# New and Unimproved Workplace Rants **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 14, 2015, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638 "2015-10-14T15:44:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 29
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2016, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/561 "2016-05-15T01:39:48Z")
I just told you that a breach at that online [del]pyramid scheme[/del] home business netted the criminals your Social Security number and your password for the site. We are trying to help you protect your identity from Russian mobsters and North Korean hackers, so why on Earth would you set up your account with us USING THE SAME DAMNED PASSWORD? ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2016, 9:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/562 "2016-05-17T09:14:29Z")
Apparently Saturday and Sunday are slow days for my company’s internal help desk (makes sense). So, someone gets around to your ticket on such a day, and they decide they need more information. They always decide they need more information, even if the information they ask for happens to be in the description or, occasionally, both in the description and the title. OK, so what they do is send you a Lync message while you’re not logged into Lync. Alternatively (and this one is better, because at least you can see it on Monday), you come back to a string of increasingly exclamation-points-filled email requesting that bit of information, because hey, little details like it being Sunday and it being 3am are irrelevant, right? I seriously hope we’re a bit less bad with our external customers, because this is crap. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2016, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/563 "2016-05-17T16:22:42Z")
I got in an argument with my coworker. It was a long time coming. I overheard my boss talking to her about some things that she did that were non-team player like, and as always, my boss was super nice and easy-going. “It’s ok! just don’t do it again! ok! thank you!” And I figured it was finally time to stand up for myself. So I did so and I tried not to shout and keep my voice down but my coworker started swearing, yelling, more at my boss than me, and then finally stormed out and said she was calling our grandboss and HR. Great. I even politely suggested to her that the three of us sit down and hash it out, but she is flipping mad. Some of the points she raises are legitimate. My boss should have been way more proactive about this. And I tried to be as mature as possible. Aargh. ---
**Author:** ![OffByOne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/45deac/32.png) [@OffByOne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OffByOne)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2016, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/564 "2016-05-17T19:27:17Z")
> [@j666](#): > > Has even one of those signs ever worked? > > Adults know their supposed to clean up after themselves. If there’s a sleaze who won’t in the office (and there always is), nothing will change them, including catching them in the act and shaming them. A savage beat-down might make him/her a little more receptive… ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2016, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/565 "2016-05-18T22:54:04Z")
I am tired of pretending I like you. I had no problems with you until J said, “Google his name and ‘conviction.’” She was under thirteen? What sort of creep are you? So that’s why you were spending time with co-worker C–you were grooming her daughter, right? And your new girlfriend, with young daughter in tow, just moved in–I guess don’t Florida and Illinois share data about people like you or you wouldn’t be allowed within 50 yards of her. Perhaps it’s time a little canary sings. I don’t like kiddie diddlers, and neither do my birds. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 8:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/566 "2016-05-19T08:44:57Z")
The online risk training I’m taking at work has some ideas which are good. In fact, the whole thing may be magnificent, but - it’s narrated by a voice synthesizer (very comprehensible, but my brain was asleep by the second paragraph), - while it doesn’t quite read from the slides, the script does not provide anything beyond the slides, so giving them to me to read at my own pace would have been quicker, - there are a lot of sentence fragments, - and a bunch of unexplained words and acronyms, some of which Uncle Google cannot find (it finds them but not in any context that makes sense). When your risk training puts people to sleep and is illegible, that’s not a risk: it’s a problem. ---
**Author:** ![Lightray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightray/32/391_2.png) [@Lightray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightray)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/567 "2016-05-19T14:41:05Z")
Our “Safety” dept is working my last nerve. We had an incident where a dumpster box headed for the landfill was found to have had a (chemical) reaction, and when we did the incident investigation I found that they’d mixed a waste stream that’s a base and is water-reactive… with wet acid waste. Without checking _anything_ first. After I repeatedly brought up how stupid this was in the incident investigation, they solved the problem by quietly dropping me from all further correspondence about the incident. Which, of course, involved _my_ products, so that was rather noticeable. I just found out that yesterday they mixed “something” into a dumpster box filled with water, and “something happened”. Did they check beforehand? No. There’s supposed to be an incident investigation on this one… I’m thinking I won’t be invited. ---
**Author:** ![WolfpackJeep](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpackjeep/32/2921_2.png) [@WolfpackJeep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WolfpackJeep)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/568 "2016-05-19T22:31:23Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > The online risk training I’m taking at work has some ideas which are good. In fact, the whole thing may be magnificent, but… That sounds so much like the “online training” we’re required to do at work! Do your presentations also force you to complete horrible little drag-n-drop or point-n-click puzzles before you can view the next set of slides? ---
**Author:** ![WolfpackJeep](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpackjeep/32/2921_2.png) [@WolfpackJeep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WolfpackJeep)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/569 "2016-05-19T22:38:43Z")
And speaking of safety, our safety meeting today was about safe tool usage. The video was fairly decent, going out of its way to show men and women engaging in safe practices with power tools, and only showing close-ups of inappropriate tool usage (such as using a screwdriver as a chisel). The safety guy tried to engage the group in conversation, asking if anyone had ever used tools in an unsafe manner. One lady quietly admitted to using a butter knife as a screwdriver. “Well, that’s something most women do anyway!” the safety guy replied. :mad: ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2016, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/570 "2016-05-19T23:22:11Z")
The health tips shown on screens around the office are usually helpful, in a blindingly obvious way, but you sometimes get counter-intuitive tips, like, “It’s easy to lose weight if you substitute sugary pop for water.” No wonder I’m so fat! I’ve been doing it wrong for decades! ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2016, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/571 "2016-05-24T12:15:58Z")
