if ppl are gonna do a job, then they should just do the darn thing, right? Or quit, maybe, & try something else? Because “life is too short”, & all that? Oh nevermind.
So anyway, we all know & understand the put-upon petty bureaucrat who hates [his] lot in life, & tends to take it out upon all & sundry. A wonderful (& wonderfully prevalent) example is the just-this-side-of-hostile toll-booth takers in SF, who often seem to compete in how sloooooow they can receive EXACT CHANGE. But hey– they’re paid shit, I can imagine doing the exact same thing, so I can’t knock them… at least, not when I’m not stuck in a long, non-moving toll-booth line… Grrrrr.
Er, but how about highly-paid Managers, for example? For publically-traded, SEC-accountable firms?
Those of us who [chose] to avoid the “Management Track” & remain “Technical Drones” or whatever, had very clear reasons for doing this (besides the chance to miss-out on 25-50% more pay, for starters). And a LOT of those reasons had to do w/ getting to stay being ‘techie dorks’, & avoiding all the ‘press-the-flesh’ & ‘kissing-babies’ BS that the average Mgr has to negotiate.
And that’s great! The onus being– if you wanna be a techie dork, & don’t wanna play the “be nice to ppl” game (ie, politics)… you’d better be quite hot at the techie bits, no?
Correspondingly, if you wanna be ‘political player’ (ie. “Manager”), don’t you have to [remember] to keep kissing the right ass?
Bog save me from frickin idiots who call themselves “Technical Managers” who both can’t find their technical asses w/ both hands, and don’t bother being nice to those who can. It’s as if they held the power of “hire/fire” in their grubbly little non-technical hands, & knew they were untouchable… gobbling-up all credit for anything their ‘team’ produces, & smoothly passing-the-buck back down for any issues. Oh wait, I guess that’s all true. Nevermind.
But anyway, I have a very strong (theoretical, to be sure) appreciation for an honest whore. They have their price, & tend to perform adequately when it’s paid. Example: in a very large & shiny building I once worked, there were a stream of very healthy & well-dressed damsels whose entire role, it appeared, was to leap forward & open the door smilingly to arriving Executive-types. I had occasionally noticed this curious process as I walked-by, & wondered what must being going-thru the minds of said damsels… or, at least, what was the going cost of each paid-for smile. So one day, due to some unmentionably bad karma, I arrived late at the building & managed to slip just ahead of a passel of ‘business-casual’ dressed guys spewing from a large stretched limo. As I hurried up to the door, one of the afore-mentioned hotties leaped into action, & swung the door open for me, showering me w/ a very fetching smile. “Gee” i thought, “I don’t remember this happening before”. And almost on cue, her (expensive) smile dropped 3cm, & the temperature of her face dropped 30degreesF… b/c she’d just noticed my “HI I work Here” badge.
So what does she do?
She slams the door in my face!
No, I’m not kidding!
& I nearly died laughing!!
Which made her even more irate!
& I laughed even harder!!
…b/c I knew exactly how she felt, having myself done crap jobs like sliming fish & smiling at reptiles… there is one, & only ONE thought going thru [her] mind:
“I’m being PAID for this”
…& clearly she wasn’t being PAID to be nice to me.
HAHAHAHAHAHA!! 
. . .
So back to highly-paid ‘take-no-prisoners’ “Managers” who treat their directs like shit.
You know what, you gotta wonder at ppl like this, who never seem to realize, that these very ppl they’re treading-on, are the very ppl who make that’s Manager’s ‘Successes’. And word gets around– crappy Managers soon don’t have anyone of quality working for them any longer.
Mark Twain once said “the principle difference between a man & a dog, is that if you take-in a starving dog & feed it, it won’t bite you”.
Lemme update that & say: “Man is the [only] animal who will gleefully, cheerfully, chop-off his nose to spite his face”.
In ethics class it’s called “Invincibly Ignorant”, & refers to those dwelling in ivory towers, etc. Why not just say, “never had a real job in their whole life (ie., really ‘work’ for a living)”, & leave it at that.
…till next time, try out this handy-dandy tool to deal with managerial pricks. It’s called the “white mutiny“. Enjoy.
{& just for giggles– why not post your own funny work “painful waste-of-space” story for others to read…}