02-26-2010, 07:59 PM
Don't bother to read this if you've got anything else exciting, like clipping nails, in your life. I've just got to vent.
I'm always in trouble at work. My best work friend is always the golden child. I tell her we're Dennis the Menace and Margaret. When I said that, she cried. She didn't want to be mean ol' Margaret.
This friend, is a level above me and sits beside me. One of her jobs is to help me figure out something I can't figure out on my own.
A couple of months ago, my boss brought me a stack of work to do. I had to figure out the out of pocket spent by about 200 contracts to see if they'd met the limit because the people who are supposed to program our system to figure that out don't do their jobs. So, people like me do it manually. I've never been comfortable with figuring this because I don't have access to the applications that would make it easier. So, before I committed myself to all these contracts and all that money, I leaned around my carrel in the prairie dog down and asked my friend's status. She said she was going to be working overtime. I asked if she has special overtime work, or if it were regular work, because regular work meant she could help me. That night, it was regular, so I zipped her an e-mail. In it, I jokingly said, "Hey, you don't start overtime work until 4:20, so you've got time to do my work.", and I proceeded to give her the details of what I needed a walkthrough on. In there, I referred to a "great" new program we're now forced to use and said, "I know I don't care what Navigator says, because it's stupid." That meant, I knew I didn't have to look in that system to help me because it had never been loaded with that information. However, one of the bugs is that it populates that area with incorrect numbers. So, we call it "stupid" and we "don't care" what it says.
Being one of those corporate monsters that is responsible for running so many lives, my company has lots of people who need to make themselves look busy by finding and destroying Dennis the Menace charaters. Today, was my day in the barrel.....again.
Call from my boss. Could I come in and "help" him out. He never phones me and he never asks me to come to his side of our wing of the building, so I knew I didn't need to take a note pad to make notes; I needed it to pad my butt because it was about to be chewed about something.
I went in and was instructed to close the glass privacy panel-which means someone is getting their butted chewed out. There, on the desk was an e-mail to my boss, from his boss, from his boss's boss. My e-mail to my friend had been copied and pasted there and parts had been highlighted.
Question 1: Why was I telling my coordinator to do my work? Was I asking about a specific inquiry?
Answer 1: No, not an inquiry, but the huge job he'd just given me to do and I didn't want to mess it up. So, in our voice conversation, which might have been recorded, she told me she was about to start overtime, but it was regular work, so she had time to walk me through out of pocket totals. I e-mailed her to give her an example of what I was working on, told her what I knew how to do, and what I didn't.
Response from the top: I was offensive in the wording of my request because, though the person to whom I addressed the e-mail might have known what I was talking about, my e-mail belongs to THE COMPANY and I can forward, respond, delete, and trash anything I want to, but it will never go away. I'm not to think THE COMPANY is Big Brother, but they do check to see that we are professional at all times and I was extremely unprofessional in demanding that a coworker do my job for me. I should just have said I wanted to be assisted with figuring out of pocket expenses.
(we weren't through)
Farther down, it got worse.
Question 2: What could I have been thinking to say that Navigator was stupid and that I didn't care what it said?
Answer 2: Because we, between us, use the term "stupid" to indicate those things that are not on the system that we are told will someday be on the system, but that are currently populated with nonsense. As in, "Don't use Navigator, it's stupid on out of pocket." And that leads to not caring what it says. Why would I care what it said and waste company time if I already knew it was populated with nonsense? So, we say, "You don't care what's in this file because it doesn't have the info you need."
Answer 2: Insert pretty much the same thing as answer 1, but with further instruction. I should have said, "I am very frustrated because Navigator has not been programmed to give me the information I need and I don't have access to the screens that give the information, so could you please assist me in the steps to correctly figuring out of pocket using the tools to which I have access?:
It all boils down to the fact that I'm an excellent target because I am irreverent and disrespectful of my electronic betters. I must never allow a personality to show because we are not programmed that way.
I am 56 years old and being beaten up by men 20 years my junior. Where is their respect for my survival, so far, in that type of atmosphere?
I've run out of hating my job. I hated it a month into it when I found out we don't care if it's logical or moral or ethical. We just churn out the work and do it again, and again, and again, because doing it right the first time is not an option when you work on production. I don't even have a word for the contempt I feel now, but I've trapped myself by staying too long and too old to move on. So, ultimately, I'm to blame. But, do we have to punish me for it when I've tried perform to the best of my ability? My accuracy rating is 99.9% and I consistently exceed my goal, but today was not about that. Today was about conforming, and I'm truly a failure at that.
Am I paranoid now? You bet! I wouldn't be a bit surprised if I get there Monday morning and my badge doesn't work at the first checkpoint because I've printed this right here for the world to see.
Freeeeeeeeedoooooommmmmmmm! for those who watched Braveheart.
Sorry about that. Go wash the nasty taste out of your mouth, if you've stayed with it this long. And, if you did read this far, you're a masochist. This was way too long, way too boring, and way too whiney to be of interest to anyone.
