Buzzword Bingo

My area of the company is reorganizing.  I work for a company that has always prided themselves on no bullshit and hard work.  That seems to be slipping. 

We have in-house consultants now.  I mentioned the one that was embedded for abit before.

We bought another company and my company is so worried about hurting the feelings of the people that we bought they are alienating the good people they already had.

They are bringing over people from that other company that are buzzword professionals. I hate buzzwords.  They are usually accompanied with by someone speaking to someone else like they are an idiot.

My least favorite word in the English language:  SYNERGY

Rapidly closing in on second place:           GOVERNANCE

My faith in my company, and most of humanity, is decaying each time I hear those words.

Knock it off!!

No one wants to have a Monday morning meeting at 9am... SO QUIT PUTTING THEM ON MY CALENDAR AND THEN CANCELLING THEM!

Idiots.

Overpaid internal consultants who are assisting the unions in driving this place into the ground.

Little mistakes that increase workload

I made the mistake of setting my boss up on Communicator today.  The rest of the department has been using it for nearly a year, so why not right? He asked, I helped.

Dear Lord do I regret that.

Where does the time go?

Things have been good, but hectic.

Brief recap -

The littlest brother and SIL and their untrained puppy moved in during the second week in March. It’s been good, except for working with the puppy. My brother and his wife currently owe us some carpet cleaning, an ottoman and a couch (ref pictures of the pooch’s handiwork). As the cost of rebuying furniture has increased they have finally caved to letting us crate the dog. It’s a dog, it will be fine. Every dog I’ve ever had has been crate trained and is perfectly well adjusted (and spoiled).

I like having them around, plus he's currently entertaining a job offer in another part of the country so it's nice to have some time in before they jet off to a new life (where it would be much harder to see him on a whim).

Job change at work. They finally hired for my old position so I’m working through transitioning stuff instead of doing double duty. Pretty amazed at how much I used to do. Still getting my feet wet in the new stuff – lots to learn.

Location change at work. We are all in cubicles now (no big deal for me but you would think some people are being tortured the way they are reacting) I think it makes me more productive (definitely less likely to go on a blog rant at work when people can walk up behind me and see it). This was a giant whuppin’ because I was in charge of this one too – at least this time everyone knew more of what they were in for and that I was pregnant so I didn’t have to lift anything (yay me).

Manfolk job change. Got a job he loves. Taking a chance on a technology company with part time hours. He was miserable before and it makes my heart happy to see him settling in to his new gig.

TheNugget is growing like crazy and sapping my brain power and energy. Brother and themanfolk painted the nursery last weekend. That’s quite a load off. 25 down… Doc scared the crap out of both of us when he told us that technically the baby could show up at any time from here on out.

All this, plus the normal family, friends and daily craziness has made me a blog slacker. I’m working on it.

*shakes head*

So I have a consultant sitting next to me during a testing phase in the new work space. On his white board he wrote his to-do list:

1. Organize to do list

If he’s making more than minimum wage I may cry.

Movin' on up

Moving at home - bought a house, had a bunch of repairmen in to fix/update/clean stuff, moved in, unpacked (mostly) and vacated and cleaned the old apartment (which we will probably lose our deposit on even though we took good care of the place because they suck balls).

Meanwhile...

Moving at work - being uprooted into a temporary cubeland so our area can be revamped and then moving back 4-6 weeks later and I've been chosen to lead this shenanigan by the higher ups.

I usually am ok with moving, I like change (usually - but this is a little much. Everything is in disarray all of the time. It's exhausting and incredibly time consuming.

I'll be happy when it is over and I can get back to my regularly scheduled life.

This speaks to me

I may develop my Team strategy at work around it for 2012

Hiring Women

I've always preferred to work with guys. Usually you can have a heated arguement regarding business with a male and then 10 minutes later it's over and you move on to football. With women everything is personal. Just about everyone I've ever hired is male.

I inherited a team of women (and hired one guy into the mix). Last year two of my seven employees had babies so I was basically working short handed for half of the year. They had paid time off and I struggled - at least that was my opinion at the time.

Now that I am considering kiddos of my own I refuse to let anyone (ok maybe one person) that I work with know and certainly not the folks I work for. Sadly, I think it would be career limiting (at least in the short term).

Change of perspective for me - it's interesting.

For a day...

I would like to be able to answer work emails with what I'm really thinking. Just one day.

Idiot Employee to the Team: "Thanks so much for doing that!"
Me: "It's your damn job and I've told you twelve times to take care of it each day. I had to pick up the slack because you are incompetent and I am so beat down that I just did it myself. I'll add this to the paper trail stack I am building regarding your complete lack of coherence."

Guy in the Department who has Ideas an no execution: "Here's my idea, how can you make it happen?"
Me: "I'll tell you how -- You can get off your ass and follow through on something for once in your life instead of spouting half cocked ideas and expecting everyone to jump in and make you look good."

