately. I presume mine is coming soon, and want to be prepared.
My jobs great, mostly. There's one colleague who constantly takes credit for my work but as she's best mates with our line manager, I feel it's best not to even mention it in my appraisal. Right? She's somehow made a career out of digging out previous colleagues old work, briefly updating it and taking credit for it by presenting it as a brand new creation she's been working on for ages. Then because it quickly goes out of date (and it's mostly really bad) my line manager's manager (big boss) asked me to update it, so I took nearly all day yesterday making it actually functional (one of the cells in the spreadsheet literally said =SUM(C53) ffs) and painstakingly updating the annual budgets. Then about 20 minutes after she realised I'd finished, emailed it to our line manager as if to say she'd done it. It's not been mentioned yet but if she gets credited with this one in a big team meeting, like previously, I'm gonna struggle not to speak up.
Anyway, appraisals! Yeah I'll be positive about everything, I reckon. I generally just sit quietly and get on with my job while the other 8 people in the office chat rubbish about Game of Thrones, Marvel movies, old Friends episodes, that sort of stuff. I mean I'm not some loser who sits silent all day and doesn't join in with any conversation, but I'm sure everyone knows I'm there to do my job well, and not much else. Ironically I somehow got put in charge of sorting out "workplace health and wellbeing" so there's staff from all over the company coming to meetings to discuss how we can support the workforce and what changes need to be made to deal with pressure and stress and worry and whatever else people get caught up about at work. As someone who has never felt stressed in his life, and whose approach to everything is "just get on with it" I'm definitely not the best person to come up with "workplace initiatives" and create a "mental health pledge." But here I am, nine months later, pretending I think that workplace wellbeing is an issue I'm passionate about, and so far haven't told anyone to pipe down and just do what they're paid to do. Phew! I mean I understand people have problems at work, but I don't, and never have, because I just get on with it. Why can't everyone have this outlook? It would make work a lot easier to deal with, for those people.
Anyway, appraisals! I've created a list of my "responsibilities" and it is surprisingly long, actually, and have listed the various training/development I've had in my nine months of working here. I honestly couldn't tell you what my job is though. Like I do so many bits in lots of areas that I can't really pinpoint my actual job. My Facebook profile lists my job title as "Best At Spreadsheets," and thankfully I can back that up, because everyone else is very bad at them, but I don't just do them. I mean, I could happily sit and just process invoices all day everyday but that's not really an option because of all the other stuff.
It seems like nobody ever really recognises that someone might be happy just doing what they're doing. Appraisals seem to be about short term and long term goals; what you hope to achieve and where you wish to be in twelve months' time. I wanna be sat in a nice big house in a nice area with nice possessions and a happy family and good friends and lots of hair and a tan, but realistically only two of those will come true. Obviously I want to be making more money (who doesn't?) but as for work stuff, I dunno? Potter on, continue as is, something about status quo. Sure if you offer me the job of big boss I'll take it, or even a slight promotion to whatever's next, but I don't strive for success and aspire to be the top gun.
I hated my previous job with a passion. I was there for over four years and the last two where like torture (but I didn't get stressed over it, I must, er, stress). I've finally got a job I not only don't hate, but actually enjoy. I can roll in at practically whenever I want and go home at four o'clock everyday if I want; it's about five minutes' drive from my house; the office is really nice and everyone who works here, within my team and across the whole office, is really friendly. It's great. I even organised the Grand National Sweepstake, which felt like a bit of a risk considering I work in Public Health, but everyone lapped it up – brill. So in twelve months' time I hope everything's the same.
You've probably not read it but there are some kids books about a cat called Mog. Out of all the kids books I've read with my daughter, they're some of the few I'll happily go back to and read over and over. But this cat, Mog, notoriously doesn't like things to be exciting. She likes things to be the same. Me too, Mog; me too.
