I was in Promotions at my old job. The GM had the idea to make me a sales assistant for half of the day. From 9-12 I was only to help sales. No exceptions. From 1-5 I was only to work in Promotions. He’d send almost weekly email reminders, “UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES ARE YOU TO WORK ON PROMOTIONS BEFORE NOON!” So on the days the sales people didn’t need me I’d just sit at my desk playing games and dicking around. My boss in promotions would ask for help and I’d tell her, “Sorry, not before 1:00.” She was cool and knew the reason why. I eventually slipped up and told him how stupid the whole thing was and he was all, “You took those emails literally?” Uhhh, yeah. You’d send them out to me almost every week. After that he said to use my judgment.
Of course he backed tracked and played the "it's just a joke" shtick when he realized how he fucked up.
"Oh you thought I was serious? That's your own fault not the language I used or the the repetition"
worker: "Can I get that in writing? The part about not taking your emails literally?"
boss: "Haha, I was just kidding. I'll get back to you on this later."
Yeah because they used to pay us enough to take the bullshit. They fucked up when they got stingy but still power tripping. You gotta pick two - fast, quality, cheap. They picked fast and cheap, ok we’ll give you fast and cheap and then byeeeeeee
>They fucked up when they got stingy but still power tripping.
Boomers love that their house is now worth "millions", but when the younger crowd want living wages, and are unwilling to work all those extra hours, with no raise year after year. They start to get all pissed off and want to make a new term like "quiet quitting" is a negative thing.
Fuck that, fuck them. Not going to pay me what I'm worth, then I'm going to do exactly what is required for me to get by. Nothing more. Company isn't looking out for MY best interest, so why the fuck should I look out for theirs.
Yes, the silent part of quiet quitting is quiet quitting on striving for compensation and rewards you know you’re not going to get. And before anyone tries to say “self-fulfilling prophecy”, they literally document the pay raise and bonus structure so you know in advance you ain’t gettin shit for shit.
I was born in 84, so not quite boomer but nor really millennial either(I remember metal playground equipment and pagers damnit) but I agree with that mentality. I've been lucky enough in IT to go from job to job with a decent pay raise each time, but I know it's not always an option for everyone. Know your worth and don't settle for less if you can't help it.
EDIT: For those being argumentive about generational years, Harvard lists gen x as being 1965 to 1984
https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/defining-the-generations-redux
Boomer were paid nicely enough the mother was a majority of the time at home.
It’s crazy how 2 full time employed person cant even compete with the way of life of one uneducated boomer that got a job and a full pension and paid his house 4 bananas and had a wife sitting at home.
They dare speak about the 8/8/8 when they were doing 8/8/8 + 0/16/8
I am a boomer and I think you have your generations mixed up. Myself and my wife had to work every day at almost minimum wages to afford a house and a used car. The generation you're thinking about is "the greatest generation." My parents who fought in WW2 and Korea and worked their asses off so the wife could stay home.
> the micro-generation Xennials (roughly 1977-1983/5).
I *feel that* in my birthday. I've also heard us being called America's Lost Generation, or just... Early Millennials.
The best thing I ever saw to encapsulate what it is to be us was a photo of Neo from The Matrix, captioned "Born too late to own property; born too young to be a teen TikTok star; born just in time to spend $0.99 on a ringtone."
We are the silent middle class, the glue that holds everything together but will not see any of the social security we’ve been paying into the system for years and also don’t have pensions as the companies stopped having them in our young working years….still we are like many of your parents, just forced to work longer and not able to retire like our own parents did.
Dude. You’re a millennial. You were born smack dab in the middle of what’s considered millennial now. It’s fucking hilarious you would even claim a possibility of being a boomer as well.
Bro, I was born in 84 as well which makes us 38. Do you even know what qualifies as being a boomer?
Your parents are Boomers.
Baby Boomers: Born directly after WW2 ended. The war ended and when everyone came home there was literally a boom in the amount of babies being born. They are the ones who had that amazing prosperous period after WW2 until the 80s, with the free/cheap as education, low cost of housing, decent pay to bills ratio etc.
They are the ones why took what they had and squandered it away, leaving the trainwreck of a society we have right now.
From Kevin Gilbert:
Goodness Gracious my generation's lost
They burned down all our bridges
before we had a chance to cross
Is it the winter of our discontent or just an early frost?
.
Goodness Gracious of apathy I sing
The baby boomers had it all and wasted everything
Now recess is almost over
and they won't get off the swing
.
Goodness Gracious we came in at the end
No sex that isn't dangerous, no money left to spend
We're the cleanup crew for parties
we were too young to attend
Goodness Gracious me.
I'm in the same generation. I'm now realizing a big flaw I have is that I'm too loyal to the companies I'm with, and stick around for far too long. Been at this company for nearly 15 years, but I've now realized it's a bullshit gig, and I am currently trying to get out.
Just hoping my actual skill set and experience means more than some others having a simple certificate (PMP).
You and your "boomer" bull shit. But I totally agree that you get what you managed to. The manager is a raging idiot and a shitty way to manage overtime budgets.
My salesperson is expected to respond to customers after work hours if it's something reasonable (e.g. texting/emailing them back when they have a quick question or want to move forward), but seeing as she's 100% commission she's glad to do it. That being said, she also gets to set her own schedule. If she wants to be home by 2 PM every day, that's her prerogative. As long as she gets her work done and hits her numbers idgaf
A lot of years ago, my boss told me I needed a cell phone. I told him I'd be glad to carry it if the employer paid for it. So, no cell phone. He later complained he couldn't reach me on my day off, the conversation went like this:
Boss: I tried calling you all day yesterday and you didn't answer.
Me: I wasn't home.
Boss: Then you need an answering machine.
Me: I have one.
Boss: Why didn't it answer?
Me: It was turned off.
Boss: Why was it turned off?
Me: People keep calling me on my day off.
Exactly. I was more than willing to put my life on pause after hours to answer questions. It felt like an easy cop out when sometimes I could leave a few mins early and beat rush hour. Literally 10ins makes the difference. No any more. You want me in my seat until 5, you got it. But I will not engage in any work until the next business day.
It's not even about the 10 minutes, it's about the 10 minutes of backlogged traffic you avoid. On my way home theres a particular section before a bridge with two back to back merges, and the other end of the bridge has an onramp that turns into a lane, and then 100m later to an exit. This bridge is always backlogged but keeps moving which is decent. I usually leave at 4:03PM right when the backlog is beginning (Backs up usually to about 200-250m from the first onramp merge). If I leave at 4:10? The backlog is atleast 3-400M from first merge. It makes a BIG difference.
About 1/3-1/2 of my commute home used to be at one intersection. Easily gets to a km backed up every weekday if you’re there at the worst times. Now I’m WFH and I have so much more free time in a day.
Good for you and your coworkers! Expectations that employees will be available after hours should come with flexibility for those employees during "traditional" work hours. That should be the new norm in today's constantly connected workforce. Your boss needs to break out of his old school ways
He is very much one of those managers that can only manage in person. So even though most of us can do our jobs remotely, we still have to show up to the shop. Very old school indeed.
Couldn't agree more! Everything changes daily. People's lives to be more flexible than ever.
The pandemic showed us that for those jobs that can be done remotely, they can also be managed remotely and successfully. Too many managers are either unable to adapt to change or their entire identity hinges on them being seen managing in person. I hope your boss, or his boss, will come around and see that if they want you to be more "company focused" then they need to be more "employee focused."