Thank you and goodnight.
janilee
I'm always in trouble at work. My best work friend is always the golden child. I tell her we're Dennis the Menace and Margaret. When I said that, she cried. She didn't want to be mean ol' Margaret.
This friend, is a level above me and sits beside me. One of her jobs is to help me figure out something I can't figure out on my own.
A couple of months ago, my boss brought me a stack of work to do. I had to figure out the out of pocket spent by about 200 contracts to see if they'd met the limit because the people who are supposed to program our system to figure that out don't do their jobs. So, people like me do it manually. I've never been comfortable with figuring this because I don't have access to the applications that would make it easier. So, before I committed myself to all these contracts and all that money, I leaned around my carrel in the prairie dog down and asked my friend's status. She said she was going to be working overtime. I asked if she has special overtime work, or if it were regular work, because regular work meant she could help me. That night, it was regular, so I zipped her an e-mail. In it, I jokingly said, "Hey, you don't start overtime work until 4:20, so you've got time to do my work.", and I proceeded to give her the details of what I needed a walkthrough on. In there, I referred to a "great" new program we're now forced to use and said, "I know I don't care what Navigator says, because it's stupid." That meant, I knew I didn't have to look in that system to help me because it had never been loaded with that information. However, one of the bugs is that it populates that area with incorrect numbers. So, we call it "stupid" and we "don't care" what it says.
Being one of those corporate monsters that is responsible for running so many lives, my company has lots of people who need to make themselves look busy by finding and destroying Dennis the Menace charaters. Today, was my day in the barrel.....again.
Call from my boss. Could I come in and "help" him out. He never phones me and he never asks me to come to his side of our wing of the building, so I knew I didn't need to take a note pad to make notes; I needed it to pad my butt because it was about to be chewed about something.
I went in and was instructed to close the glass privacy panel-which means someone is getting their butted chewed out. There, on the desk was an e-mail to my boss, from his boss, from his boss's boss. My e-mail to my friend had been copied and pasted there and parts had been highlighted.
Question 1: Why was I telling my coordinator to do my work? Was I asking about a specific inquiry?
Answer 1: No, not an inquiry, but the huge job he'd just given me to do and I didn't want to mess it up. So, in our voice conversation, which might have been recorded, she told me she was about to start overtime, but it was regular work, so she had time to walk me through out of pocket totals. I e-mailed her to give her an example of what I was working on, told her what I knew how to do, and what I didn't.
Response from the top: I was offensive in the wording of my request because, though the person to whom I addressed the e-mail might have known what I was talking about, my e-mail belongs to THE COMPANY and I can forward, respond, delete, and trash anything I want to, but it will never go away. I'm not to think THE COMPANY is Big Brother, but they do check to see that we are professional at all times and I was extremely unprofessional in demanding that a coworker do my job for me. I should just have said I wanted to be assisted with figuring out of pocket expenses.
(we weren't through)
Farther down, it got worse.
Question 2: What could I have been thinking to say that Navigator was stupid and that I didn't care what it said?
Answer 2: Because we, between us, use the term "stupid" to indicate those things that are not on the system that we are told will someday be on the system, but that are currently populated with nonsense. As in, "Don't use Navigator, it's stupid on out of pocket." And that leads to not caring what it says. Why would I care what it said and waste company time if I already knew it was populated with nonsense? So, we say, "You don't care what's in this file because it doesn't have the info you need."
Answer 2: Insert pretty much the same thing as answer 1, but with further instruction. I should have said, "I am very frustrated because Navigator has not been programmed to give me the information I need and I don't have access to the screens that give the information, so could you please assist me in the steps to correctly figuring out of pocket using the tools to which I have access?:
It all boils down to the fact that I'm an excellent target because I am irreverent and disrespectful of my electronic betters. I must never allow a personality to show because we are not programmed that way.
I am 56 years old and being beaten up by men 20 years my junior. Where is their respect for my survival, so far, in that type of atmosphere?
I've run out of hating my job. I hated it a month into it when I found out we don't care if it's logical or moral or ethical. We just churn out the work and do it again, and again, and again, because doing it right the first time is not an option when you work on production. I don't even have a word for the contempt I feel now, but I've trapped myself by staying too long and too old to move on. So, ultimately, I'm to blame. But, do we have to punish me for it when I've tried perform to the best of my ability? My accuracy rating is 99.9% and I consistently exceed my goal, but today was not about that. Today was about conforming, and I'm truly a failure at that.
Am I paranoid now? You bet! I wouldn't be a bit surprised if I get there Monday morning and my badge doesn't work at the first checkpoint because I've printed this right here for the world to see.
Freeeeeeeeedoooooommmmmmmm! for those who watched Braveheart.
Sorry about that. Go wash the nasty taste out of your mouth, if you've stayed with it this long. And, if you did read this far, you're a masochist. This was way too long, way too boring, and way too whiney to be of interest to anyone.
Thank you and goodnight.
janilee
![[Image: lol-040.gif]](http://smileys.on-my-web.com/repository/Laughing/lol-040.gif)