# Workplace griping, anyone? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 12, 2010, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401 "2010-11-12T06:39:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 45
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/881 "2011-03-14T19:37:18Z")
Tempting, but only eight more days of work, and again–it isn’t management who is doing this, it’s my immediate team members. They’re doing it because after two years of somnolence, management’s suddenly asking them to accomplish things to make board members happy. They need a scapegoat, and it’s me. I checked task-tracking again this morning, and I am still the only one with work assigned. I decided that since they aren’t tracking their work, it obviously shouldn’t matter to them whether I do or not. Ergo, I’m not checking the tracking system anymore. I hate confrontation anyway, and with a new baby I won’t have energy for a lawyer. I just want life to be quiet and nice and for them to have no part in it. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/882 "2011-03-14T19:52:55Z")
> [@](#): > > Even better: you send me a document to edit and [company]-ize. But wait! Gee, this looks familiar. In fact, this looks just like the original, unedited version of the first document I worked on for you last week. Well, whaddya know! It is! You had some changes, so instead of making them to the FINAL version, the one I spent all that time on and broke our in-house style rules for because you’re a controlling bitch who doesn’t understand branding, you made them on the shitty, ugly original. And, of course, didn’t enable Track Changes like I’d asked you to. So I got to re-do everything I’d done to the original file to this one. Send the final version back to her. Don’t mention that it’s already been sent. Just send it. See if she notices. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/883 "2011-03-14T20:03:12Z")
Damn - don’t they understand that the last week before maternity leave is like the last couple months before retirement, or the last hours on Friday before a long weekend? You should be coasting there! ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/884 "2011-03-14T20:34:15Z")
A new-to-our-location patient said she didn’t come to her research appointment because she drove all over looking for parking and couldn’t find any. My incredulous coworker said she’d never known the parking garage to be full. ‘I didn’t find a garage,’ said this lady. Really? It’s right next to the building. We’ve got a big-ass parking garage with the hospital name all over it and huge “PARKING” signs on each side. She claimed to have driven all up and down the streets around our location and never saw it while looking for a spot on the street. Why the hell would you expect a modern hospital wouldn’t have a parking garage? Maybe I should have drawn her a map. Oh wait. No. I did better. Earlier in the week I FedEx’d her an explanation of the visit and a full-color map of our ‘campus,’ plus used highlighter to circle the parking garage and our building, and wrote our room number and my name and phone number. Geez lady. For research visits like yours, I expect to dedicate the better part of 5 hours or so to making sure I’m carrying out the visit in a proper fashion, personally escorting you to various places (the lab, various tests, different doctors), scheduling all kinds of things that take up much sought-after time slots on several people’s schedules, and then I stress the fuck out because I just want to make sure that our study patients are being taken care of properly. Did you even bother to show? Was that a passive-aggressive way of trying to not be in a study (rather than say “no thanks, not interested”) and you’re just trying to somehow blame me rather than tell your doctor no? Or are you really that out of it? ---
**Author:** ![StarvingButStrong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/starvingbutstrong/32/335_2.png) [@StarvingButStrong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarvingButStrong)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/885 "2011-03-14T22:40:34Z")
Soooo minor compared to the rest of yours, but – I understand grabbing my chair for a big meeting, there are only so many ‘resident’ chairs in the room. But why the hell did you have to muck around with ALL the adjustments??? ---
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/886 "2011-03-15T16:00:45Z")
Fun typo of the day: “we are defiantly interested in blahblah service …” We are defiant in our interest!! Dammit! _pounds fist on table_ ---
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/887 "2011-03-15T16:08:30Z")
Oooo, even better than our CEO’s “early adaptors”. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/888 "2011-03-15T21:38:31Z")
> [@Sattua](#): > > Tempting, but only eight more days of work, and again–it isn’t management who is doing this, it’s my immediate team members. That doesn’t preclude them (at least ostensibly for the purposes of litigation) doing it on behalf of management. However! If you hate confrontation, don’t have a lawyer handy, and just generally don’t want to muck about any more with this mess than you already have to, that’s certainly your prerogative. Good luck getting through the last of it. Almost there! > [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#): > > Send the final version back to her. Don’t mention that it’s already been sent. Just send it. See if she notices. She added in a chunk of shit at the end. She’d have noticed if I sent her the previous final version. > [@StarvingButStrong](#): > > I understand grabbing my chair for a big meeting, there are only so many ‘resident’ chairs in the room. But why the hell did you have to muck around with ALL the adjustments??? What the hell? Who does that? Maybe later they can come use your computer and change all of those settings, too. > [@purplehorseshoe](#): > > Fun typo of the day: “we are defiantly interested in blahblah service …” Shit, I am adding that to my exclusion dictionary _right away_. My favoritest of all time is still one my coworker once received, where someone apologized “for the incontinence.” ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/889 "2011-03-15T21:45:59Z")
Oh, and that reminds me of my other fun anecdote from that document (proving that I did, in fact, need to look over the shit she added): **Me:** Hi, this makes a reference to the “[Noun1 nominal form] [Noun2]” program. Should that be “[Noun1 adjectival form] [Noun2]”? **Me:** _waits several minutes with no response_ _looks into it herself_ **Me:** Okay, I checked and it is in fact [Noun1 adjectival form] [Noun 2]. Nevermind! **Obnoxious Consultant:** No, [Noun1 adjectival form] [Noun 2] is correct, leave it the way it is **Me:** Actually, the document said [Noun1 nominal form] [Noun 2]. But it’s correct now Daft twat. You’re supposed to be responsible for content; I’m supposed to be responsible for formatting. It’s going to drive me completely fucking insane that you want to do everything wrong, because these documents are going out with my ID on them, so if anyone in the future wants to track them down, they’ll think I’m a fucking retard who doesn’t know our style. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/890 "2011-03-15T23:57:40Z")