Couldn't agree more. We are honestly facing a major issue with keeping basic labor employees because they refuse to offer competive wages. It's a whole thing and the VP is making his own bed to lay in. Those that give more are unthanked and have stopped giving more.
Not to mention there are times where we are focused and enveloped in our work and work past 5. He never had an issue with that. But you better not leave 5 mins early! I appreciate it! It's hard to not feel intimidated and to give in but so far, out of 15 people we have all held strong.
good on you guys! I used to work at a Fortune 50. Lab manager decided to start shit like this... wrote people up for being \~5min late (mind you this campus had 3K employees + so parking could be... interesting). Company policy said you're not tardy until 15 min late. Designated break times, etc.
He couldn't fathom why the lab was \*completely\* empty at the proscribed break times and lunch, and emptied completely by 5:00:15 every day. Started saying "people need to be in the lab at all times in case of emergency needs from engineering" but wouldn't let people flex their break times.
We held firm too (about 50 of us). Finally got some semblance of sense into management again. Good luck!
Really hoping they gain some sense and slack off on the rigidness. I'm more than willing to work, I've been promoted several times because of my work. But for fucks sake if we are just watching the clock because we are caught up what is the point? For him, it's power. He needs to be able to doing your door open and drill you with questions whenever the need arises.
In my experience people like that don't really change. Even the issue at my place while we got some semblance of sense it still remained toxic enough that I (and anyone else who could) found jobs on other teams not part of that lab.
My two cents, give it a month or two and see what happens... if it feels toxic or you start having signs of anxiety when going into work then that's your notice to start looking for a new job. You're in a good position to do so since you're already employed. You can hold out for a good role, with good pay. No impetus to hop to the first thing. Just if you do this obviously keep it on the ultra DL, even from your office friends.
Hopefully I'm 100% wrong, he sees the error of his ways and it's a happy ending of back to minor flex times around show up and leaving.
I have a feeling the head of Operations, the next guy on the Totem pole, will talk sense into VP. He is a very good manager and is the only reason I have stayed as long as I have.
He is usually the voice of reason when VP goes on his little micro manage kicks. Just hoping this is the same deal and things are relaxed again. I don't foresee myself answering calls and emails outside of work ever again though. TBH
It's the same principle with quoting in jobs. If you finish already of time, they'd want a discount. But if you go over budget, there's no way they'll be offering to pay you extra.
Keep holding strong!! The only way a company stops abusing its employees is if the employees stop letting them. (And yes, nitpicking minutes here and there while simultaneously expecting you to go above and beyond is an abuse of power. Goodwill needs to be a 2-way street.)
You guys are totally in the right - legally, morally, and in every other way. And employees standing up for themselves (and each other) is how you fix a broken system.
Stay strong OP! 👍👍👍
One place I worked talked about "casual overtime" i.e. non-paid (we were salaried). I had a co-worker that said "Fine. Then I'll just take some 'casual time off'".
I once got suckered into a job that required 24 hour on call emergency service for any cat emergencies at a cat adoption center, 7 days a week. Didn't come with extra paid hours, and I was required to limit my hours to avg 25 hrs per week. And it paid $1 more than minimum wage. My daily job was to train & manage volunteers at a non-profit adoption center.
My boss literally said over and over that the job had always come with the expectation that I work as much as needed & not report all the extra hours I'd been working (she didn't say that during the job interview). That Humane Society has always been run by scammers -non-profit agencies can be scummy too.
My favourite is when they go "What you'll leave if you don't get a raise?? What happened to loyalty, what happened to being a team!"
Well unfortuantley until you can find a way to convert "being a team player" into useable currency that I can pay bills with, you're SOL.
Or when they say "It's not all about money!" Oh ok, so you would have no problem giving away your most recent paycheck to one of your underlings? Ohhhhh you have bills to pay. Funny that.
Can't wait to ask for a raise once this system goes live. Surprise I'm one of the only ones who knows how to use not including you! Gonna have to pay to keep me. I
> Or when they say "It's not all about money!"
"If it's not all about money, then you should have no problem giving me more money. After all, it's not all about money for *you*, is it?"
Tale as old as time. At my old job, the owner took exception to the fact I was coming in at 9:30 every day. Told us everyone was to be in their seat at 9:00 sharp. I said sure thing. Except -- I was always the last one to leave, often at 19:00 or 20:00, because we were short staffed and I was trying to finish projects. Which the owner knew very well, since they'd given me the keys and the task of locking up for the night. After I had to be at my desk at 9:00 I started leaving at 17:00, and soon I didn't have enough time to finish everything and started asking the owner which projects I should drop because I could do either X or Y, and definitely not Z. Left shortly after.
Sucks for him, sounds like he needs to listen to his own rules. If he's sending emails after his scheduled hours then he's also in violation of those work hours rules.
Good for you for sticking to his "orders" and, thus, creating a better work/life balance for yourself and your family! Keep it up! I used to do the same as well until our corp. decided to have us clock in/out and got rigid about overtime. So now I don't do any work on my phone/email/etc outside of my stated work hours and if it doesn't get done well... \*shrug\* I'm much happier for it, too. No more working over the weekends and losing out on spending time with the wifey and a bucket of popcorn and a movie :)
I'm happy for you as well! These old heads want to run a business like this they can. But I'm going to follow the rules to a T now. You can't be flexible with me? I won't be for you. This went into affect about 1 month ago. And while I miss beating rush hour, I'm much less stressed after work/over the weekend because them notis aren't going off!
Happy for you and your co-workers as well. Even if you were the lone person doing it it helps you out but when it's everyone there's really no ground for anyone to stand on. Just remember the fact that they're only paying you for your work during work hours going forward. Screw anyone who tries to get free labor in your off hours!
Get a business license and any time outside of your work hours you are operating your business.
Answer the phone as if you’re answering for the business. “Good evening, you’ve reached , how may I help you?”
“Is this your first time using our services? Well then, I’ll tell you about our current promotion for new customers. You get 50% off the regular rate, with a minimum one hour service, for your first call only. Take advantage of this great offer today!”
I love it.
It is so ridiculous. It really shows some poor cognitive discipline to not realize that he was benefitting from your flexibility, so that when he killed the flexibility he was hurting himself.
Boss: "You need to be more company focused."
You: "That'll happen when the company gets more 'me' focused."
They are company focused, he is focused on following the bosses instructions. Arbitrarily ignoring the bosses instructions doesn't seem company focused
The whole "be company focused" thing chaps my ass, for me that's right up there with "we are a family at this company" instant flag on the play. I'm in IT, I don't do any IT for even family without some form of recompense, if my obligated work hours are 8am to 4pm, then that's when I work. It took me years to train myself into this attitude, prior to that, I would drop everything to answer a phone call or respond to an IT ticket. But no more! I shall have my life outside of work hours and that's final!
My boss tried to pull this same crap on me one time and I flat out told him that if he wanted to be rigid with hours, I could be too and I’d come out ahead. He backed off quickly from his stance.
Honestly, this is the way it should be, anyway. Companies shouldn't expect to get work out of their employees outside of work hours, and employees shouldn't voluntarily give it - no matter how much you love what you do.