So what should I do to prepare for my appraisal? And what should I do during it? Pretend I want to be the top gun, right? Lie about made up aspirations of progressing to the top and taking ownership of my own projects and portfolios? Eurgh, I just wanna dick about with spreadsheets, pay doctors for doing chlamydia tests. encourage people to gamble once a year, then go home and enjoy my actual life.
My jobs great, mostly. There's one colleague who constantly takes credit for my work but as she's best mates with our line manager, I feel it's best not to even mention it in my appraisal. Right? She's somehow made a career out of digging out previous colleagues old work, briefly updating it and taking credit for it by presenting it as a brand new creation she's been working on for ages. Then because it quickly goes out of date (and it's mostly really bad) my line manager's manager (big boss) asked me to update it, so I took nearly all day yesterday making it actually functional (one of the cells in the spreadsheet literally said =SUM(C53) ffs) and painstakingly updating the annual budgets. Then about 20 minutes after she realised I'd finished, emailed it to our line manager as if to say she'd done it. It's not been mentioned yet but if she gets credited with this one in a big team meeting, like previously, I'm gonna struggle not to speak up.
Anyway, appraisals! Yeah I'll be positive about everything, I reckon. I generally just sit quietly and get on with my job while the other 8 people in the office chat rubbish about Game of Thrones, Marvel movies, old Friends episodes, that sort of stuff. I mean I'm not some loser who sits silent all day and doesn't join in with any conversation, but I'm sure everyone knows I'm there to do my job well, and not much else. Ironically I somehow got put in charge of sorting out "workplace health and wellbeing" so there's staff from all over the company coming to meetings to discuss how we can support the workforce and what changes need to be made to deal with pressure and stress and worry and whatever else people get caught up about at work. As someone who has never felt stressed in his life, and whose approach to everything is "just get on with it" I'm definitely not the best person to come up with "workplace initiatives" and create a "mental health pledge." But here I am, nine months later, pretending I think that workplace wellbeing is an issue I'm passionate about, and so far haven't told anyone to pipe down and just do what they're paid to do. Phew! I mean I understand people have problems at work, but I don't, and never have, because I just get on with it. Why can't everyone have this outlook? It would make work a lot easier to deal with, for those people.
Anyway, appraisals! I've created a list of my "responsibilities" and it is surprisingly long, actually, and have listed the various training/development I've had in my nine months of working here. I honestly couldn't tell you what my job is though. Like I do so many bits in lots of areas that I can't really pinpoint my actual job. My Facebook profile lists my job title as "Best At Spreadsheets," and thankfully I can back that up, because everyone else is very bad at them, but I don't just do them. I mean, I could happily sit and just process invoices all day everyday but that's not really an option because of all the other stuff.
It seems like nobody ever really recognises that someone might be happy just doing what they're doing. Appraisals seem to be about short term and long term goals; what you hope to achieve and where you wish to be in twelve months' time. I wanna be sat in a nice big house in a nice area with nice possessions and a happy family and good friends and lots of hair and a tan, but realistically only two of those will come true. Obviously I want to be making more money (who doesn't?) but as for work stuff, I dunno? Potter on, continue as is, something about status quo. Sure if you offer me the job of big boss I'll take it, or even a slight promotion to whatever's next, but I don't strive for success and aspire to be the top gun.
I hated my previous job with a passion. I was there for over four years and the last two where like torture (but I didn't get stressed over it, I must, er, stress). I've finally got a job I not only don't hate, but actually enjoy. I can roll in at practically whenever I want and go home at four o'clock everyday if I want; it's about five minutes' drive from my house; the office is really nice and everyone who works here, within my team and across the whole office, is really friendly. It's great. I even organised the Grand National Sweepstake, which felt like a bit of a risk considering I work in Public Health, but everyone lapped it up – brill. So in twelve months' time I hope everything's the same.
You've probably not read it but there are some kids books about a cat called Mog. Out of all the kids books I've read with my daughter, they're some of the few I'll happily go back to and read over and over. But this cat, Mog, notoriously doesn't like things to be exciting. She likes things to be the same. Me too, Mog; me too.
