I’m just not fond of it. I’m not good at it. I get impatient when a two-hour meeting is just so much of it.
I know there is always a certain amount of supporting the boss or making the boss look good, but when it borders on lying I find it very difficult. I have also lost all respect for the boss.
They say that if you aren’t part of the solution, you are part of the problem. So I think I’m the one who needs to leave. Because all of the other 11 people in the room seemed fine with it.
I know I need to get off my keister and get moving, but I don’t just want to make a rash decision. I want to find a job I like and can do well.
On Monday I took a break from work and went to a Caribou and sat there writing things in my little notebook about why I didn’t want to leave my job–most of which seemed to be about abandoning my friends. But on Tuesday I sat there looking at them thinking, “what am I doing here?”
If you’re looking for the perfect workplace where everyone tells the truth, treats everyone equally and with respect, makes informed sensible decisions, etc then you’ll be looking a long time. Most workplaces involve putting up with bullshit of some kind or another. Some workplaces are more full of it than others.
I try to keep a healthy ‘don’t give a shit’ attitude to my job.
What that means is, I do my job to the best of my abilities, I’m friendly and helpful, I do what I can to help the organisation succeed…but the fact that I don’t really give a shit means that if I’m asked to do something a particular way when I think there’s a better way it could be done, I don’t get all cut up about it. I try to keep it in perspective - it’s just a job. It provides me with money. If I can get some good workmates and an enjoyable day out of it, then that’s a bonus.
Clearly, I’m never going to be CEO with an attitude like that. But I’m a lot happier than many other people who, in my opinion, take their jobs way too seriously.
All those people who seem fine with it? You’ll find that most are not and have other ways of expressing it, or are dead inside.
Honest people with personal integrity do not make it in Management. I wish that wasn’t the case, as I’d make a good manager, but time and again, I’ve learned that I will be royally fucked over by people with no integrity who lie their asses off about things and for some reason or another, are the ones who are believed, while I am labeled the liar. Even in the face of hard physical evidence to the contrary.
You not only have to put up with bullshit, you have to generate it. And it has to line up with what the people above you are spewing out. And you have to be quite gung-ho about the whole thing. And you have to do more than a little self promotion, but fairly subtly. For maximum upward movement, working excessive hours is a necessity, although we all know people who work lots of hours and don’t get very far. That’s because, although they’re there, they aren’t really accomplishing anything.
Aside from all this posturing, though, you also have to manage to be effective. And by this I don’t mean merely competent. I mean you have to do something that makes you stand out. You should gear your mind towards something that is profitable; something that stands out technically but doesn’t make the company any money is not good enough.
If you accomplish what’s listed in paragraph 1, but not paragraph 2, or vice versa, you’ll get ahead a bit. You need both to really succeed, though.
Yes, that has been my experience. I’ve worked lots of different places in different industries, and being successful, however you define it, has never had to do with being good at your job and caring about doing things right.
It has a LOT to do with stroking your boss’s ego and being “easy to deal with” - read thrilled! and happy! to do your work and support the boss’s agenda! - and giving the impression that your priorities are exactly the same as the boss’s.
It’s really exhausting for me, personally, to have to fake it all day. That’s why I end up doing nothing on Saturday.
I find it’s important to accept this as fighting it will only make your life really crappy. On the other hand, you should never stop looking for a workplace that isn’t like this. Just accept that you may not find it, and if you never do recite the Serenity Prayer as much as needed. It’s not about you, find your fufillment and self-expression outside of work.
Bullshit is everywhere. The tricky part is drawing the line between acceptable levels of bullshit that you can tollerate, and what levels you can’t tollerate. There is no avoiding bullshit.
I have no idea why this idea about putting up with and creating bullshit is so pervasive.
I’ve worked two jobs since coming out of college.
In both of them, you’re required to perform real services, produce real product, be efficient, communicate well, and do it on time.
No matter how well you “play the game”, if you’re incompetent, you get let go. And, in both jobs, I’ve had bosses that leave me alone as long as I’m getting my work done.
