So yesterday I did no work at all. I just piled everything up into a nice big pile of TO DO so that when I came in today, I would hopefully be kept busy all day.

I just finished everything single thing in the TO DO pile and it’s 8:38 a.m.

I know I haven’t been updating much lately, but work is crazy. There’s this big event that I’m having to prepare a bunch of briefing material on and everything is just well, crazy.

That said, I’ve had enough time to prepare a Battlestar Gallactica party for the season premier tonight. Yeah, I’m cool.

This was actually a comment I was going to post on Soupy’s blog in response to a rant about work, but it got so long I thought it deserved its own post:

This is my experience/observations from being in the workforce for the last 10 years.

There are different rules for Admin and Junior staff than for Managers. The rules are as follows:

REGARDING EXTRA HOURS:
ADMIN & JUNIOR STAFF : No matter how much overtime, or working through your lunch, or staying late that you do; you never get paid overtime and you are never compensated for it, nor are you recognised as being a dedicated and hard worker. Solution? ALWAYS take your breaks and lunches.

REGARDING WORK
ADMIN & JUNIOR STAFF : You will work 10 times more than your Manager. Get used to it. To get recognition for your work requires craftiness. The trick is to get work requests in writting so that you have a record of what you’re doing.  It’s always good to have the old, “What is the biggest priority talk.” with your manager, thus forcing them to give you priorities and recognise what you’re doing. Of course, you HAVE to follow up with an email otherwise the manager will forget all this work come pay rise time.  This also forces them to make decisions on what you’re doing, so that if they get heat from above about stuff not getting done, you will have a written record that says, “Well, I asked you and said that this wasn’t a priority – here’s the email. If you would like me to work on it, what should I drop from my current workload?”  Your Manager may not like it, but it gives the impression that you are VERY BUSY and that’s what matters.

REGARDING PERCEPTION OF WHAT IS HARD WORK

The golden rule is always, The Last One Standing Wins. If you are Admin or Junior, the only way you will move up is a combination of careful documentation of your work, and always being the last one in the office. Always being the last one in the office often overrules any work you actually do.   In the last 10 years I have seen alot of crap. Hardworking people who work through lunches and who are there early get put aside for people who don’t do much, but who APPEAR to do much.

I can’t tell you how many friends I have who show up at work at 9:30 a.m., take their full hour for lunch, plus breaks whenever it strikes them, and then stay until 6 p.m. (when everyone else has gone home), who get promoted like you wouldn’t believe.  It is the PERCEPTION that they are working hard.  

Where I work now, I could stay late and do nothing and everyone would think that I was SO BUSY and WORKING SO HARD cause I’m at the office later. In reality, I would just be catching up on emails and playing Yahoo! games.  That’s just the way it works. I did this last night and got praise for it today when I came in. Crazy how it’s not about the ACTUAL work I am doing, but what people THINK I am doing.

So the Basic Rules:

-Always take breaks and lunches and never come in early. (Remember, you will never be paid overtime and no one cares.)
-Always document your work in writing. (You will never get a pay increase oterwise.)
-If you want to be promoted, stay late. (Sure, you aren’t actually doing anything, but people will think that you are.)

If you’re frustrated at work (“I asked to get paid for all the extra hours I did and they refused. It’s not FAIR” or “I aksed for a pay increase/promotion and someone else got it, but I know they don’t do shit and I work so hard!”), it’s because you aren’t following the Rules!!!

(Managers have different rules that I don’t know cause I’m not a Manager.)