When I was at a government contractor, we had government mandated annual Ethics training. The subject varied from year to year, but you could guess the topic by reading the business section of the newspaper and seeing what our C-suite had been busted for in the previous year. Most years it was typical business shenanigans like proper time card charging or contracts stuff (If project A goes over budget and project B comes in under budget, no, you can’t move the money from B to cover A. Duh). One year the company settled a harassment suit against a VP, and of course, that year’s ethics training covered harassment.
The strangest one was the year that had a grab bag of topics, including 30 minutes on human trafficking. There was a lot of emphasis on “don’t use prostitutes on company travel, even in countries where it is legal”. That topic appeared only that one year. We really wondered who got busted and what they had done.
The one I hate most that comes up every year is a “business ethics training” course. I work for a federal contractor, so this is the training we get every year about not taking bribes from foreign nationals and shit like that. I’m a software developer, I’m sitting at my computer every day, I’m not a globe-hopping marketing dude meeting with rich prospective foreign clients. Complete waste of time.
(Not to mention that, based on that training couse, I am apparently held to a higher standard of conduct in my job than a certain former white house occupant.)
My favorite example of this, was my annual requirement for ‘IED Awareness Training’. This was required for all of us on active duty regardless of AFSC.
I tried to remove this training from our inventory, since I was EOD, and specifically trained to be aware of, identify/isolate, and neutralize IEDs. (Hint: I was already fully aware of IEDs). I was unsuccessful in my attempts with headquarters, and my shop wasted 200+ hours of productive time annually because we all had to take this training. I wonder if they required doctors and nurses to take “First Aid Training.”
Now that I’m a federal contractor, it’s the same rigamarole. My newest favorite example is “Computer Use Training,” which is dumb, because I have to log into and use a computer to take the training which teaches just that. Stoopid lawyers.
Tripler
The other dumb one: Office Equipment Safety (aka How to Properly and Safely Use a Copy Machine.)
You don’t know pain. My spouse manages a remote group, so he has to do training relevant to the state we live in, the state where corporate headquarters is located, and every state the members of his team live.
This includes subtle variations on topics, so he has to do separate sexual harassment prevent training videos for CA and IN, for example. It’s not enough to do one training that checks all the boxes, if the states’ requirements for content varies.
I can think of one training course that was actually helpful – workplace active shooter.
We had a disgruntled employee kill four and wound two others. But people did know what to do. Happily, I was working from home that day and missed the “excitement.”
I also had to take an “workplace active shooter” training class and actually learned a lot about how police will handle these incidents. If they evacuate everyone from a building, they have to be careful that the “bad guys” don’t try to hide amongst the other people – so they have to treat EVERYONE as a possible shooter and we shouldn’t be surprised if we were told to come out with our hands in the air.
Otherwise, all I can remember now is that the possible responses were hide, run, and fight. We had to practice hiding. Fortunately we didn’t practice the other two responses.
Oh, yeah, at some point it’s like, really? At my current place the already existing sexual harassment requirement was doubled over with another whole separate additional one after 2017 and #MeToo.
OTOH I suppose TPTB do want to make it so there’s no one who can say “nobody told me THIS specific thing”. I mean, one would think “don’t be a jerk” and “anything that may go wrong, will” would be the simplest guides as to what to watch out for, but it’s obviously not so for many.
At least this past year even the sessions that we had to do in person became virtual, allowing me to be doing useful work (or, Dopeing) off to the side.
Prime suspect, any corporate dude who got cleaned out in a divorce that previous year.
We had that last year, and a random drill to go with it .
They told us we are to barricade in a board room and fight back if we had too. I told my boss we’re on the second floor I’m getting TFO of the building if that happens and breaking a window to do it if I have too.
Have you met people who work in Corporate America? Most of them have the mental competence of a 9 year old. Or at the very least, the organizational structure tends to be designed to encourage acting like one.
I thought I was actually joking at first, but the more I think about it, I think I might not be. Unless you have one of the few jobs that actually requires intelligence and/or creativity - like actually designing new products, writing complex software, or something artistic - most corporate jobs are basically being a carbon-based cog in a complex machine that can’t (yet) be replaced by automation.
Based on time spent consulting in small corporate offices, I formed a similar theory. With few exceptions, nobody in junior management knows how to manage.
People who are good at something else observe or attempt management, realize that they aren’t any good at it, and move to jobs they are good at. People who aren’t good at anything else go into management streams, and never come to the realization that they are bad at management.
Also… how incredibly important is sleeping or smoking or drinking or going to school with the right people.
All of these get bonus points if the training video is on a VHS where the company keeps a 20+ year old CRT TV and VCR around on a cart so that they don’t have to buy a new video.
I just finished our annual idiotic “security training” videos. Fortunately, they don’t stop you from skipping ahead directly to the quiz (with challenging questions like "Should you plug a thumb drive you found in the parking lot into your work computer?), and mark the course as “completed” for the records.
I did an online Food Safety Certified course just yesterday, and the canned questions after it were suprisingly good. Yes, there was a lot of boilerplate, but I got canned the first time for making the wrong choice between “sanitise your hands” and “wash your hands with soapy water” and a couple of similar subjects, so I had to go back and study a bit harder.
So now I have the exact food temperature ranges burned into my brain, and have become aware that there’s a substance called lupin which is a common enough allergen for some people to care about.
Not sure if this information is really necessary in order to put pre-bought sushi on plates at student club games night - but that’s a different kettle of appropriately-refrigerated fish