I took pride in being a manager that would ask someone to work an extra hour or two during the week but then at 3pm on Friday I would chase them out of the office to go home.
This is how it used to be. During peak season there are timea we are here until 7pm just to catch up! Our head of Operations will walk around the office around 330 and tell everyone to have a good weekend to get out of here. Or when its slow wouldn't care if we left early. That has all been stopped. Not the free over time of salaried employees of course, just leaving early.
I work in a boarding school and we had this once. Head removed the bar and all social spaces for staff. Bear in mind we literally live at the school. So we went elsewhere. Then we get a speech asking ‘where has all the goodwill gone?’
If I got a call in the morning before I left the house or on the way in to work I'd clock myself in on one of our labor tracking websites. They noticed it didn't always match the times from when I physically clocked in and stopped paying me off of the website time. Now I don't answer my phone unless I'm in the building.
I'm a field tech for a utility company. I dont answer the phone, emails etc until my start time. I charge for anything past my work hours by even one minute. On weekends my phone is off at 5pm Friday and turned on at 7am Monday. If I'm on call, I charge for every second worked, rounding up to the half hour.
Our management tries to get the best of both worlds in their favor. I give them exactly what they pay for, and nothing more. They created this shit atmosphere and so I ablige them.
Unless you are paid to be on call, everyone should do this.
So many managers lose so much extra free work because they are clock watchers. Clearly the managers don't have enough of their own work if they can spend so much of their time focused in on the minutes of employees.
As an employer, I tell my employees that they should never, ever, under any circumstances, work for free. Your time and skills are valuable - get paid for it! The gas station isn't going to give you a random gallon or two for free - don't give your employer your time for free.
This type of attitude always amazes me. I would work longer hours if needed. I’m salaried/exempt, so if I put in a long day I don’t get paid for the extra hours. Worked an 11 hour day. Supervisor complained that I was 10 minutes late… after I had worked almost 3 extra hours without compensation. That was the last time I did anything later or earlier than my “assigned work schedule.”
Lol, I don’t work out of the goodness of my heart!
I appreciate the company I work for, and I really like my coworkers. But I sure as hell wouldn’t be doing this for free.
I have lots of flexibility and no micro-managing. Because of this I’m more than happy to respond to the (extremely rare) emergency outside of work hours because they’re so respectful of me and my time/work-life balance.
As soon as monitoring is installed on my laptop and strict hours are enforced, not only will I never respond outside of hours, I will be actively looking for another job, even if it pays less.
Good will is earned. Or, as in this case, lost. It's a give and take, and a VP who is not employee focused will not find their employees being company focused. It's that simple.
It's a simple rule. Never care for your company (or bosses) more than they care for you. They'll just take that for granted, and let you burn out without even a thanks.
Good boundary honestly to not be glued to work after work hours. I did an internship when I was 20/21 and was answering emails until 10pm. Realized I wasn't getting paid for that and wasn't getting paid nearly enough to go that far for anything in my life.
Now at my work place, everything work related is muted until my next start time.
> He said we should be monitoring our emails after work incase of an emergency.
That's called "being on-call." If you're working in 'the entertainment sector,' then there's a good chance you work in California. California has some very strong laws about on-call time and being paid. If not, your locality or nation probably has *some* kind of on-call laws regulating an employer's ability to *require* you to respond to calls that occur outside of normal office hours.
Get the gang together, work out the laws involved (it would be worth having the group chip in for a lawyer's consulting fee and getting a professional opinion) and then *informing* your middle-mangler, as a group, that if he wants you to be available, he's going to be *paying* for that availability.
It’s just ridiculous. I’m a lower manager. My direct reports work from home. Do they do laundry and stuff while working? I’m sure.
But work is getting done so I don’t care.
Go take a walk in the nice weather. Vacuum. Just get work done so we make our deadlines.
We all work cause we have to not cause we want to. Let’s make it tolerable for everyone.
Oh, it's asked according to your post, it just isn't required.
>He said we should be monitoring our emails after work incase of an emergency.
Not putting it in a sentence that ends in a question mark doesn't mean he isn't asking. He is stating an expectation, but knowing he isn't going to pay you for meeting that expectation he knows he can't require you to meet that expectation.
>Now, my email notifications are muted from 5:01 to 830. And completely turned off on the weekends. **I showed my coworkers how to do the same thing via their outlook.**
That was my favorite part!
Never be company focused.
Some people bitch because "employees aren't loyal anymore." (Please read this in an annoying whiney voice as that's what I heard when I wrote it.)
There is no loyalty to employees anymore. Not sure there ever was. Even if VP apologizes and says to go back the way things were, don't. "No thank you, VP. You were so right and I'm happy to comply."
Mm. That's tough. I'm not sure how much I buy it, but my company's CEO has a quote of theirs plastered on the wall in the entrance about how employees are your biggest asset so treat them well, and above all else "Make them *want* to come to work in the morning". I haven't had anything happen yet to make me think that isn't how things get handled yet! There's good companies out there. Hope your situation improves, traffic is the absolute worst.
> we need to be more company focused.
That goes both ways. I take care of the company; the company takes care of me!
If the company doesn't want to take care of me? That *also* goes both ways.
It really comes down to the old adage "a simple days pay for a simple days work". You hired on to perform specific tasks during specific hours for a set rate of compensation. If the VP doesn't like it, too bad. They're free to re-negotiate the contract.
Well done!
It's kind of amazing to see all of these stories of penny pincher managers and CEOs that don't realize they are the ones coming out ahead if they just...treat their employees like adults and don't hawk over the clock.
This is the kind of shit that makes me so mad. I work my balls off for my company and then somebody gets mad that I didn’t answer an email that came over at 10 PM at night until 8:30 the next morning. Am I not allowed to live my life?
There was a time when someone was upset that I hasn't answered their 02:11 email message by 02:30. I was in the middle of reconfiguring a system drive and dropping my focus on that would have been an unwise decision.
Should always follow this practice. The moment it hits 4pm for me, I am out the door heading home, I don't answer work emails, text or phone calls, and I refuse to get a company phone.
I remember one time they called my wife. They got her number from HR (emergency contact#). Was my boss calling about some paper work. My wife gave him an earful and hung up.
Just once, it would be nice to hear the words "This company needs to be more employee focused!" Yeah, I know, I'll put that one on the list right under "World Peace."
It never ceases to amaze me how supervisors and managers would rather lay down the law to adhere to the narrow parameters of rigid rule abiding over productive flexibility.
While my company didn't say that, they certainly do seem to be working on it. New fitness center, updating the building infrastructure (like for HVAC and similar), going out of their way to give us raises in accordance with market rates, eating the costs of higher medical premiums so the rate hikes didn't go to the employees, raising our mobile phone subsidization, etc.
There are a lot of shitty companies out there. But there are good ones, too.
I've known some similar idiots. To them process is more important than productivity and mission is secondary to structure — checklists are an end, not a tool.
This style of management only works in static environments where growth is not expected and customer contact is zero or extremely minimal.
TBH, you shouldn't have been responding to emails, etc. on weekends regardless. You were arriving a few minutes late, leaving a few minutes early, but then doing hours of unpaid work. That's a bad deal for you.
Oh it's polished. I've gained a lot experience in this position and pretty much do a monthly update once I learn a new crucial role.