Idiot Employee #2 to the Team: "I don't know if I quite understand this yet."
Me: "Well you should. We've had two meetings and a one on one totaling about 5 hours of discussion on how to do this so if you don't get it by now I should be allowed to beat you with a brick. I know that you are resisting this because it wasn't your idea and you are feeling threatened because you have no self confidence - which, in all honesty you shouldn't have any confidence because you do the bare minimum, aren't innovative and promoted because of longevity and not merit."

Leader who doesn't make a decision: "I'll take that to the higher ups and we will discuss"
Me: "I'm shocked you can pick out your underwear in the morning without convening a meeting about it. Or maybe you do - I should ask your wife and kids."

It could just go on and on. I think it would be extremely therapeutic.

Can't lie...

Work was more exciting when there was the prospect of having random sex during the workday. Now all I have to look forward to is working. Sheesh.

As toxic/stupid/crazy as it was -- I was never so excited to get out of bed in the morning.

Oh well. What I've got now is infinitely better - though it is really hard to get out of bed in the morning when I'd rather be snuggling (or doing other naked stuff) with the manfolk.

How hard is it to be an intern?

Seriously... I had to fire an intern last week for general incompetence and inability to follow direction. How difficult is being an intern?

Really all you need to do is what you are told. Oh, by the way, we pay our interns and give them airline benefits.

Shit.

Waste of a day and a lot of heartache for the two sweet people who run the program for me. They were absolutely tormented to fire him in the last half of his tenure here. When I sat him down with HR to do the deed he immediately threw them under the bus. That helped make it crystal clear that we made the right decision.

The remaining intern is pretty much scared out of his wits... he is nervous around me at all times now. Ugh. He's a good kid who will probably give himself ulcers if he has to stand in my office too long.

Damn Monday's keep showing up...

Drive-by

Ok. I am a non-union Employee at the Headquarters of a company that is 86% unionized.

In the big scheme of the world, for what I do, I make dick.

So, when we have our shareholders meeting and one of our union (extremely senior, extremely overpaid for what they do, easily outsourced but we as a company are too big of pussies to do it) groups is picketing on the corner, talking to the media, asking for equal pay and more headcount I have to resist the urge to drive by and throw something at them.

Preferably something heavy and sharp.

Seriously, this group probably makes, on average about $52 an hour, has flexible scheduling and very little responsibility.

This is one of those things where if i was king for a day around here I would outsource it and spend the money that we waste on these folks on a few much needed programs.

There was a time and place for unions. And some still provide valid benefit:
Coal miners need unions.
Hazardous materials plant workers need unions.
Railroad mechanics need unions.
Baseball players, pilots and these jerks absolutely do not.

A gift?

The creepy guy at work sent this to me this weekend.



Um... I guess you can see why he is the creepy guy at work.

Happy Admin Day!

As someone who used to be an administrative assistant - admins should be spoiled. They put up with more crap than anyone in an office and get the least amount of praise. I have showered mine with flowers and gift cards and cards and I just hope they don't quit because a person who has the attitude and wherewithal to do that job is just incredibly difficult to find (especially for what we pay).

It's my Friday

Don't know why, but I am so freakin' excited to have four days off in a row I can barely stand it. Don't have anything big planned (except a Rangers game tonight and then Easter shenanigans with manfolk family and my extended family on Sunday) but I am totally excited about it.

Thanks for the candy...

Happy Monday from Dane Cook... Just click here and watch....

Just when everything was rolling...

Picked a date for the wedding, put down a deposit, bought plane tickets, paid for dog surgery, about to sign on a slightly bigger place to live... lots of money out the door in the last few weeks.

So of course the manfolk got laid off this morning. Apparently their team was too efficient and got their project done, so the company is restructuring and no longer has a need for them. WTF? You did your job too well so now you are unemployed?

Plus they told him this morning and said his last day would be Friday. What company does that? Aren't you setting yourself off for a pissed of employee to sabotage you?

On another note, as much as my people make me crazy I am extremely lucky to have a stable job that I enjoy (except for the days where I want to strangle someone).

Less than a week...

This time next week I'll be on a boat.

I can barely stand myself.

Compounded by the fact that an employee actually screamed at me today after I told her that my expectation was that she wouldn't walk out of anymore meetings when things didn't go her way. Apparently that makes me a terrible boss. Who knew?

Derailed

So.. I didn't get to go to Canada because my Team has decided in the last week to strive for a level of drama and incompetence I didn't think they had in them. It is rediculous.

Most of the issue stems from one particular person and I had to resist the urge to key her car this morning in the parking lot as I was walking by the handicapped parking space that she is constantly parked in and doesn't need (this may become Pet Peeve #10 in a later post).

The good thing about not going to the Frozen North is I get to be home with the manfolk. Its weird. I used to love to travel for work just to get away for a couple of days, now I'd rather be home on the patio with him.