The Job You Do

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My 6-month review--and, I hope, raise--is coming up in a month and a half, and lately I've been thinking about how well I perform in my job. Honestly, I goof around on the internet way too much. I would like to be able to honestly say to myself that I deserve a healthy raise and am a great employee, but I fear it's not quite true. I'm not a bad employee, but I slack off too much and don't take enough initiative on a regular basis. (I am sporadic, with sudden bursts of fervor, and lulls of malaise.)

I don't know how aware my boss is of my internet goofing, but at any rate, I want to impress the pants off of management for the next month and a half, to prime the pump (so to speak) for a raise. This would mean not only quitting the internet for a while, but also doing much more away-from-work planning/thinking about my job and how to do it better. I think I'm up for the challenge!

So, with all of this in mind, I wanted to get a dialogue started about:

Thanks in advance! This should be interesting.

-- Anonymous, April 04, 2000

Answers

IMHO, as long as you LOOK like you're working and get your job done well, in a timely manner, and once-in-awhile volunteer to do something to help out that's really not necessary (like, deciding to attach applications to contracts and you know it's going to take forever, OR, volunteering to update the residence hall books in the lobby and a YEAR later you're still working on it), then you'll do just fine.

be confident. you know you're good. make them believe it.

-- Anonymous, April 04, 2000

Clementine, I wish I could help you out, but I can't. Your description above describes me at work so perfectly it's scary. Before I had internet access at work, I was super-productive and was always going above and beyond the call of duty. Other people used to tell me to slow down because I was making them look bad. Then, I got online.

Every morning on my way to work I tell myself that I'm NOT going to check on Pamie, or see if there are any new recaps on Mighty Big TV, or take a look at Beth's Bad Hair, etc. And every morning, it's the first thing I do, plus intermittent checks throughout the day to the same sites, or their links, in case there was a new update added in the last 2 seconds. The worst part? I can easily do all this from home. I just don't. Why waste time at home that I can be spending with my husband when I have access at my fingertips all day long at work? I do feel terribly guilty about it, but I get my job done, and no one knows about my sneaky surfing, and I have to justify it like that because it's an addiction for me. I'm a closet surfer.

Good luck with the raise! I am a firm believer that as long as people are impressed with your work and productivity, and have no reason to reprimand you (for being late, or whatever) then the raise is probably in the bag.

-- Anonymous, April 04, 2000

My Internet goofing is out of control. Completely. I have so many bookmarks, it's at least 9:30 before I turn to do anything work- related. (I get here at 8:00.)

I'm currently interviewing for a teaching position, which means I'd never get to be around a computer until I got home at night. And I'm actually quite relieved at the prospect of not being so bored out of my head that I hit refresh on my inbox 30 times an hour. It's getting really problematic -- I have lost any attention span I may have once had.

As for work, they just don't give me enough to do. They think I'm some wunderkind because I crank out projects in three days that they think will take a month. The boss just seriously underestimates how long it takes a writer to write something. That's the glory of my job -- nobody else here could ever do it, so they just give me all the room in the world. I had my review last week (found out about it the morning of), and I started to panic. "Omigosh, what if they know how much I surf and it comes up"? etc.

Well, I got a perfect score. On every category. No weaknesses. Only strengths. Man, I wish I knew what it is they think I do so I could get crackin on it.

Hopefully I'll know by next week if I'm outta here. Keep your fingers crossed!

-- Anonymous, April 04, 2000

Leigh Anne--

There has to be some happy medium between compulsive e-mail checking and web surfing and being a teacher. It's nice that the hours between 7:30 and 3:00 whiz by at lightning speed, but by 3:15 I am completely wiped out. It's 8:00 p.m. now and I haven't had the energy to do any of the non-teaching stuff I wanted to do, and I still have a project handout to whip up and a set of quizzes to grade.

I can't help but wonder if I'd be less tired if I had a less stressful job.

-- Anonymous, April 04, 2000

I'm a law student. Technically I don't have a job but anyone who's been to law school or has a friend who goes to law school knows that it IS a job. A crappy job you PAID 25,000 a year to work your butt off in order to put "Esquire" at the end of your name.

ASk me about my web goofing once I get my grades this semester. (hee hee)

I've been told my non-law people that I work like a dog. I've been told by law people that I'm laid back. I don't know. IT's all relative.

-- Anonymous, April 04, 2000

I work pretty hard, but I'm easily distracted, so it's two hours of hard-out working followed by half an hour of playing silly buggers. I look at the internet WAY too much, and it's even harder now when I'm doing company research for new joint ventures. I'll look at a company's site, check out some share performance at Yahoo, read Pamie, visit The Onion, read an NZ newspaper online ... and it's an hour later.