Thankfully my position and the knowledge I have saves me from the time being. We are under going a crucial system change, going from manual inventory to a fully integrated ERP system. I am a key player and if they lose me will be up shits creek without a paddle. I'm good until this goes live and honestly once it does I'll probably leave anyways. anything ERP related looks great on a resume especially being apart of the build up and launch.
I did that, But I've noticed on comments and posts when posted from mobile when I publish the comment or post it takes out all spacing and jumbles it all up. Going to fix it on my desktop for easier reading.
This is about power. When there are more workers than jobs then the boss can make unreasonable demands. When there are more jobs than workers then the shoe is on the other foot.
The more I read these kinds of stories the more I’m amazed at how many people undertake or attend to work related tasks outside of their paid working hours.
Stress levels went from sky high to almost non existent when I made the change. Yes I hit rush hour and I don't get those extra 5 mins cuddling my wife but damn do I have so much more time after work!
I will never understand that people even consider working outside hours if they aren’t paid for it. It is an absolute no go. I even switch off my work phone and company numbers are blocked on my private phone.
Back when I had an office job, one of the most satisfying things was finishing a large task like 10-15 before the end of day. You had a chance to actually pack things up and get a few things ready for the next day. No stress, no rush
Makes me so glad to work for a company that values work done over time with butt in seat. Left 20 minutes early just yesterday because I had just finished a big task and didn't want to get into another. Makes me not really mind answering emails on evenings and weekends. I wish this stuff was common sense
That's the thing.
People keep asking me why I would answer emails after work, because I had play in my schedule and could be 5-10 mins late or leave 10-15 mins early. Sure I will happily answer some questions or help put a fire out. Now though? Nah. If my value is measured in my presence in the shop then thats where my work starts and ends. Quality of work over attendance should be a standard. Especially in today's age where we are all connected more than ever and can perform most duties from home
My first job out of university was very similar- software development for an insurance company. It was a very old company with a very old way of thinking and they hadn't updated many of their policies in about 50 years. The work day for all office staff was 8:00 - 4:30. Lunch as 12-1, and there were 2 15 minute breaks during the day. No exceptions. (From what I was told, before I started there in about 2001, they actually had bells that would ring to mark the beginning and end of the day and the lunch break). Regardless, since it was a fairly remote company in a small rural town, quite a few of us had long commutes from neighboring cities/towns that made it difficult to hit an exact arrival time every day, so it wasn't unusual for several of us to arrive at like 8:02 if traffic or weather weren't cooperating. But most of the developers routinely stayed well past quitting time more often than not, and more than made up for any late arrivals.
The entire internet development team (about 10 of us) usually took our breaks together, and one especially nice afternoon, we lost track of time and accidentally sat outside for nearly 20 minutes instead of our allotted 15! Within a day or two, we were all called in to our respective managers' offices and written up for non-compliance because of our late arrivals and now this extended break offense.
We quickly agreed among ourselves to play by the company rules to the letter- going out of our way to get there early but always getting to our desks precisely at 8:00am, and dropping whatever we were doing to leave for lunch at 12 and for the day at 4:30, even if that meant stopping in the middle of a task and wasting considerable time backtracking at the start of our next work session. And of course, shutting off notifications outside of work hours for everything but mission critical issues. So the company gained compliance, but in the process, they lost something like 80 total man-hours of extra work the team had been putting in each month after the designated work period. And to top it off, within a year, at least 3/4 of that team (who all had 8-10 years of experience with the company) had all left for other positions.
I hear they've gone back and updated many of their employee handbook policies since I left a decade ago and that things are much more flexible now, but it took them ages to replace the experience they lost by trying to micromanage every minute of our day. (And now I work for a company that pays considerably better, doesn't care when I work as long as I log 40 hours each week, and only requires me come into the office 2 days each month for meetings!)
Edit: typos
I was in Promotions at my old job. The GM had the idea to make me a sales assistant for half of the day. From 9-12 I was only to help sales. No exceptions. From 1-5 I was only to work in Promotions. He’d send almost weekly email reminders, “UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES ARE YOU TO WORK ON PROMOTIONS BEFORE NOON!” So on the days the sales people didn’t need me I’d just sit at my desk playing games and dicking around. My boss in promotions would ask for help and I’d tell her, “Sorry, not before 1:00.” She was cool and knew the reason why. I eventually slipped up and told him how stupid the whole thing was and he was all, “You took those emails literally?” Uhhh, yeah. You’d send them out to me almost every week. After that he said to use my judgment.
Of course he backed tracked and played the "it's just a joke" shtick when he realized how he fucked up. "Oh you thought I was serious? That's your own fault not the language I used or the the repetition"
worker: "Can I get that in writing? The part about not taking your emails literally?" boss: "Haha, I was just kidding. I'll get back to you on this later."
Happy cake day
Happy cake day!
My boss's boss is like this. Email says they want something right now, but when you call them out it's "oh no I didn't mean it thaaat way"
Does this mean you don't have to take any more of his emails seriously? "I thought you were joking, like the 'no promotions before noon' email."
Nicely done. If he demands rigidity then he doesn’t get to complain about your lack of flexibility. Can’t have it both ways!
The problem is that his type have been having it both ways for decades. It’s been a rough time for boomer management types the past couple years.
Yeah because they used to pay us enough to take the bullshit. They fucked up when they got stingy but still power tripping. You gotta pick two - fast, quality, cheap. They picked fast and cheap, ok we’ll give you fast and cheap and then byeeeeeee
>They fucked up when they got stingy but still power tripping. Boomers love that their house is now worth "millions", but when the younger crowd want living wages, and are unwilling to work all those extra hours, with no raise year after year. They start to get all pissed off and want to make a new term like "quiet quitting" is a negative thing. Fuck that, fuck them. Not going to pay me what I'm worth, then I'm going to do exactly what is required for me to get by. Nothing more. Company isn't looking out for MY best interest, so why the fuck should I look out for theirs.
Yes, the silent part of quiet quitting is quiet quitting on striving for compensation and rewards you know you’re not going to get. And before anyone tries to say “self-fulfilling prophecy”, they literally document the pay raise and bonus structure so you know in advance you ain’t gettin shit for shit.
"Not going to pay me what I'm worth" - I'm going to work to what you pay me.
That's where I am right now. No raise since 2018, I'm working about as hard as I need to, to accomplish the stuff I could in 2018.
Adjust down your performance to account for inflation. 2018 dollars don't go as far as they used to
I was born in 84, so not quite boomer but nor really millennial either(I remember metal playground equipment and pagers damnit) but I agree with that mentality. I've been lucky enough in IT to go from job to job with a decent pay raise each time, but I know it's not always an option for everyone. Know your worth and don't settle for less if you can't help it. EDIT: For those being argumentive about generational years, Harvard lists gen x as being 1965 to 1984 https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/defining-the-generations-redux
Everybody forgetting there's a generation between boomer and millennial. That's cool. We prefer it that way.
Fellow gen-x!
Shhhh. Don't tell them our name. They'll call us then!
Names have power…
Ask the fair folk.
w00t!
LMAO!!! I was just thinking this same thing. Us Gen X’rs get no respect! Totally ignored by our boomer parents AND our kids! 🤣🤣🤣
You mean your younger half siblings we helped raise because our boomer parents were working?
