The bitch about work thread

The BBQ Pit
1

I’m working part time now, but I’m still the entire graphics department. Well, we got a shipment in and I can’t print the labels fast enough because 1) I’m only here a couple of hours everyday but Friday and 2) I only have two working printers.

I’ve let everyone know that I need new printers, whether a different model (which I’ve made suggestions about ranging from ‘ask the copier guy, he might be able to recommend one’ to ‘look! This generic ink cartridge will go in all these models, including these two printers we have that I’m not using.’ Naturally these were ignored.) or repairing the ones we have, since buying ‘new’ ones means we get ones that are usually as beat up as the ones we have. But, I have two working printers.

The big boss has finally decided to do something - looking into buying ink for the two Canons I have and buying the parts for at least a few of the broken printers. A little late, but at least for NEXT time…

Well, my boss decided to have me show her and the warehouse guy how to print. And by how to print, I mean I set up the jobs and they just had the feed the printers and make sure they didn’t clog, jam, or run out of ink. You would think a trained monkey could do this, wouldn’t you? But they did some and then the big boss figured out a way to have the printers have more than one sheet of label paper at a time (I always just feed it one at a time, because the label paper is thick and it tends to jam.) Well, then he decided that meant he could walk away.

So I walk into my office this morning.

  1. There’s random piles of blank paper everywhere. Why the hell did you make a mess of my office? Seriously, do you have any idea of how RUDE that is?!

  2. There’s six pages misprinted, plus two that I have no idea if were reprinted or not. Because, like usual, there was an ink clog and the wrong color printed. This is why you don’t walk away.

  3. Apparently they did something so it was spewing nonsense. I have no idea what they did there. But that’s another ruined page. And another that didn’t feed right.

Look, when I say, sit there, feed the printers, and watch it, and I give symptoms of what to watch for, DO IT! Am I or am I not the expert? Have I or have I not been doing this and refining the method for three years? I’m sorry, but printing means you are CHAINED to the printers until it’s DONE. You don’t walk away! How many errors do I tend to have? Maybe two pages out of 500? And you had 8 out of less than 30? ARGH!

The fastest possible way to piss me off is to not listen.

So… bitch about work!

2

I work. I get money for it.

Nothing to bitch about.

I know to get more money for less work, but it’s much more labor intensive and much harder on the clients.

So nothing to bitch about.

3

I’m out of work. Can’t wait to have a job to bitch about again. That was sweet.

4

I work as a contractor for a company that is currently filing for bankruptcy. We’re fairly certain our location will get sold to the competition or something and will remain open, so I’m not too worried about getting laid off.

The main problem is the amount of ass-covering going on with those that work for the soon-to-be-defunct company. Oh my god people, do you have no morals or standards at all? If something goes missing, blame the contractors. If someone falls on property and threatens to sue, blame the contractors. If the company vehicles use one gallon of gas more than they did the same week last year, blame the contracts. It’s getting crazy. I mean I get it, those at our branch are middle-managers who want to look good so they have the chance of getting picked up at corporate when the branch sells.

But really, I am not personally responsible every time someone sneezes wrong around here. Stop micromanaging and blaming us for everything and we just might actually give a damn about our jobs and work harder.

5

If my monitor, which is currently at 1260px wide, cannot display the entire table of data, making the site fluid width is not going to help. This is why PDFs were created. Anyone who is actually going to use this information isn’t going to go off of the HTML tables.

Also, hells naw I am not going to move into programming at this company, I have not seen a requirements doc the entire time I’ve worked here. I’ve seen wireframes once. Feature creep is a given. Our projects never end because no one in management moves to stop the feature creep.

However, I still have a good job. It’s just human nature to always find something to bitch about.

6

I haven’t figured out yet if my supervisor is micromanaging me as a result of a power trip or dangerous levels of incompetence, or some unholy blend of the two. I’m looking for another job, but nothing yet. Fingers crossed I can leave micromanaging, powertripping/incompetent lady behind soon!

7

You want a tip from the south. Tell her to her face exactly what she can micro-manage putting up her power tripping tight-ass. Not behind her back.:slight_smile:

Edit: after you find another job of course.

