Yup. Getting tackled first thing in the morning before I’ve even got my coat off is one of my least favourite things.
I’ve had two experiences that have shaped my view of working in an office; the first was being a medical lab tech, where people did die if I messed up or didn’t get the work done. The second was working in an accounting department where everything was crisis, crisis, crisis, can’t miss the deadline, until we did miss the deadlines because we were understaffed, then it was, “Oh, well, we’ll do it today, I guess.” I put in a solid day’s work, but I don’t stress about ANYTHING that goes on in an office today, and I go home at quitting time.
Weirdly enough, my experience has been the opposite - Everyone sees you leave but nobody sees you come in.
Long ago, I once worked for a company where the CEO allowed you to set your own hours. I chose 5AM to 2 PM.
I can also brag that I was fast at my job. I was literally over twice as fast as the other 2 people who did what I did and there was documentation to show that.
However, I had to switch to working 9-6 because of 2 things:
Whenever an emergency happened it happened during or toward the end of the day and needed to be fixed by the end of the day. Therefore my 5am-2pm often became 5am - 6pm. People weren’t called in early for emergencies, only held late. Not a complaint - it just is.
Second is that I would saunter out a 2 and people would passively aggressively make a big motion of checking their watches…say things like “half day?” and the like.
Basically, nobody saw me come in and everyone saw me leave and so even though I had documentation of being really good at getting things done I was getting a rep as a slacker.
I think others have done a great job of explaining this question, but my situation is a little different so I thought I’d chime in. Due to the nature of my work, I am usually directing people to complete a task.
I take complete responsibility for the outcome of my work efforts when something goes wrong or is done incorrectly: I was in charge of the crew, was directing their efforts, and signed off on things as done (and done correctly). If that isn’t the case, it’s my responsibility and I own the problems.
I praise my crew and point out how they did all the hard work that resulted in a successful installation when things go well. Although they followed my plan and my directions, they were the ones actually sweating and getting dirty and physically making things happen. I was just the guy who came up with the plan.
So yes, I take complete responsibility for failures in my work, but my crew and I share responsibility for the successes.
Heh - people are always so “funny.” When I work part-time, I get comments like that all the time; “Must be nice to go home at 2.” “Yeah, it really is. The part-time wages, though, not so great.” (I only said the first part, not the last part.) People have a really hard time just tending to their own knitting.
I know this is kind of a variant on the “crabs in the pot” mentality, but workaholics tend to make all of the rest of us look bad by comparison, if they’re doing the things that bosses want to see.
I used to work with a guy who used to put in routine overtime when he didn’t have anything pressing to get done- the department had no big projects, he wasn’t working on anything pressing- just normal projects with reasonable deadlines.
He got all sorts of kudos and promotions for being such a hard worker, etc… even though he didn’t have anything resembling a personal life, and I even asked him why he worked so much and so long when most of what he was doing wasn’t even under the gun. You can’t compete career-wise with a guy like that- he was essentially sacrificing his entire social life and personal life to be good at his job and get ahead.
So you turn around, look those motherfuckers in the eye and say “What time did you get here pal? 8am? 9am? I did more than you’ll do all day by that time. Go fuck yourself.”
Seriously, people making comments can be shut down real fast. When the “nice guy” stops taking their shit and throws it back in their faces.
That’s a great idea - I think we should all do that, every time something happens in a job that we don’t like. Then, after we’re all fired, we can hang out here together ALL DAY!
I was often accused of being a workaholic but the truth is multi tasking gets on my nerves so I chose to do the physical aspects of my job durring the normal shift and sacrifice a couple of my own hours most days to do my paperwork. It was just a lot more relaxing and I could do a better job on it. I avoid multi tasking as much as possible.
And when it does, I’m very good at that part of it.