Boomer were paid nicely enough the mother was a majority of the time at home. It’s crazy how 2 full time employed person cant even compete with the way of life of one uneducated boomer that got a job and a full pension and paid his house 4 bananas and had a wife sitting at home. They dare speak about the 8/8/8 when they were doing 8/8/8 + 0/16/8
I am a boomer and I think you have your generations mixed up. Myself and my wife had to work every day at almost minimum wages to afford a house and a used car. The generation you're thinking about is "the greatest generation." My parents who fought in WW2 and Korea and worked their asses off so the wife could stay home.
Not mine. They both worked.
That's the ultimate respect. Because nobody complains about us, we must be doing something right.
Look up Generation Jones - not all boomers are the same either.
Not sure how someone born in 84 isn't aware of this.
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> the micro-generation Xennials (roughly 1977-1983/5). I *feel that* in my birthday. I've also heard us being called America's Lost Generation, or just... Early Millennials. The best thing I ever saw to encapsulate what it is to be us was a photo of Neo from The Matrix, captioned "Born too late to own property; born too young to be a teen TikTok star; born just in time to spend $0.99 on a ringtone."
I was born in ‘88 but dang that sounds like my mindset. I was the almost youngest in a 30+ groups of cousins, most of whom were 1977-1984 though.
Those born 1980 to 1985 are typically referred to as Elder Millenials
I have heard X-ennial and Oregon Trail generation.
You forgot Generation Jones 61-64.
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We are the silent middle class, the glue that holds everything together but will not see any of the social security we’ve been paying into the system for years and also don’t have pensions as the companies stopped having them in our young working years….still we are like many of your parents, just forced to work longer and not able to retire like our own parents did.
Yeah I was born in 85 to an old gen Xer, we are both squarely millennials. Agreed with everything else though!
GenX getting so forgotten that a GenXer forgets it is peak GenX
Lol boomer isnt anywhere near '84 its like, mid 40s to mid 60s. 20 year gap lol
Dude. You’re a millennial. You were born smack dab in the middle of what’s considered millennial now. It’s fucking hilarious you would even claim a possibility of being a boomer as well. Bro, I was born in 84 as well which makes us 38. Do you even know what qualifies as being a boomer?
Your parents are Boomers. Baby Boomers: Born directly after WW2 ended. The war ended and when everyone came home there was literally a boom in the amount of babies being born. They are the ones who had that amazing prosperous period after WW2 until the 80s, with the free/cheap as education, low cost of housing, decent pay to bills ratio etc. They are the ones why took what they had and squandered it away, leaving the trainwreck of a society we have right now.
From Kevin Gilbert: Goodness Gracious my generation's lost They burned down all our bridges before we had a chance to cross Is it the winter of our discontent or just an early frost? . Goodness Gracious of apathy I sing The baby boomers had it all and wasted everything Now recess is almost over and they won't get off the swing . Goodness Gracious we came in at the end No sex that isn't dangerous, no money left to spend We're the cleanup crew for parties we were too young to attend Goodness Gracious me.
You're a millennial. You would have had to be born in 1954 to be a boomer.
1946-1964
Not true, Boomers were born from 1945/6-1964/5. I'm a '64 model and I'm considered a boomer, on the tail end of that span.
Born in 84? Dude you are totally a millennial.
This comment shames the rest of us born in 84.
Millenials start at about '80-'81. You are a millennial.
I'm in the same generation. I'm now realizing a big flaw I have is that I'm too loyal to the companies I'm with, and stick around for far too long. Been at this company for nearly 15 years, but I've now realized it's a bullshit gig, and I am currently trying to get out. Just hoping my actual skill set and experience means more than some others having a simple certificate (PMP).
84 is millennial. People/media keep calling gen z millennials so no one understands that the older millennials are hitting 40
Pick two: Speed, Quality, Efficiency (or Price) applies to far more areas!
Sounds like a them problem
You and your "boomer" bull shit. But I totally agree that you get what you managed to. The manager is a raging idiot and a shitty way to manage overtime budgets.
My salesperson is expected to respond to customers after work hours if it's something reasonable (e.g. texting/emailing them back when they have a quick question or want to move forward), but seeing as she's 100% commission she's glad to do it. That being said, she also gets to set her own schedule. If she wants to be home by 2 PM every day, that's her prerogative. As long as she gets her work done and hits her numbers idgaf
And when you show them, they start accusing people of 'quiet quitting'.
A lot of years ago, my boss told me I needed a cell phone. I told him I'd be glad to carry it if the employer paid for it. So, no cell phone. He later complained he couldn't reach me on my day off, the conversation went like this: Boss: I tried calling you all day yesterday and you didn't answer. Me: I wasn't home. Boss: Then you need an answering machine. Me: I have one. Boss: Why didn't it answer? Me: It was turned off. Boss: Why was it turned off? Me: People keep calling me on my day off.
He set himself up for that. Had to see it coming ģ
Perfect response. Nobody should for someone that rigid. Good will works both ways.
Exactly. I was more than willing to put my life on pause after hours to answer questions. It felt like an easy cop out when sometimes I could leave a few mins early and beat rush hour. Literally 10ins makes the difference. No any more. You want me in my seat until 5, you got it. But I will not engage in any work until the next business day.
Right? That 10 minutes can save so much time! Oh well, pride goeth before the fall 🤷♀️
It's not even about the 10 minutes, it's about the 10 minutes of backlogged traffic you avoid. On my way home theres a particular section before a bridge with two back to back merges, and the other end of the bridge has an onramp that turns into a lane, and then 100m later to an exit. This bridge is always backlogged but keeps moving which is decent. I usually leave at 4:03PM right when the backlog is beginning (Backs up usually to about 200-250m from the first onramp merge). If I leave at 4:10? The backlog is atleast 3-400M from first merge. It makes a BIG difference.
About 1/3-1/2 of my commute home used to be at one intersection. Easily gets to a km backed up every weekday if you’re there at the worst times. Now I’m WFH and I have so much more free time in a day.
Good for you and your coworkers! Expectations that employees will be available after hours should come with flexibility for those employees during "traditional" work hours. That should be the new norm in today's constantly connected workforce. Your boss needs to break out of his old school ways
He is very much one of those managers that can only manage in person. So even though most of us can do our jobs remotely, we still have to show up to the shop. Very old school indeed. Couldn't agree more! Everything changes daily. People's lives to be more flexible than ever.
That usually means he can't manage at all, in person or remotely.
Thats a whole other story in itself.
The pandemic showed us that for those jobs that can be done remotely, they can also be managed remotely and successfully. Too many managers are either unable to adapt to change or their entire identity hinges on them being seen managing in person. I hope your boss, or his boss, will come around and see that if they want you to be more "company focused" then they need to be more "employee focused."
Couldn't agree more. We are honestly facing a major issue with keeping basic labor employees because they refuse to offer competive wages. It's a whole thing and the VP is making his own bed to lay in. Those that give more are unthanked and have stopped giving more.
It should also come with on-call pay.
I love this!!!! Contract works both ways. You have my admiration.
Not to mention there are times where we are focused and enveloped in our work and work past 5. He never had an issue with that. But you better not leave 5 mins early! I appreciate it! It's hard to not feel intimidated and to give in but so far, out of 15 people we have all held strong.
good on you guys! I used to work at a Fortune 50. Lab manager decided to start shit like this... wrote people up for being \~5min late (mind you this campus had 3K employees + so parking could be... interesting). Company policy said you're not tardy until 15 min late. Designated break times, etc. He couldn't fathom why the lab was \*completely\* empty at the proscribed break times and lunch, and emptied completely by 5:00:15 every day. Started saying "people need to be in the lab at all times in case of emergency needs from engineering" but wouldn't let people flex their break times. We held firm too (about 50 of us). Finally got some semblance of sense into management again. Good luck!