8

Oh low level customer service reps, you tickle me so much.

When we email you to confirm how many cases of X that your company shipped, don’t provide me with a screenshot of the screen showing how much we ordered. I need you to click on the little tab called ‘shipping’, and confirm how much of our order actually left your warehouse.

And when this order arrives with only 1.25% of the stock we ordered, with a computer-generated packing slip from your company stating ‘yes, we shipped a whopping 1.25% of your blessed order’, don’t tell me it shipped in full.

9

Actually, thinking about it, I know what it is - it’s completely power-tripping. Thinking about it, she has already tipped her hand.

Jeff, that’s funny - from working in accounts payable, I know the difference between “ordered” and “shipped.” “Shipped” is what I’ll cut you a cheque for; “ordered” is what we’ll argue over. :slight_smile: (Well, that and “Incorrect or defective product shipped.”)

10

Yesterday I got a pay cut. To minimum wage. Yes. from >$80k/year to minimum wage.

It’s going to be fun to try and pay may the mortgage on my house on $7.15/hour. If goes on more than a month or two, I will have no choice and will quit, pull my children out of their respective care situations and be a house husband. This will reduce the bleeding a little, but not enough. I figure we can last for 8 months or so with our savings until we have to walk away and what? Be homeless? Probably not, but who knows?

Unfortunately, I don’t know anybody that is hiring currently. I know many people that have educations and skills similar to mine (graduate degrees in engineering) that are not able to find work…

Does anybody know if Obama’s stimulus plan has a minimum wage increase?
Oh. But at least I still have a job and they have not cut my benefits. For this I am truly grateful.

11

I’d bitch about how my boss would forget her head if it wasn’t attached to her body (and she’d be late for her own funeral, if you let her), but I’m honestly more concerned about her health because her short-term memory is for shit. Concerned, but, yeah, I get the blame because she can barely remember her tightly-packed schedule, and if something slips through the cracks because she commits to something, then forgets to tell me about it so I can put it on her calendar, set up a reminder alert, and subsequently remind her every so often because she gets another commitment that will conflict with the old one.

And, to add to the frustration, with her being the CEO and the only one with the authority to make all executive decisions (we don’t have an Operations Manager/General Manager), we’re often left flapping in the wind when something comes up that needs her approval while she’s being the belle of the ball at the Chamber of Commerce or at some fundraiser for some city councilwoman.

Thing is, this company she built over the past 35 years is a great little company, she’s a fantastic artist who has been a great inspiration for the talented crew we have in our factory, but she is a horrible manager. And that’s what keeps me banging my head on my desk every day.

12

At my last job, we were sold to a bigger company and after being fed lies for several months about how nothing would change for us, we were told that most of us were going to be laid off. OMG, talk about lack of morals! And the sad thing is, it worked in that they kept one of the worse producers who had a history of interpersonal issues who (surprise!) was the absolute worst for going out of her way to make everyone else look bad. If it hadn’t been so sad ( and extremely irritating ) the level of her lies would have been funny.

Or, maybe they kept her because she conveniently became pregnant right after the announcement that there would be layoffs…

13

This demands a story. What do you do and what happened at your company that forced you to take a $30/hour pay cut?

14

Actually, maybe it’s time you had a talk with her about it. She sounds like she does have a good head on her shoulder, but that she’s trying to do too much. Perhaps you should suggest she create that position. Express some concern that she’s being stressed out beforehand, and say that if she’s decides against it, no problem.

15

I am a researcher in a high tech field at a venture capital funded company. We are selling some products, but not nearly enough to match our burn rate and the products we currently sell are not why we exist. We have term sheets on the next round of funding which should take us through to profitability, but the investor was unable to come up with the cash he promised. Everybody at the company (about 100 people, including ~20 Ph.D. and ~50 engineers with post-graduate educations) will make minimum wage until the cash is in the door. If he cannot come up with it in the next 2 months or so the company will surely shut its doors. We are soooo close to success too! :frowning:

16

I love my job most days, but it’s a very lonely job. I work QA for a call center, and I’m the only QA person for the center. I’m the Maytag Repairman of the call center. I can’t be included in any of their games, because it could look like I’m biased toward someone. When they have parties, I’m never invited. I have an officemate who does other stuff, and it hurts to have people walk into the office and invite her to their parties, and she has nothing to do with the call center floor: while I sit right there across from her, listening and seeing them ignore me completely.