I have quite a good track record as far as getting payrises goes. My salary increased by about 40% over two years. The big trick is shameless self-promotion. If you do something well, tell people - send you boss an email saying 'I thought you'd like to know how well the XXXXX went. So and so was really happy with the end result, and I'm really pleased I decided to do XXXXX to complete this project'. Your manager may read it and go 'big wow', but it will stick in their mind, and when you hit them for a payrise they won't be completely surprised.

-- Anonymous, April 05, 2000

My boss wants me to work harder, the company we do work for wants me to be able to be anywhere in the world instantly. I have to get up for work at four AM. I am getting tendonitis in my lower arms from loading and unloading hundreds of packages by hand. The sun always seems to be right in my eyes. Other drivers on the road are,,,,well lets not go there. BUT,,,,

As my real drive begins I leaving the city behind and enter the void of the open road. I look over my left shoulder and across the northern sky from east to west like a great curtain hangs the Aurora Borealis. Brighter and more colorfull than I have ever seen. I smile at my good fortun and say a thankful little prayer.

Later as my capsule rushes through the last of the night, the stars fade away and the fient magenta of the dawn lights the purple and grey silhouette of the rocky mountains. They remind me of the rough torn edges of heavy watercolor paper, forming jagged edges like teeth retreating towards the horizon.

AS the early light begins to show me a world hiding outside the area of my headlights I see thick columns of mist hanging over a dug out water pond. They look like ghosts that are hesitant to return to the earth at the break of day. Just as ghostly is the yodel pup (coyote) that halts his lonely trek across an open field long enough to watch me pass on the highway. From the oposite lane ,heading west, a truckdriver waves a silent good morning. The three of us share the loneliness of the dawn.

Prarie Giants, old wooden grain elevators, stand at attention awaiting battle like Don Quixote's windmills. I ask myself "Where is my Dolcinea?" as a airliners contrail is turned to a question mark by fluctuations in the jet stream above.

On the fence posts, small birds with their feathers puffed up shiver to produce enough warmth to go looking for their first meal of the day. At the same time I watch an Eagle swoop down low over the road ahead of me, dip down into the ditch and come up with an unlucky ground squirrel.

The vast flatness of the prarieas is broken up by stands of trees that surround farms and towns like castle walls. They defend the places of man from the armies of the elements, wind, rain, sun, dust and snow. Outside those protective walls grain bins and smal out buildings lean over at impossible angles. An abandoned farm gives mut testimoney to the futility of standing alone. The once tall strong and proud barn now is just a pile of weather beaten wood turned silver by the enciroment. One broken and jagged beam thrust towards the sky like a fist, defiant but still going down for the last time. Yet as I crest the top of a valley ridge before me is spread out a patchwork quilt of farmers fields. the warmth and comfort of the image reminds me of home. That must be the dichotomy of the Canadian praries, a sometimes harsh but beautiful land.

Farm equipment like little insatiable dragons have , in places, cut down oceans of waving grasses and grains; future beer, bread and cooking oils. Now in those fields cows roam on their way two the golden arches, stupid and tame. Once the land was filled with Bison wild and free. The harvested fields are pinstriped like the suits of business men fro the city, rushing about in tall glass containers like gold fish in a bowl.

I stop to pick-up another part of my load. Its at an organic grain distributer in the middle of nowhere, my load is not ready yet. As I walk around the yard a soft breeze carries the scent of dew on freshly cut alfalfa. The air is untainted by traffic or industry. I let the midmorning sun warm my face and listen to laundry flapping on a clothes line.

I guess it's not such a bad job after all.

-- Anonymous, April 05, 2000

Wow! I am getting interesting responses!

-- Anonymous, April 05, 2000
I've just begun a new job, and though I do love it, I know I spend way too much time goofing around on the Net. The funny part is that everyone here thinks I work so hard and so quickly and constantly compliments and thanks me, that it leads me to believe that the person before me in this position was an utter and complete moron. No one seems to notice that I am the one who always knows the latest stories from Boston.com or CNN.com or that I have so many great recommendations on fun and fascinating websites for them to visit. My workday is supposed to start between 8:30 and 9 o'clock am. It is now 10, and I am no where near beginning my actual workload. I am such a slacker.

I have a pretty strong work ethic. I feel bad when I have to say "No,I can't do that/help you" to someone. Even the really annoying guy who everyone hates. I have serious guilt-complexes built into it. I have been told it all goes together: Irish-Catholic- guilt-complex-work-ethic, but who knows.