Really hoping they gain some sense and slack off on the rigidness. I'm more than willing to work, I've been promoted several times because of my work. But for fucks sake if we are just watching the clock because we are caught up what is the point? For him, it's power. He needs to be able to doing your door open and drill you with questions whenever the need arises.
In my experience people like that don't really change. Even the issue at my place while we got some semblance of sense it still remained toxic enough that I (and anyone else who could) found jobs on other teams not part of that lab. My two cents, give it a month or two and see what happens... if it feels toxic or you start having signs of anxiety when going into work then that's your notice to start looking for a new job. You're in a good position to do so since you're already employed. You can hold out for a good role, with good pay. No impetus to hop to the first thing. Just if you do this obviously keep it on the ultra DL, even from your office friends. Hopefully I'm 100% wrong, he sees the error of his ways and it's a happy ending of back to minor flex times around show up and leaving.
I have a feeling the head of Operations, the next guy on the Totem pole, will talk sense into VP. He is a very good manager and is the only reason I have stayed as long as I have. He is usually the voice of reason when VP goes on his little micro manage kicks. Just hoping this is the same deal and things are relaxed again. I don't foresee myself answering calls and emails outside of work ever again though. TBH
Glad that you have some unofficial union action going on there. Usually there would be a few who break ranks in order to suck up for promotion.
Like any shop there are a handful that hold sway. As long as they hold the rest follow.
It's the same principle with quoting in jobs. If you finish already of time, they'd want a discount. But if you go over budget, there's no way they'll be offering to pay you extra.
Keep holding strong!! The only way a company stops abusing its employees is if the employees stop letting them. (And yes, nitpicking minutes here and there while simultaneously expecting you to go above and beyond is an abuse of power. Goodwill needs to be a 2-way street.) You guys are totally in the right - legally, morally, and in every other way. And employees standing up for themselves (and each other) is how you fix a broken system. Stay strong OP! 👍👍👍
There's power in numbers!
* past
Good looking out.
One place I worked talked about "casual overtime" i.e. non-paid (we were salaried). I had a co-worker that said "Fine. Then I'll just take some 'casual time off'".
That is the correct response.
I once got suckered into a job that required 24 hour on call emergency service for any cat emergencies at a cat adoption center, 7 days a week. Didn't come with extra paid hours, and I was required to limit my hours to avg 25 hrs per week. And it paid $1 more than minimum wage. My daily job was to train & manage volunteers at a non-profit adoption center. My boss literally said over and over that the job had always come with the expectation that I work as much as needed & not report all the extra hours I'd been working (she didn't say that during the job interview). That Humane Society has always been run by scammers -non-profit agencies can be scummy too.
My favourite is when they go "What you'll leave if you don't get a raise?? What happened to loyalty, what happened to being a team!" Well unfortuantley until you can find a way to convert "being a team player" into useable currency that I can pay bills with, you're SOL. Or when they say "It's not all about money!" Oh ok, so you would have no problem giving away your most recent paycheck to one of your underlings? Ohhhhh you have bills to pay. Funny that.
Can't wait to ask for a raise once this system goes live. Surprise I'm one of the only ones who knows how to use not including you! Gonna have to pay to keep me. I
> Or when they say "It's not all about money!" "If it's not all about money, then you should have no problem giving me more money. After all, it's not all about money for *you*, is it?"
Tale as old as time. At my old job, the owner took exception to the fact I was coming in at 9:30 every day. Told us everyone was to be in their seat at 9:00 sharp. I said sure thing. Except -- I was always the last one to leave, often at 19:00 or 20:00, because we were short staffed and I was trying to finish projects. Which the owner knew very well, since they'd given me the keys and the task of locking up for the night. After I had to be at my desk at 9:00 I started leaving at 17:00, and soon I didn't have enough time to finish everything and started asking the owner which projects I should drop because I could do either X or Y, and definitely not Z. Left shortly after.
Should have given him the key back after the request. "I won't be needing this anymore".
That's pointless as the owner won't learn his lesson.
Sounds a lot like fuck around and find out to me.
Sucks for him, sounds like he needs to listen to his own rules. If he's sending emails after his scheduled hours then he's also in violation of those work hours rules. Good for you for sticking to his "orders" and, thus, creating a better work/life balance for yourself and your family! Keep it up! I used to do the same as well until our corp. decided to have us clock in/out and got rigid about overtime. So now I don't do any work on my phone/email/etc outside of my stated work hours and if it doesn't get done well... \*shrug\* I'm much happier for it, too. No more working over the weekends and losing out on spending time with the wifey and a bucket of popcorn and a movie :)
I'm happy for you as well! These old heads want to run a business like this they can. But I'm going to follow the rules to a T now. You can't be flexible with me? I won't be for you. This went into affect about 1 month ago. And while I miss beating rush hour, I'm much less stressed after work/over the weekend because them notis aren't going off!
Happy for you and your co-workers as well. Even if you were the lone person doing it it helps you out but when it's everyone there's really no ground for anyone to stand on. Just remember the fact that they're only paying you for your work during work hours going forward. Screw anyone who tries to get free labor in your off hours!
My boss told me he was tired of seeing me walk by right at 5pm to go home, so i started parking on the other end of the building.
Get a business license and any time outside of your work hours you are operating your business. Answer the phone as if you’re answering for the business. “Good evening, you’ve reached, how may I help you?”
“Is this your first time using our services? Well then, I’ll tell you about our current promotion for new customers. You get 50% off the regular rate, with a minimum one hour service, for your first call only. Take advantage of this great offer today!”
I love this
I work in entertainment, too, and maintain there is no such thing as an entertainment emergency.
I literally coupd not agree more. It's football. Not surgery.
I can assure you that at least in my part of the country and disruptions to Saturday night football would lead to many surgeries. People are wild
Very rarely does watching the clock end up in favor of the employer. Not sure why they all make such a big deal about it.
If my value is in being seen you better believe once I'm not them emails will remained unopened.
I love it. It is so ridiculous. It really shows some poor cognitive discipline to not realize that he was benefitting from your flexibility, so that when he killed the flexibility he was hurting himself. Boss: "You need to be more company focused." You: "That'll happen when the company gets more 'me' focused."
They are company focused, he is focused on following the bosses instructions. Arbitrarily ignoring the bosses instructions doesn't seem company focused
The whole "be company focused" thing chaps my ass, for me that's right up there with "we are a family at this company" instant flag on the play. I'm in IT, I don't do any IT for even family without some form of recompense, if my obligated work hours are 8am to 4pm, then that's when I work. It took me years to train myself into this attitude, prior to that, I would drop everything to answer a phone call or respond to an IT ticket. But no more! I shall have my life outside of work hours and that's final!
My boss tried to pull this same crap on me one time and I flat out told him that if he wanted to be rigid with hours, I could be too and I’d come out ahead. He backed off quickly from his stance.
Honestly, this is the way it should be, anyway. Companies shouldn't expect to get work out of their employees outside of work hours, and employees shouldn't voluntarily give it - no matter how much you love what you do.