They do the same thing with lunches. They’ll come in and ask her if she wants to order out, and none of them ask me. Not even her. Even if I don’t have money, it’s nice to feel included. I’ve told her that any number of times.

The only thing that irks me about the job itself is I get forgotten when important information is sent out. The management sends emails out to the supervisors, and I find out a week later. If it affects customer service, and I’m evaluating customer service, it affects me too. I have to have all this information to make sure I’m doing my job right and I’m treating them fairly. I hate hearing about things second or third hand. Example: I did a QA on one of our reps on a Wednesday. Then I find out her last day was the Friday before. That just wasted my time, and since I’m the only QA person, I don’t have that kind of time to waste.

I’ve been with this company for a long time now. My direct co-workers (training department) are fantastic, and I couldn’t ask for a better boss. She has tried to make sure we’re included in important communications. She’s been very good to me, not only as a boss and a co-worker, but as a friend. But I need to be with other people once in a while. I feel respected: I just need to feel included.

Rant over. Thanks for starting this thread.

17

I’m just shy of 14 hours on today and expect another three before I go home. General bitch everyone can relate to - hourly positions get slashed and salaried make up the slack. Result: six weeks behind on getting ready for year-end because I lost two people in my deparment but none of the work they did, and now I have to babysit a PITA movie shoot on the museum grounds. Four 12-16 hour days of trying to make sure they don’t succeed in burning the place down. After they leave I get the auditors in for a week, then it’s time to try to get all the stuff that’s been pushed aside done.

I could just about manage it but I am also supposed to get the year-end books done for two other non-profits and I don’t know how I am going to showhorn that in.

I’d like to think this is a temporary situation, but looking at the schedule, I don’t see where it will slow down much.

18

I worked Security for 4 years and now I work a Customer Service job that pays about the same.

I always have one piece of advice for management of Security and Customer Service people: We’re not paid very much and we’re expected to put up with a lot of shit from the public/customers. It’s really a very bad idea for you to think that we’re also being paid to put up with your shit.

Sure, you can tell us that if we don’t like it, we can leave. And leave we will, which is why turnover in these jobs is always so high. But the same applies to you, assface. If you have a problem with not dumping shit upon your people, you can always leave and find another job where you don’t have to do whatever the hell it is that’s causing you to dump all over your people.

When I was a low level supervisor, I considered it my job to be a barrier to the shit flowing in either direction. Stop the shit the workers were doing from reaching higher management, stop the shit the management was dumping from reaching the workers. That was what I got paid for, as little as it was.

19

I love my job but I’m sick of hearing about all my coworkers bitching about the mandatory overtime we have right now. Over 100,000 workers have been laid off in the U.S. in just the past week and these people are complaining about having to come in for an extra 5 to 10 hours every week? We’re even paid by the hour so everyone gets overtime pay. And it’s not as if it’s grueling work or anything; It’s extremely laid back and I actually love coming in to work in the morning.

I hope everyone’s happy now because management recently announced that they are going to start outsourcing a portion of the work due to our high volumes. Maybe they will start oursourcing all of it.

20

The OP reminded me of a place I used to work in, until one fateful morning. Some of us came in on a Saturday morning to do archiving of the computers. We had all the computers backing up, and the main computer was doing a total backup/archive. Once the procedure was started it would take about 3 hours, and you couldn’t use the computers during that time. So we all went out to lunch.

While we were gone, the boss showed up. This guy was a real cheapskate, always complaining about the cost of everything. He was also extremely dumb. He saw that all the computers were on, so he got down on his hands and knees and ***unplugged ***every computer. In the process of doing this, he somehow managed to set fire to the main computer and the cabinet that contained all our backup disks. By the time he discovered the fire extinguisher (about 5 feet from where he was standing), everything was either burned or melted.

All of our work, since the beginning of the company, was lost. Monday morning, we were all on unemployment.