When my asshole boss finally retired last fall, after more than six months of medical issues, he was being praised as this great heroic figure, and it made me ill. But amazing how the worm turns. Every couple of weeks I get a new story from some corner or the other about how he was this Great Colossal Shit not just to me, but in management meetings, and how if he hadn’t decided to retired for ‘medical reasons’, he would have been forced out. 🙂 That’s a smile of Karma Revealed. Letting my stress and anger at the situation dissolve in knowing I wasn’t alone and upper management had huge problems with his attitude toward his own team. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2016, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/572 "2016-05-24T13:29:07Z")
> [@WolfpackJeep](#): > > That sounds so much like the “online training” we’re required to do at work! Do your presentations also force you to complete horrible little drag-n-drop or point-n-click puzzles before you can view the next set of slides? Not unlike deciphering undefined acronyms and jargon count, but unlike other sets it didn’t respond to the “next” button until the synthesized voiceover… waaaas… oooooover. By the halfway point I wanted to kill that synthesizer dead. No. Deader. Once it was well and truly in tiny pieces I would have started with whomever chose such a design. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2016, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/573 "2016-05-24T13:36:43Z")
unless! The first one is “unless”, not unlike! I actually can spoik an’ rite rite! ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2016, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/574 "2016-05-24T15:47:30Z")
I just had to explain to the only guy in our HR department that yes, “two hours without toilets” constitutes enough reason to go home early and work from home when you’re a woman over 40 and your manager has authorized it. The alternative toilet being proposed is 1km away, I could maybe reach the trees on the sidewalk in front of our building. So long as my manager authorizes it, what the hell is it his business if it’s because we’ll be without toilets or because I’m covering my kitchen in day-glo stickers? And I hope his mother pees on him, he probably did it enough times on her when he was little :mad: ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2016, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/575 "2016-05-24T16:07:26Z")
> [@Lightray](#): > > Our “Safety” dept is working my last nerve. We had an incident where a dumpster box headed for the landfill was found to have had a (chemical) reaction, and when we did the incident investigation I found that they’d mixed a waste stream that’s a base and is water-reactive… with wet acid waste. Without checking _anything_ first. > > After I repeatedly brought up how stupid this was in the incident investigation, they solved the problem by quietly dropping me from all further correspondence about the incident. Which, of course, involved _my_ products, so that was rather noticeable. > > I just found out that yesterday they mixed “something” into a dumpster box filled with water, and “something happened”. Did they check beforehand? No. There’s supposed to be an incident investigation on this one… I’m thinking I won’t be invited. I can send you a couple of dimes if you want to drop them to OSHA and EPA. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2016, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/576 "2016-05-24T16:21:58Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > Not unlike deciphering undefined acronyms and jargon count, but unlike other sets it didn’t respond to the “next” button until the synthesized voiceover… > waaaas… > oooooover. > > By the halfway point I wanted to kill that synthesizer dead. No. Deader. Once it was well and truly in tiny pieces I would have started with whomever chose such a design. Did you not have the option of turning the speakers off (or down to an inaudible level)? ---
**Author:** ![Lightray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightray/32/391_2.png) [@Lightray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightray)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2016, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/577 "2016-05-24T17:58:55Z")
Travel advisory for upcoming work trip to Singapore, includes such delights as: “Drinking in public places between 22.30 and 07.00 (local time) is illegal. ‘Liquor Control Zones’, such as Little India and Geylang, prohibits public drinking during all weekends and public holidays. Visitors will be fined if this is violated.” “Any gathering of five or more people is prohibited without a permit; as such, demonstrations are rare.” “A far more serious attitude is taken towards the importation of pornographic materials and especially drugs such as heroin, cannabis and morphine. The import or export of these can carry the death penalty.” It’s not like I travel carrying porn or heroin, but _yikes_. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2016, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/578 "2016-05-25T00:35:53Z")
> [@Lightray](#): > > “Drinking in public places between 22.30 and 07.00 (local time) is illegal. ‘Liquor Control Zones’, such as Little India and Geylang, prohibits public drinking during all weekends and public holidays. Visitors will be fined if this is violated.” Beats getting caned. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2016, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/579 "2016-05-25T02:49:30Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > Did you not have the option of turning the speakers off (or down to an inaudible level)? Yeah, but that wouldn’t have helped with the speed or the jargon. All of these trainings have a voiceover that reads out loud the same stuff that’s already on the slides (you know, in case we’re illiterate), but in the other ones you could move on at your own speed. In the TOEFL there is an oral comprehension part. There will be a recording which reads something with the kind of slow, careful overenunciation you do not even find in documentary voiceovers and then a few questions. A couple of times I missed the beginning of the speech simply because there was so much time between them that I was drifting. And at least there, the voice had information different from what was already in front of me. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2016, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638/580 "2016-05-25T06:08:23Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > The health tips shown on screens around the office are usually helpful, in a blindingly obvious way, but you sometimes get counter-intuitive tips, like, “It’s easy to lose weight if you **substitute sugary pop for water**.” No wonder I’m so fat! I’ve been doing it wrong for decades! I’ve seen this construction many times in many places in many contexts. (Sorry, no examples to cite at my finger tips.) “Substitute X for Y” meaning: Replace all X with Y. I can’t wrap my head around the logic of this construct. “Substitute X for Y” seems to say, to me, replace all Y with X. Out with the Y and in with the X! Yet I see it frequently the other way around. What is going on with this? How did this ack-bassward locution evolve? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638.md?page=28) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-and-unimproved-workplace-rants/734638.md?page=30)