Saturday, January 21, 2012

Oh, Let us Just Feign Ignorance and All the Problems Will Go Away

For some people, maybe.

I've had people tell me before that it's not worth it giving your all to your job. "Just work hard from September" they'd say if they saw you working late in January, as we get appraised only in mid December, and three months of 'good' work is apparently sufficient to fool your bosses into thinking that you've been good the whole year. I suppose they get away with such behaviour because their superiors are probably fools anyway. 

Now, while I don't think what you do should dictate your life (although sometimes you can't help it when it's in the manufacturing field), I believe that people should be responsible enough to perform tasks they are supposed to do. Feigning ignorance is just unacceptable. Allowing others to pick up their slack when they say that they do not know how to do their own bloody job is just an excuse for laziness. And their superior not giving them an earful for such irresponsible behaviour is even worse.

I suppose all of us view our jobs differently. For some people, it's probably just the thing they do so that they have enough money to justify them marrying their *second wife, inconveniencing everyone else around them in the process.

The thing is, no matter what our objectives are for working, we are paid to do it. Copying the supplier's data from their certificate of assurance can be done by anyone who knows how to read and write (yes, even an eight year old can do it after you've thought them how and on top of that you can also con an eight year old and pay them with cheap ice cream  - I kid, I kid)

I wonder if the quality people in charge of checking the quality of the incoming raw material felt any sort of embarrassment after the process people highlighted that a certain raw material was of extremely poor quality - which would have been detected before the process people used it had these quality people done their job. I also wonder how they could have relinquished the responsibility of checking the other lots that haven't been used yet to the process people by pointedly refusing to do it.

* I don't know how this person ever convinced the 2nd wife to get married to him. Or even the first one for that matter. Yes, I know it's a personal attack and it's not very nice.

Edit: Yup, ranty post. I'm annoyed, I guess. Anyway, got a pretty long weekend ahead, and here's wishing a Happy Chinese New Year to anyone who celebrates. Cheers to the dragon! 

20 comments:

  1. Well being a volunteer I can get away with the whole "You're paid to do it" thing. My boss is generally nice, if you legitimately don't know how to do something, he'll talk you through it so you can do it next time. If however it's a job you need some kind of qualification or basic training for, you should know how to do it. Still the blame can be laid on either the person failing to do their own job, or the people who failed to train them to do it.

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    1. If it is something new, then yes, they need to be trained on how to do it. The test they were required to do, however is one of the most basic quality control tests in our industry. Only the judgement for this product would have been a bit challenging, but they could have asked for help or guidance for that.

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  2. Exactly, if you are paid to do it, do it. I always want it done and out of my hair, can't stand people who just sit around off in la la land expecting nothing to happen to them, with their poor pitiful me act.

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  3. Concentrate on doing your job well and try not to let other people's limitations/failings/stupidity affect what you do too much. That's easy to say but chickens usually come home to roost in the right place...eventually.

    And always remember to enjoy the weekend.

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    Replies
    1. Interestingly, this was what I discussed with my boss when she was appraising me last year. Our dept has been trying our best to improve ourselves, but others remain in the old mentality and inadvertently bring us down with them. If this material problem had been detected by the quality section we would have saved quite a bit in terms of rework costs by rejecting the material instead of pondering where our process had gone wrong!

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  4. work is work, just gotta do it even if sometimes it sucks.
    hmm. maybe it didnt take much to convince the wives :p

    enjoy your weekend :)

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    Replies
    1. Yes, that is true. Don' t know much about the wives, though... But I noticed that those with attitude problems end up getting more than one wife.

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  5. I think I'm one of those supervisors you complain about. I've had one part time assistant for 10 years and she's pretty hopeless. About 6 months ago I get a second part time assistant who is fabulous!

    Anyway, she threatened to resign yesterday if I didn't do something about X's poor performance. The trouble is, X is nearly 60 and has multiple health problems, I doubt she'd get another job if we fired her. I think I'm too soft-hearted to be an effective supervisor. X and I started out as coworkers and when I got promoted over her, it made things difficult *sigh*

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    Replies
    1. I understand compassion getting in the way of professional judgement, and your situation is very tough indeed. Isn't someone who's almost 60 supposed to be retired, though.

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    2. In Australia most people work until 65 unless they have enough superannuation to retire sooner.

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    3. Oh wow... the retirement age here is 55, while most people are still healthy enough.

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    4. 55?! I'm moving to Malaysia. By the time I retire, the state retirement age will have been stretched up to 67.

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    5. Ha ha. The govt sector has plans to extend the retirement age, though. No news so far for those of us working with the private sector.

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  6. I have always believed in doing as good a job as I could. even in low level jobs. It's easier now that I have a profession I like, but even when I was a kid raking yards for money, I did what I was paid for.

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    1. Me too, and I hope to continue doing so without being disheartened by the inefficiency of others.

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  7. I've always been an honest, hard worker. Sometimes I think it's in my genes; I simply can't slack off.

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    Replies
    1. Your students are a very fortunate bunch to have a teacher like you.

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  8. I've felt like that before. and sometimes i feel like I'm the only ones who's really trying that hard :/ hope things turn around for ya! following

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    Replies
    1. Yeah, I guess it's just that way sometimes. Thanks for dropping by and following

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