So what should I do to prepare for my appraisal? And what should I do during it? Pretend I want to be the top gun, right? Lie about made up aspirations of progressing to the top and taking ownership of my own projects and portfolios? Eurgh, I just wanna dick about with spreadsheets, pay doctors for doing chlamydia tests. encourage people to gamble once a year, then go home and enjoy my actual life.
Ours are mainly based on goals you set for yourself at the beginning of the year and peer feedback, so it's fairly easy to just review your goals and see what you accomplished.
For real, though, that credit stealer is not okay. You need to let someone know because the corollary to her making others think she does all the work is that she'll also make others think the rest of you do nothing. It'll only get worse if she gets promoted and continues to over-delegate/steal credit, as you'll be forced to do higher level work without any additional compensation.
For real, though, that credit stealer is not okay. You need to let someone know because the corollary to her making others think she does all the work is that she'll also make others think the rest of you do nothing. It'll only get worse if she gets promoted and continues to over-delegate/steal credit, as you'll be forced to do higher level work without any additional compensation.
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I guess I will post this here. So I was at a work vacation thing and at night, the people decided to go to this person's room to continue drinking and have a party. Almost everyone was plastered, and there was this new person who kept hugging and rubbing herself to us, the men in the room. The few of us who noticed this noticed she wasn't even drunk but she kept circling the room throwing herself to every man on the room. But no one was interested and yet she kept on doing this, and she kept doing it the most to the obviously most drunken guys in the room.
Tomorrow is going to be interesting.
Tomorrow is going to be interesting.
Talk about awkward in the office. Did you say anything to her during the party while she was doing it?
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Nope, I didn't want to kill the mood but I wasn't about to throw anyone to the wolves too. What I did was when we moved rooms, the most drunken ones, I looked for their roommates and told them to lock them up.
Been at my most recent job for a month straight out of uni basically
It's an amazing opportunity, mostly in my field of work, amazing benefits and good people. But man I'm just always stressed. I have that constant feeling of doing minor fuck ups and being called out for it, the workload is either way to much or not enough.
I'm just faking it till i make it at this point aha.
It's an amazing opportunity, mostly in my field of work, amazing benefits and good people. But man I'm just always stressed. I have that constant feeling of doing minor fuck ups and being called out for it, the workload is either way to much or not enough.
I'm just faking it till i make it at this point aha.
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So there's this new hire and I was thinking where to sit this person. I could either give them a new chair on the edge of the tables, or at the middle. But I am having qualms giving the latter, since they might feel trapped, day 1. Hmm.
If you were said person, where would you like to sit?
If you were said person, where would you like to sit?
Getting more of my hours cut sucks. I'm hoping they are looking for more Audits in my side of town to do....I really don't want to do a second job on this type of schedule I'm doing.
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I want to ask everyone, how outspoken/opinionated are you in the workplace? I am pretty much outspoken and I speak out if I think something is not right even if I'm speaking with clients, and usually they listen. But yesterday I got pretty mad inside because we were planning stuff and while planning I told them that what they want to do is not right since we just spoke days ago that it was not how things are supposed to be done. Then my teammates, both who were on leave when we decided to do these things, agreed to do it the wrong way, basically throwing me under the bus because I think they want to appease the person who wants it done the wrong way.
I don't like these people anymore. I will just continue to do work normally and professionally, and when the pandemic hopefully goes away I'll move on.
I don't like these people anymore. I will just continue to do work normally and professionally, and when the pandemic hopefully goes away I'll move on.
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I feel like my previous post still is true, at this moment I really want to switch jobs and I would've if not for the pandemic. I feel like my teammates are all stroking each other's egos and I don't want any part of it. When they equate good work with time spent working and not the quality of the work you've produced I feel like all of this is not worth it anymore. Anyone in the same boat?