I spend about half of my paid time writing reports for our local management, from line sales managers up to local VPs. I have also written reports for more corporate types, because I produce quality results, quickly. That’s because I work in the sales department, not in IT. Now, corporate wants to disband all the local databases in favor of the corporate data warehouse. Fine, it makes sense that we should all use the same data model. No matter that they are 3 years behind in producing this data warehouse, it’s (mostly) up and running now. This new corporate data warehouse requires the use of a new reporting tool, and this requires me to be trained to use it. This costs a shade over $3K. Corporate is dragging their feet over spending the money, and threatening that if they pay for it they get to tell me to do reports for any and every corporate site. My local managers can just go hold their cups out on the corner for the data they need, I guess. If I don’t get this training, within 6 months I’m going to be spending a lot of time every day trying to find work to do around here. My best hope is that my local management will be able to find $3K and that they will be willing to spend it on an old-timer like me. If they train the much younger (and cheaper) guy in our department instead, I will leave to your imagination what that means to my job and my future. Roddy ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/891 "2011-03-16T00:29:04Z")
Ouch - fingers crossed that this goes well for you, **Roderick**. I am so ready to be done with this assignment - what kind of law of nature is it that the good assignments end when they’re supposed to, and the bad ones just linger on forever? ---
**Author:** ![Tess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e480ec/32.png) [@Tess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tess)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/892 "2011-03-16T06:37:14Z")
Co-worker, I’ve spent the last few hours doing a physically demanding assignment and now I want to use my break to space out on the computer. Alone. If I wanted you to know what sites I was visiting, I’d show them to you. Stop ‘casually’ sitting at the break room computer next to me, craning your neck, or standing behind me commenting or reading out loud in that delightfully patronizing voice you have. I’m this close to hunting down that video where the quiet scene gets broken by a ghost popping out a screaming. You strike me as someone who doesn’t handle shock very well. ---
**Author:** ![StarvingButStrong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/starvingbutstrong/32/335_2.png) [@StarvingButStrong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarvingButStrong)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/893 "2011-03-16T14:45:54Z")
Er. At lunch yesterday I heard another woman complaining about having the adjustments on her chair messed around with after the big meeting. A much taller woman than I am from an office down the hall. Yeah. :o Okay, I amend my gripe: I understand about grabbing extra chairs for big meetings, but put those chairs back at THE RIGHT DESKS. Sheesh. (Yes, way too late for us to simply swap the chairs back.) ---
**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:** [March 16, 2011, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/894 "2011-03-16T15:08:56Z")
> [@Tess](#): > > I’m this close to hunting down that video where the quiet scene gets broken by a ghost popping out a screaming. You strike me as someone who doesn’t handle shock very well. [Here ya go.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qBlfhmfFRI) No need to hunt next time. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/895 "2011-03-16T15:12:30Z")
> [@Tess](#): > > I’m this close to hunting down that video where the quiet scene gets broken by a ghost popping out a screaming. You know, I used to know that URL just off the top of my head. Can’t think of it now. I want to say the domain started with a k… ---
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/896 "2011-03-16T16:41:19Z")
Dear whoever just stank up the bathroom: Good God, woman. What did you _eat_?? Walked in, took one breath, reconsidered my options, and beat a hasty retreat. Thankfully there’s another bathroom on a different floor. Still - you might reconsider your diet, lady. Less of whatever the hell you just ate might be in order. ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/897 "2011-03-16T16:43:57Z")
No, brain-dead co-worker. That lone Japanese man found floating ten miles out at sea, clinging to the roof of his house, was not “meant to be found.” When you say it with that glurgey simpery pulpit tone, I mentally clench my fists. He was just incredibly lucky. By your reasoning, then, approximately 10,000 people were “meant to die a horrific death by drowning or crushing.” Also, I don’t think that if the same nuclear incident happened in this country, that “American engineers would be able to fix it instantly.” ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/898 "2011-03-16T16:54:52Z")
> [@teela\_brown](#): > > By your reasoning, then, approximately 10,000 people were “meant to die a horrific death by drowning or crushing.” Hey, if you listen to some crazy right-wingers, that’s \*exactly \*what it was. God’s paying them back for Pearl Harbor, doncha know. ---
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/899 "2011-03-16T16:55:55Z")
> [@Cat\_Whisperer](#): > > If you really want to screw with them, just mis-file stuff. You put stuff in arbitrary boxes, it will NEVER be found. I missed this before. Have you been giving career advice to the girl\* who used to do billing here in my office? Cuz if so, I want you to know: **she listened to you**. - The one who left behind a stack of resumes from job-hunting while on the clock. Was gonna do that cool linky thing but I can’t find my post now, and I am, y’know, on the clock too… ---
**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:** [March 16, 2011, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/900 "2011-03-16T17:35:52Z")
> [@purplehorseshoe](#): > > Was gonna do that cool linky thing but I can’t find my post now, and I am, y’know, on the clock too… [This one?](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13543956&postcount=830) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401.md?page=44) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401.md?page=46)