I will be given a raise when I end my probationary period, anywhere from 2 - 4 months from now. I would expect a 5% raise, but it may even be better, from what my coworkers tell me. Since this is my first real job, I have no idea what the standard is, or how to get a good raise. I had a hard enough time figuring out how to do a good interview, I shudder at the thought of having again to pimp myself to the HR people and my boss...

-- Anonymous, April 05, 2000

I just transferred to another division on another floor (yay!), which will get me away from an unpleasant micromanaging jerk of a woman. (I alluded to her in an earlier post or two. I'm now free!)

So...due to the move, I don't know if I'll get the same amount (or more) Internet surf privs down there or not, but I've always managed to scratch the itch before...and there's IE access. And my new work space is private, big and has a kickass computer. I suspect I'll get to read on lunch break like always!

The rest of your questions will have to wait until I acclimate to the new position.

-- Anonymous, April 05, 2000

Most companies claim to favor open communication between employees and management. Large ones seek to learn what employees think, through confidential opinion surveys, to which they respond, in meetings, with graphs, on an overhead projector, showing how they plan to address complaints, morale issues, and so forth. What action they mean to take. Policies are spelled out, in handbooks. It's clear what is permitted and what is not. You discuss what is expected of you with your manager. You agree on what will get you a raise, what will get you a ding in your helmet. No surprises at performance evaluation time. Your raise is tied to how well you do your job, and how well the company is doing, and how well the economy in general fares. In my experience, some people work hard, and get ahead, faster than people who aren't interested in getting ahead, but want to have a life outside work. If you just serve your time, and do what is expected, a little more, now and then, you'll get about the same raise as everybody else, because if you don't, you'll sull up and do less work than you were doing before you got a shitty raise. There are sweat shops--I have worked in them--where you're paid piece work, essentially. Your compensation is tied to tangible output. Work-product. Given a certain minimum level of quality, the more work you do, the more you get paid. The less you do, the less you make. Contract work is often like this. Tied to a project. But most white-collar, knowledge-work is done by salaried, paraprofessional people, and you still get paid between projects. Busy periods and slack periods alternate. If you stay overworked, your manager will hire more help. If it's too slack, he lets people go. Layoffs, and unemployment, depress wages. A scarcity of workers, relative to work needing to be done, tends to inflate wages. If you're doing well, bad times are around the corner. And vice versa. That's called the business cycle. Don't overextend yourself, because the next slowdown is coming, as sure as the tide must go out here to come in there. Have enough set by to see you through. Work-family, diversity, and employee relations are related to how well the economy is doing, how well the company is doing, and how well you blend in with your co-workers, in a kind of industrial melanism. Don't stand out. Don't confront them with your humanity, your individuality, your personality. Don't make them acknowledge you. Hide. Sneak. Dissemble. They don't mean what they say. As Joyce said, silence, exile, cunning. I make it a policy not to write on company time, with company equipment. It's habit-forming, like dope, or degenerate gambling, or sex addiction. Watching Oprah Winfrey. If you write, don't print it out on the company printer. If you print it out, don't xerox it on the company xerox machine. If you're on the Internet, go ahead and surf the net, everybody does, but try to limit it to business use, a legitimate professional development, and the odd hobby interest. Avoid Web sites that deal with guns, child porn, games of chance, hate speech, insurrection, or about some kind of pinworm-in- the-brain-of-the-monster site about work, about smuggling, being a blockade runner instead of a gatekeeper, or a drone. Save those for home. Don't confront them with who you are and they'll look the other way. If they do decide to come after you, it will be for poor performance, or misuse of company resources. They can read your email, check how much time of the day you're on the Internet, and list what Web sites you visit. They'll label you a substandard performer. Or a thief. Of computer time. It won't be about your attitude, or how you aren't a keen guy and a peachy dancer. And all the other girls in the dorm like you. This saying one thing and doing another is their modus operandi. This double standard. Double talk. They keep it vague so they can do whatever suits them. Promising this and delivering that. Reneging on one side of the social contract. The company side, the university side, the government side. It's Orwellian. People say what they know is false and don't say what they know is true. To keep their job. Fear of the sack keeps modern, Western man in line, Orwell said. A writer should encourage people to think about such matters, to talk to co-workers about such matters, to communicate laterally, horizontally, with writers, co-workers in other companies, over the Internet, and to change the top-down, we give the orders, you obey mentality from the bottom up, through subversion, through give-and- take, through sharing, through reading and writing, daily, making Web sites a favorite and reading them every day and sending email off when a site rings your chimes and telling a friend about the site. What's the difference between that and putting Dilbert cartoons on your cubicle wall, responding to chain letters, balancing your checkbook, shopping, forwarding corny office humor, playing the football pool, flirting, at the water cooler, gossip, listening to talk radio, proselytizing for your fundamentalist religion, or health foods, driving in traffic, like the guy going to work in Office Space, the old man on the walker passing him (spoiler). Keep your resume up to date and take all the training they will pay for. If you can use the computer good enough to misuse it, you can get another job. They know that. Or they'd have a moron in there doing what you do. For half the pay. "One of these days I'm going to own this here construction company," Brother Dave says. "Gimme another drink of water." If I had a company, I would surf the Internet, not to snoop on my own people, but to find out what the kind of resourceful, innovative people I wanted to attract thought about work. I'd hire them, and tell them to develop their own jobs. Tailor a job to their abilities and interests. I would want to keep them happy, and productive. I would certainly have my personnel people, my diversity people, my employee relations people keeping track of the climate of opinion, among opinion-setters, leading-edge talent, self-starters. Tricksters, shaking up the zeitgeist. Of course, that's probably why I don't own a company. Why I work for The Man, and surf the Internet. Why I'm not a bestselling author. But that's another story.

