...next to a note that said "useless, damn your bones"
So on Friday, after literally months of irritating back-chat from a particular person I work with, I finally had some grudgingly positive feedback about a piece of work I had submitted.
I am one of those "accommodating" people in "real life", so it took some persuasion for me to stand up to this person and refuse to keep reinventing the wheel because they felt like it.
An example:
Let's say you baked some one a cake. And they had said "I don't care what kind of cake you bake, as long as it's round"
When presented with said cake, they respond
"Oh. No, that's not the cake I wanted. Here is a cake some one else made me. I like them like this"
And when presented with the new cake, they respond
"Oh. No, that's not right either. You've got the cake right, but I need piped icing, candles, three different sugar animals and a toffee cage"
It was at this point that I told said cake-eater that given that the earlier cake had met the standards of other cakes provided, that they could eat the cake I had made, or go without.
They ate the cake.
Now it's not like I mind working hard, I don't. I've brought home for this weekend an 80 page pro-forma document I've created which needs populating with about another 40 pages of detail, a work-plan for a committee I'm on that needs doing by Monday morning*, a new training program that will take at least three hours voluntary work per week for the next six months and, let's be honest, a smallish bottle of white wine.
What I mind, in contrast to hard work, is
a) being told "no really, you can do it any way you like" with "as long as it's our way" being muttered under-breath and out-of-earshot.
b) the goal posts being shifted constantly without any notice at all.
c) spending all my time putting out fires while I could be enjoying the work I do and actually making some kind of perceptible difference to the world....
....and all the coffee and chocolate in the world can't fix that.
* Anonymous, I promise you it will be done.
I am one of those "accommodating" people in "real life", so it took some persuasion for me to stand up to this person and refuse to keep reinventing the wheel because they felt like it.
An example:
Let's say you baked some one a cake. And they had said "I don't care what kind of cake you bake, as long as it's round"
When presented with said cake, they respond
"Oh. No, that's not the cake I wanted. Here is a cake some one else made me. I like them like this"
And when presented with the new cake, they respond
"Oh. No, that's not right either. You've got the cake right, but I need piped icing, candles, three different sugar animals and a toffee cage"
It was at this point that I told said cake-eater that given that the earlier cake had met the standards of other cakes provided, that they could eat the cake I had made, or go without.
They ate the cake.
Now it's not like I mind working hard, I don't. I've brought home for this weekend an 80 page pro-forma document I've created which needs populating with about another 40 pages of detail, a work-plan for a committee I'm on that needs doing by Monday morning*, a new training program that will take at least three hours voluntary work per week for the next six months and, let's be honest, a smallish bottle of white wine.
What I mind, in contrast to hard work, is
a) being told "no really, you can do it any way you like" with "as long as it's our way" being muttered under-breath and out-of-earshot.
b) the goal posts being shifted constantly without any notice at all.
c) spending all my time putting out fires while I could be enjoying the work I do and actually making some kind of perceptible difference to the world....
....and all the coffee and chocolate in the world can't fix that.
* Anonymous, I promise you it will be done.
posted by gigglewick at
1:52 pm
3 Comments:
Would all the lindt chocolate in the world fix it?
Sounds like you're stuck with a nasty bunch - particularly their two-faced rubbish.
Just do the best you can - no one can ask for any more. Best of luck!
Rosanna,
Not sure...we racked out the 'Heaven' this week.....
It's not my immediate colleagues, just a bunch of people I have to work with intermittently.
Yes, it's a pain.
I have worked with people like that. Infuriating.
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