no-life co-workers who never leave the office, making everyone else look lazy

The BBQ Pit
1

I’m going to gargle my own piss and choke on my own vomit at work one of these days!

Somehow, three of my coworkers and both my boss and his boss have no lives - no families, friends, or hobbies to speak of - which results in them never leaving the office. These guys routinely arrive early and stay inappropriately late - we’re talking two, even three hours past their regular 8-hour workday, just because they’re bored, lonely, and have nowhere to go but their empty homes and nothing to do.

I feel for these guys, really, I do - but I’ve got a new wife, an active social life with our friends, and a multitude of hobbies and interests, and the LAST thing I want to do is hang around at work after I’ve finished my daily scheduled projects and put in my 8 hours. Yet I look like some sort of slacker for wanting to get out of there while these guys hang around long after they should be gone.

It’s not like they’re tough, dedicated workers - they just have no life!

2

Have they said anything to you about it? If not, then the idea that you’re a slacker for leaving on time is nonsense. You’re not required to work overtime unless your bosses require it, and it’s clear that they haven’t yet. So don’t worry about it.

Just because your co-workers have no life doesn’t mean that you don’t.

3

That’s the problem- recently, there have been comments. Not threatening, per se, but that sort of jovial, jocular nudge, along the lines of “you know, you don’t have to leave here right at 6:00,” and “i’m usually here longer than my 8 hrs…” - because you’re my fucking boss and you actually make a decent living! And you hate your family so you stay here to escape from them!

4

maybe they need the money :dubious:

5

Nope, everyone’s salaried.

6

well damn dude

7

I feel for you, man, I do.

There are twenty people in my office, where we have a 10-6 workday. At the moment, it is 6:40 and nobody has gone home, nor is anyone likely to in the next couple of hours (and we’re all salaried). I may go home soon anyway, as all my work’s been done since 4:30 and I’m keeping myself occupied by Doping and settling the occasional grammar dispute.

The problem is not just that everyone stays late, but that nobody thinks it’s the least bit odd to routinely put in a 12-hour day. To make matters worse, our clients also don’t think it’s odd for us to put in 12-hour days and will routinely schedule meetings for 9pm or later.

What’s really pushing me over the edge is that we’ve just started having departmental status meetings scheduled for Friday at 8pm. When I told Cerowyn about this last week, he said it sounded like a great way to keep the meetings as short as possible. I’d agree, except that’s not why that time was chosen; these morons actually all consider late Friday night to be a perfectly reasonable time for everybody to sit around droning endlessly about their current projects.

8

Sounds like they’ve really got that ‘gambare’ attitude.

9

A main reason I hate salaried jobs.

Freejooky, sac up and respond to them that you have a wife waiting at home for you. I know that’s easy for me to say from my keyboard, and you may very well have good reason to not do it. But that’s just the way I am. I’ve always believed that if you are on salary, that means you’re paid to do a certain job/amount of work in a day. Once it’s done, you’re outta there, money earned, day over. I’m sure your wife can put your time to better use. :wink:

Here’s another thought if you have to give up your time. If you golf, and the weather is good, invite them. Just say, “Sorry boss, I reserved a 6:30 tee time. But I could change it to a foursome if you guys want to get some air.” Of course, this only works if they want to golf, but if they’re that damn insistant on giving away time, you might have a shot. Amend this to any activity you think might interest them. Including a pool hall that serves liquor to numb yourself to thier moronicism (trademark, copyright, all rights reserved).

And if you can get them to golf, get your wife to meet you there and drive the cart. This gives you some seperation, and you can enjoy any beverages you want while laughing at thier bad shots.

Hey, gotta keep your sanity somehow! :smiley:

10

I came in here to say that I work in an office in Tokyo and that this situation was the norm but find that Sublight has already said it. Of course, that really doesn’t help Freejooky’s situation.

What I think is really funny is that our weekly sales meetings are also scheduled for Friday evening as “That’s the most convenient time.”

I don’t know who Cerowyn is but I am guessing he’s never been to a Japanese style meeting if he thinks Friday nights will keep them short.

11

Well, he’s high up enough in his company that I think he can usually tell his co-workers whether or not there will be any inessential meetings when he’s in town. I probably helps that the president is another gaijin.

Anyway, it’s now nearing 8:30 and I’m still here. I’m heading out now, though.

Btw, SLingshot, I was about to welcome you to the boards until I saw your sign-in date. Talk about lurking! Well, it’s always good to have another Tokyodoper around. You should join in next time there’s a mini-Dopefest (aka eating yakiniku and going to a really loud live house).

12

If your work is done for the day, say so. “Well, I’ve got all my stuff done for the day, if anything comes up after now, it’ll be done early tomorrow.” That’s the thing about salaried employees, your job is to “get shit done” not to “work X hours per day”. If your shit is done, go home. The only caveat there is that you can’t necessarily just leave at any time, you have to remain available during business hours.

If your boss is complaining about it, you need to have a talk with him. A talk about how you’re committed to completing all of your tasks and providing your share of effort to the cause. Also a talk about how this job is to make your life better, and staying late for no reason does exactly the opposite.

One of my old bosses used to work insane hours, often sending emails at midnight or 3am :eek: Of course, even with all of those hours, we all wondered what he did with all that time, since nothing ever seemed to come from his desk…

13

It sucks. The work week keeps getting longer, and the culture promotes an attitude that we’re so grateful for our jobs we work 10-12 hour days. That’s why I’ll never work in corporate America. Not that the academic world is strictly a 40-hour work week, but it still somewhat acknowledges that people are human beings and respects individuality where only the people who want to work 10-12 hour days have to.