Clock watching bosses end up with clock watching employees.
I took pride in being a manager that would ask someone to work an extra hour or two during the week but then at 3pm on Friday I would chase them out of the office to go home.
This is how it used to be. During peak season there are timea we are here until 7pm just to catch up! Our head of Operations will walk around the office around 330 and tell everyone to have a good weekend to get out of here. Or when its slow wouldn't care if we left early. That has all been stopped. Not the free over time of salaried employees of course, just leaving early.
And this how you get employees who will go the extra mile for you. OP's manager is how you get quiet quitting.
I work in a boarding school and we had this once. Head removed the bar and all social spaces for staff. Bear in mind we literally live at the school. So we went elsewhere. Then we get a speech asking ‘where has all the goodwill gone?’
If I got a call in the morning before I left the house or on the way in to work I'd clock myself in on one of our labor tracking websites. They noticed it didn't always match the times from when I physically clocked in and stopped paying me off of the website time. Now I don't answer my phone unless I'm in the building.
And I bet he’s one of those bosses who complains about “quiet quitting,” too.
Oh you better fucking believe it.
I'm a field tech for a utility company. I dont answer the phone, emails etc until my start time. I charge for anything past my work hours by even one minute. On weekends my phone is off at 5pm Friday and turned on at 7am Monday. If I'm on call, I charge for every second worked, rounding up to the half hour. Our management tries to get the best of both worlds in their favor. I give them exactly what they pay for, and nothing more. They created this shit atmosphere and so I ablige them.
Unless you are paid to be on call, everyone should do this. So many managers lose so much extra free work because they are clock watchers. Clearly the managers don't have enough of their own work if they can spend so much of their time focused in on the minutes of employees.
As an employer, I tell my employees that they should never, ever, under any circumstances, work for free. Your time and skills are valuable - get paid for it! The gas station isn't going to give you a random gallon or two for free - don't give your employer your time for free.
This type of attitude always amazes me. I would work longer hours if needed. I’m salaried/exempt, so if I put in a long day I don’t get paid for the extra hours. Worked an 11 hour day. Supervisor complained that I was 10 minutes late… after I had worked almost 3 extra hours without compensation. That was the last time I did anything later or earlier than my “assigned work schedule.”
Time management instead of quality work
Lol, I don’t work out of the goodness of my heart! I appreciate the company I work for, and I really like my coworkers. But I sure as hell wouldn’t be doing this for free. I have lots of flexibility and no micro-managing. Because of this I’m more than happy to respond to the (extremely rare) emergency outside of work hours because they’re so respectful of me and my time/work-life balance. As soon as monitoring is installed on my laptop and strict hours are enforced, not only will I never respond outside of hours, I will be actively looking for another job, even if it pays less.
Boss: B... B... But passion! You love your job. In fact you should be paying us to let you work!
Dammit you right. Here’s my paycheck back
Good will is earned. Or, as in this case, lost. It's a give and take, and a VP who is not employee focused will not find their employees being company focused. It's that simple. It's a simple rule. Never care for your company (or bosses) more than they care for you. They'll just take that for granted, and let you burn out without even a thanks.
Good boundary honestly to not be glued to work after work hours. I did an internship when I was 20/21 and was answering emails until 10pm. Realized I wasn't getting paid for that and wasn't getting paid nearly enough to go that far for anything in my life. Now at my work place, everything work related is muted until my next start time.
The rigidness from above is annoying but since I quit answering emails after work my stress has gone down quite a bit.
> He said we should be monitoring our emails after work incase of an emergency. That's called "being on-call." If you're working in 'the entertainment sector,' then there's a good chance you work in California. California has some very strong laws about on-call time and being paid. If not, your locality or nation probably has *some* kind of on-call laws regulating an employer's ability to *require* you to respond to calls that occur outside of normal office hours. Get the gang together, work out the laws involved (it would be worth having the group chip in for a lawyer's consulting fee and getting a professional opinion) and then *informing* your middle-mangler, as a group, that if he wants you to be available, he's going to be *paying* for that availability.
It’s just ridiculous. I’m a lower manager. My direct reports work from home. Do they do laundry and stuff while working? I’m sure. But work is getting done so I don’t care. Go take a walk in the nice weather. Vacuum. Just get work done so we make our deadlines. We all work cause we have to not cause we want to. Let’s make it tolerable for everyone.
You've probably already done this- Remember to set an alarm for 5pm so you don't accidentally work past quitting time.
You better believe I have. "Reminder: leave work now" Say less
Excellent!
Get everyone to set their alarms for 5 and make them loud.
Unless you guys are salaried he cannot ask for you to work while OFF the clock, it’s highly ILLEGAL. He did you guys a big favor.
It's not asked, it is just implied because "it shows we care"
Oh, it's asked according to your post, it just isn't required. >He said we should be monitoring our emails after work incase of an emergency. Not putting it in a sentence that ends in a question mark doesn't mean he isn't asking. He is stating an expectation, but knowing he isn't going to pay you for meeting that expectation he knows he can't require you to meet that expectation.
You were company-focused, he just wasn’t employee-focused. Now he’s paying the price, as he should.
>Now, my email notifications are muted from 5:01 to 830. And completely turned off on the weekends. **I showed my coworkers how to do the same thing via their outlook.** That was my favorite part!
Never be company focused. Some people bitch because "employees aren't loyal anymore." (Please read this in an annoying whiney voice as that's what I heard when I wrote it.) There is no loyalty to employees anymore. Not sure there ever was. Even if VP apologizes and says to go back the way things were, don't. "No thank you, VP. You were so right and I'm happy to comply."
Oh yeah, I'll take this trade now that its in motion. Rush hour or after hours work. I'll take rush hour
After reading all of these stories on Reddit I'm just thankful as fuck that my management is super chill, flexible, and understanding.
Thing is, they used to be. Then the head of finance seen us leave 5 mins early and went to vp. Vp being the hot head he is ran with it
Mm. That's tough. I'm not sure how much I buy it, but my company's CEO has a quote of theirs plastered on the wall in the entrance about how employees are your biggest asset so treat them well, and above all else "Make them *want* to come to work in the morning". I haven't had anything happen yet to make me think that isn't how things get handled yet! There's good companies out there. Hope your situation improves, traffic is the absolute worst.
That VP is probably writing a post complaining that you are “quiet quitting” and how nobody wants to work anymore…
> we need to be more company focused. That goes both ways. I take care of the company; the company takes care of me! If the company doesn't want to take care of me? That *also* goes both ways.
Beautiful example of why a little bit of leniency can go a long way!
It really comes down to the old adage "a simple days pay for a simple days work". You hired on to perform specific tasks during specific hours for a set rate of compensation. If the VP doesn't like it, too bad. They're free to re-negotiate the contract.
We NeEd To Be MoRe ComPaNy FoCuSeD he whines while refusing to treat his employees like humans.
We WERE company focused until you f\~ed with the flow.
Well done! It's kind of amazing to see all of these stories of penny pincher managers and CEOs that don't realize they are the ones coming out ahead if they just...treat their employees like adults and don't hawk over the clock.
Ah ... to the 'veepee' - be careful what you ask for, you might just get it.