Oh, we have some meetings that go on way too long, but those are the rare ones. Usually, we meet, discuss what has to be discussed, and then go do what we discussed.
Anyone who thinks they have to put up with a ton of bullshit, I’d like to hear what they studied in college, and what field they’re working in.
FIWI, I studied math, statistics, and operations research and I work as a programmer.
You studied English Lit and you’re in a marketing department and you hear a lot of daily bullshit? That’s a fucking surprise!
I feel much the same way sandra nz does. I try not to let it get to me (good luck sometimes).
I think in any organization there’s going to be something that sucks - too much red tape, a jerk manager, blah blah blah. Nowhere is perfect. It’s also about finding the right bullshit, the kind you can tolerate. Slow processes might not drive you insane, but an asshole CEO might. Working for the best boss in the world might help make up for the fact that your accounting system sucks. (by the way, Trunk, I’m in the accounting/finance group!)
Some places just have more crap than others. So far in my work experience I’ve worked at some pretty cool business and others that don’t know shit from shinola.
I find that it’s hard for some people to differentiate between the kind of bullshit that is generated by people wasting other people’s time with nonsense, and the kind of bullshit that is more like, anything that I don’t work on or know much about is bullshit. The latter requires an attitude adjustment, the former requires either a strong will to cut through the crap or a new job.
It sounds from the OP that this is indeed a case of a lousy job if so much time spent kissing the boss’s behind.
Succeed? No. Move up the ladder? Well, yeah…bullshit seems to be a prerequisite. I dislike office politics intensely, but health care bureaucracy seems custom made for it. As a result, I do my job as well as I can, stay out of politics, and try to let the politics slide over my head. If it’s something I just cannot get past, I vent to the darling man or here. The money may be nice in upper management, but I like sleeping at night and living relatively stress free.
This is so true. I’ve never worked a job where there hasn’t been some kind of bullshit. In my current job, the big buzzword is “sustainability.” Sustainable this, sustainable that. We even get evaluated on our “sustainability” in our annual reviews. I’m not against environmental responsibility, but it often seems like a smokescreen to deflect attention away from some serious problems with the organization. So to some degree, it’s bullshit, but it’s not horrendous, unbearable bullshit, and the good stuff about the job makes up for it.
Trunk, I’m sure you won’t be shocked to learn I work in higher ed. Every day, I’m reminded what PhD really stands for.
I’m not a professor or a secretary. I work on the administrative side of things, mostly with students, but also with some profs. It’s a good gig for the most part–good enough that I can mostly laugh about the b.s. rather than getting mad about it.
Thank god. I’ve been trying to think of another field to work in, and thanks to you I know that programming is the job for me. Cuz when you’re a programmer, your job never has any bullshit.
Exactly. Spewing bullshit and forwarding your boss’s agenda are key to getting ahead. Said bullshit includes liberal use of buzz words, coming up with ways to shoot down others’ ideas (unless they’re your boss’s, of course - those are ALWAYS wonderful ideas and must be implemented immediately) and undermining others’ projects if they can’t play along.
Additionally, you must be sure to send e-mails until the wee hours of the night. Everyone knows that if you spend time with your family, you’re not really dedicated to the job. Right? Right??
I’m having a hard time figuring out where the bullshit comes in here. Was the meeting useless? Was it useful for some, but not for the OP? Does the boss want people to bow down, or does the boss just want people to not undercut her?
I’ve found that it is quite useful to learn how to look attentive in meetings while fantasizing about more pleasant things - or even figuring out what to do next at your real job. Bring a notebook and write down ideas - people will think you’re taking notes on the meeting, and consider you quite the team player.
If you have no shame, you can make bullshit work for you. When I was young and innocent I got excited about something, and when I started to evangelize it, it got taken up by our senior management. I soon discovered that they had no desire to make the changes to really capitalize on this idea, and wanted to do what the authors of the idea specifically said not to do, but before it burned out I got the biggest raise and highest rating of my career.
There are lots of good reasons to leave a place, but bs meetings isn’t one of them. You’re not likely to find a place without them.