Some Thoughts on Diversity (by a True Believer)

' A knowledge-worker's loyalty is to his profession, not his employer. ' His skills are portable, and in demand, if he keeps them current. ' He will spend as much time keeping his skills current as he does performing the rote tasks he is paid to do. For self-preservation, in an age of continuous workforce rebalancing. ' A cigar doesn't have a thing to say about who smokes it. That is, if a person can do the work, it doesn't matter what he looks like. Or does when he's away from the job. It's nobody's business but his. ' If you let a person improve a process, she will. Not reward them. Stand out of their way. ' A company should, in its own enlightened self-interest, facilitate an employee in changing the process, in learning, in challenging the status quo, the received tradition. To do this is to defy authority, willy-nilly. Authority should grow from experience out. Not be legislated in, and passed down. Especially in a time of rapid technological change. ' If a man, for example, were capable of writing books about this, of looking at procedures, work environments, benefits, impediments to efficiency, talking to people from all ranks, analyzing, summarizing, testing, reformuating hypotheses, it would be foolish to have him write some document to guideline and checklist a detail-oriented data- entry person could "write." ' Benefits don't reflect people's needs. I can adopt a mixed-race child with its heart born on the outside, but I can't stay home with a sick kid. I can have a sex change operation but I can't get my teeth fixed or buy a pair of eyeglasses. ' I don't trust the company. It lays people off arbitrarily. Capriciously. Or callously. Cynically. It rewards conformity and sycophancy and punishes independence and originality. ' You take advantage of me, I take advantage of you. Preemptively. And I'm a state agent at it. Which is a sound, pragmatic, bottom- line reason not to take advantage of me. ' Treat me right and I'm loyal. I'm a member of the team. A team is a team. Not stars and bench-sitters. Parasites and supernumeraries taking credit for someone else's work. Too many suits, too much doubletalk. Too much hypocrisy and sham, code words, secret agendas, omert` about how things really work. Tear the doors loose from the doorjambs, Walt Whitman said. Open it up and let her rip.

-- Anonymous, April 05, 2000

Good grief.

-- Anonymous, April 05, 2000
i have an interview tomorrow for what SOUNDS like the job was WRITTEN by me, in my dreams (minus the hottie in hotpants, of course)... i've got to sell 'em, so send good thoughts this a-way...

(thanks. you're THE BEST!)

*smile*

-- Anonymous, April 05, 2000

Hi. Just so happens I'm in a field doing a gig that I actually LIKE...as some of you may have guessed, I drive a Greyhound bus.

I've driven motrcoaches for almost 23 yaers now. I've been in 49 states, 10 provinces, 3 territorries, and have been in and out of Mexico and Belize. As nutty as people claim Greyhound buses are, I like the job, like most of the people I come in contact with, and seeing the world through a bus windshield appeals to me.

Among the people that I've come in contact with in my travels have been several Hollywood celebs. They are facinated with the nomadic lifestyle that some of us drivers lead, and the stories that we have (several Greyhound buses were involved in the Grammys and the Emmys!).

As a work ethic, I'll borrow a line from David Byrne that goes, "If your work isn't what you love, then something isn't right." If you are in a service occupation as I am, you shouldn't waste your time bitching about how lousy it is. If you don't like the situation or working conditions, get out!

ON INTERNET GOOFING: Right now, I am not as geeky that I have a laptop I take on the road. When I am home from a tour, I do like to sit down and 'touch base' with my o/l community. I also write fictional tales and sometimes when I am stuck on stupid, I can surf and find ideas for sub-plots and character quirks. The 'net is addictive. Many relationships and jobs have gone south because of irresposible surfing. Be careful.

The Greyhounder

-- Anonymous, April 11, 2000

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