14

When people at my work stay late and I leave at the time I normally do. I usually tell them on the way out “SEE YOU CUMPS LATER!” then I laugh.

I get the craziest looks from my coworkers sometimes.

15

I’ll never understand the “live to work” mentality of so many people. If someone said that to me, I think I’d furrow my brow and ask in a confused voice, “Why wouldn’t I want to go home and spend time with my husband?” Even when I was salaried, it was very, very rare for me to work more than 40 hours a week. In fact, the most hours I ever worked in a week was 45, and that was only once. I would simply not work more than 40 hours a week on a consistant basis. Anything short of saving lives can wait until the next day.

16

Use the family values thing if your org or company is a big supporter of family values. Say, “I value my family, and want to see them. Are YOU saying that the company supports family values in the abstract but opposes them in the real world?”

17

Yeah this whole attitude of people working extra hours like the ‘martyrs’ (losers) that they are really makes me see red. They’re raising the bar for everyone else but you just NEED to stick to your guns and do what is your right to do - leave when your contract says you can. Otherwise you will just be colluding with the exploitation of staff by the management who will be only too happy to increase your workload in accordance.

I can’t believe anyone would have the audacity to comment on the fact that you’re leaving at the official end of your working day as if you’re somehow slacking off. Just because they don’t have the ability to manage their workload efficiently doesn’t mean you should give up your life too.

Next time anyone comments on the fact that you’re leaving on the dot of 6pm just say ‘Well I’ve got other stuff to do’. It is none of their business what and only a complete idiot would not be too embarrassed to ask ‘what stuff?’

18

Heh.

In my experience, there are a lot of environments where, even though they won’t explicitly say “you must work overtime,” if you don’t there’s no way you’re going to get anywhere and are gonna be the first person under the axe when the next RIF happens. It doesn’t matter how competent you are or how much work you get done–just appear to love the Mother Company with all your heart…

19

My cow-orker is one of these people. She works for the State and only has to put in 7.5 hours a day, but routinely puts in 10 at least. I shake my head and leave after my 7.5 unless I have some pressing deadline that night (have to make FedEx) or first thing in the morning.

What do we do that is so important and time-sensitive? Nothing. We’re editors. We have long lead times on our work. Which means, if you need to stay until 8pm on a Friday night, you either cannnot manage your time properly or you have no life. Somehow, I manage to get all my work done in about 6 hours, with plenty of time for goofing off. I am not hanging around here just so other people think I work really hard.

Cow-orker had returned from a several-day business trip one Friday. I had taken care of things while she was away – there was not a lot of work backed up on her, besides her 117 e-mails, most of which were probably spam. As I walked out the door at 4:30 I said, “Don’t work too hard. Why don’t you go home and get some rest?” knowing that her kids and hubby had gone camping and she’d have a nice quiet house to herself. (Working moms: is there a more tempting offer?) Well, she’d decided she had to stick around to finish things up.

Is it due first thing Monday?
No.
Do you have other things due Monday or Tuesday that will get in the way of finishing this?
No.
So you’re telling me that you want to stay here on a Friday night, to work on something with a vague and nebulous deadline that is a task that only you care about, is that right?
Pretty much.

I tried to encourage her to, I dunno, have a life, but she insisted this stupid memo or whatever it was, was far more important.

I might also add: are these the same people who believe they will be promoted up the ladder for working 100 hours a week? At my old company, at the very least, they were the people who got all the awards and recognition for their “acheivements.” (You should see my achievements: I have the most beautiful butterfly garden on the block!) I realized years ago, that I will never be a successful executive. I will never win the Pulitzer or the Nobel Peace Prize, or the National Book Award. My name will never be known far and wide; I will die unknown and of little importance. But my friends and family will feel well-loved, my pets will be spoiled rotten, my garden will be beautiful and I am the only person who cares about those things. And that’s fine with me. I am not willing to give up my life, meaningless as it may be, for some job/work/profession that is even more meaningless, i.e. making someone else rich. I am simply not willing to put in enough time or effort to earn any sort of recognition. The simpler things in life are far more important.

So, instead of encouraging these workaholics to go the fuck home, I say: Hey you stay here and work your ass off. Somebody’s got to be the overachiever around here. It ain’t gonna be me. I’d rather go play in the sunshine.

To quote my hero, Cartman:

Screw you guys, I’m going home.

20

I have the exact same problem…all three of my co-workers are the kind of people who love to come in Monday morning and brag about how many hours they worked this weekend. It drives me nuts. On the rare occasion that I have HAD to come in on the weekend, I never mentioned it to anyone. It always seemed to me to be an indictment of my time management if I had to come in off duty. And I dread the beginning of the new year, because as Civil Servants, we can only carry over 240 hours of vacation time, so I’ll have to hear interminable complaining about how each one has use or lose leave to get rid of. I keep an average of a hundred hours on the books, becaus I USE IT! I go camping, I take off for road trips…I like to spend time with my family and friends.
I can say that it’s never been a problem to get time off, nothing said by my boss, just a lot of asides like “well, Yancey is off AGAIN today”, or “It must be nice to be able to take off whenever you want”. Christ. We build DVDs and interactive CDs. This is not brain surgery, rocket science or suicide prevention. No one dies if we take some time off.