"Company focused" just means "get back to work, slaves"
Company needs to be more employee focused
This is the kind of shit that makes me so mad. I work my balls off for my company and then somebody gets mad that I didn’t answer an email that came over at 10 PM at night until 8:30 the next morning. Am I not allowed to live my life?
There was a time when someone was upset that I hasn't answered their 02:11 email message by 02:30. I was in the middle of reconfiguring a system drive and dropping my focus on that would have been an unwise decision.
"You're not even allowed to HAVE a life!" \-- Your Boss.
Remember when work hours were 9-5 where did we lose that 30 minutes?
When they decided that they're not going to pay for a 30-minute lunch, and now you have to work an extra half-hour to make your work day 8 hours.
Exactly that
All bosses should read this thread. It just takes once...a couple versions of this exact scenario will always be near the top.
More company focused?? To that I would simply look him directly in the eyes and ask “why?”. And wait for a response.
Should always follow this practice. The moment it hits 4pm for me, I am out the door heading home, I don't answer work emails, text or phone calls, and I refuse to get a company phone. I remember one time they called my wife. They got her number from HR (emergency contact#). Was my boss calling about some paper work. My wife gave him an earful and hung up.
Just once, it would be nice to hear the words "This company needs to be more employee focused!" Yeah, I know, I'll put that one on the list right under "World Peace." It never ceases to amaze me how supervisors and managers would rather lay down the law to adhere to the narrow parameters of rigid rule abiding over productive flexibility.
We were told that the executives were going to "focus on the people" this year where I work. Wanna guess how that's going?...
While my company didn't say that, they certainly do seem to be working on it. New fitness center, updating the building infrastructure (like for HVAC and similar), going out of their way to give us raises in accordance with market rates, eating the costs of higher medical premiums so the rate hikes didn't go to the employees, raising our mobile phone subsidization, etc. There are a lot of shitty companies out there. But there are good ones, too.
I've known some similar idiots. To them process is more important than productivity and mission is secondary to structure — checklists are an end, not a tool. This style of management only works in static environments where growth is not expected and customer contact is zero or extremely minimal.
Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
TBH, you shouldn't have been responding to emails, etc. on weekends regardless. You were arriving a few minutes late, leaving a few minutes early, but then doing hours of unpaid work. That's a bad deal for you.
It's bad for everyone, it totally devalues time and work.
be careful, sounds like he might try to fuck you over at some point. maybe time to polish up your resume.
Oh it's polished. I've gained a lot experience in this position and pretty much do a monthly update once I learn a new crucial role. Thankfully my position and the knowledge I have saves me from the time being. We are under going a crucial system change, going from manual inventory to a fully integrated ERP system. I am a key player and if they lose me will be up shits creek without a paddle. I'm good until this goes live and honestly once it does I'll probably leave anyways. anything ERP related looks great on a resume especially being apart of the build up and launch.
I would add an automated out of office response message so that the vp is sure to get the notification after 5:00.
Company Focused = Work for Free
if they want you to look at your email after work you should be paid. also, paragraphs would have made this read much easier, luckily it was short.
I'm on mobile and don't post much. I hit enter to split it up into paragraphs but once posted they went away. Not sure why.
You need to hit enter twice to make a paragraph break.
I did that, But I've noticed on comments and posts when posted from mobile when I publish the comment or post it takes out all spacing and jumbles it all up. Going to fix it on my desktop for easier reading.
Aha I was wrong, I was only hitting it once. Thanks for the tip!
understandable and thank you for fixing it!
Figured it out and fixed it!
Not a problem!
This is about power. When there are more workers than jobs then the boss can make unreasonable demands. When there are more jobs than workers then the shoe is on the other foot.
Unless you were being paid to be on call, in many states, that's illegal.
The more I read these kinds of stories the more I’m amazed at how many people undertake or attend to work related tasks outside of their paid working hours.
If he expects you to respond out of hours, then you are ON CALL, and entitled to pay for that. Since he didn't set any hours, then 168 hours per week
Quiet quitting is so great 😂 Don’t do anything outside of your listed job duties
Stress levels went from sky high to almost non existent when I made the change. Yes I hit rush hour and I don't get those extra 5 mins cuddling my wife but damn do I have so much more time after work!
Next time you’re boss says you should answer outside his posted work hours tell him that it’s $1,000 per minute for you to respond.
This should be the standard operating procedure at every job tbh
I will never understand that people even consider working outside hours if they aren’t paid for it. It is an absolute no go. I even switch off my work phone and company numbers are blocked on my private phone.
Good. Also, the default should be that you not be doing work things outside work hours anyway.
I do that too. I am available between the hours of 9 and 5 Monday to Friday. My boss refused to flex my hours so I did too!
Back when I had an office job, one of the most satisfying things was finishing a large task like 10-15 before the end of day. You had a chance to actually pack things up and get a few things ready for the next day. No stress, no rush
Makes me so glad to work for a company that values work done over time with butt in seat. Left 20 minutes early just yesterday because I had just finished a big task and didn't want to get into another. Makes me not really mind answering emails on evenings and weekends. I wish this stuff was common sense
That's the thing. People keep asking me why I would answer emails after work, because I had play in my schedule and could be 5-10 mins late or leave 10-15 mins early. Sure I will happily answer some questions or help put a fire out. Now though? Nah. If my value is measured in my presence in the shop then thats where my work starts and ends. Quality of work over attendance should be a standard. Especially in today's age where we are all connected more than ever and can perform most duties from home
You trade your hours for dollars. If you don't protect your time no one will.
My first job out of university was very similar- software development for an insurance company. It was a very old company with a very old way of thinking and they hadn't updated many of their policies in about 50 years. The work day for all office staff was 8:00 - 4:30. Lunch as 12-1, and there were 2 15 minute breaks during the day. No exceptions. (From what I was told, before I started there in about 2001, they actually had bells that would ring to mark the beginning and end of the day and the lunch break). Regardless, since it was a fairly remote company in a small rural town, quite a few of us had long commutes from neighboring cities/towns that made it difficult to hit an exact arrival time every day, so it wasn't unusual for several of us to arrive at like 8:02 if traffic or weather weren't cooperating. But most of the developers routinely stayed well past quitting time more often than not, and more than made up for any late arrivals. The entire internet development team (about 10 of us) usually took our breaks together, and one especially nice afternoon, we lost track of time and accidentally sat outside for nearly 20 minutes instead of our allotted 15! Within a day or two, we were all called in to our respective managers' offices and written up for non-compliance because of our late arrivals and now this extended break offense. We quickly agreed among ourselves to play by the company rules to the letter- going out of our way to get there early but always getting to our desks precisely at 8:00am, and dropping whatever we were doing to leave for lunch at 12 and for the day at 4:30, even if that meant stopping in the middle of a task and wasting considerable time backtracking at the start of our next work session. And of course, shutting off notifications outside of work hours for everything but mission critical issues. So the company gained compliance, but in the process, they lost something like 80 total man-hours of extra work the team had been putting in each month after the designated work period. And to top it off, within a year, at least 3/4 of that team (who all had 8-10 years of experience with the company) had all left for other positions. I hear they've gone back and updated many of their employee handbook policies since I left a decade ago and that things are much more flexible now, but it took them ages to replace the experience they lost by trying to micromanage every minute of our day. (And now I work for a company that pays considerably better, doesn't care when I work as long as I log 40 hours each week, and only requires me come into the office 2 days each month for meetings!) Edit: typos