Japan is legendary for its insane work schedules. Corporate employees in America are known to love to stay and work unpaid overtime, but in Japan it’s not unheard of for employees to keep inflatable beds around so they can sleep at the office. The Japanese language even has a word, karoshi, that means “death from overwork”.
The main difference between American’s long hours and the long hours worked by Japanese employees lies in the context.
Americans love being at the office because they hate their lives and hate spending time with their families and would rather be at work. Japanese, on the ..read more
“Lucrative” is the most commonly heard word before you accept a job (contrast with “proactive” which is the most commonly heard word after you accept a job).
Every job posting I have ever seen has described its benefits package as “lucrative.” Sometimes it even says “lucrative salary,” too. And then during the initial interview, it’s as if HR wants to make absolutely sure you are aware of their “lucrative” package, so before actual compensation amounts are even discussed, the interviewer always mentions again how “lucrative” their offer is.
There wouldn’t even be anything wrong with that if every company didn’t describe its ..read more
If there’s one thing corporate employees love more than working long hours, it’s giving stupid names to simple concepts.
There’s a really long explanation involving lots of math, but I will give you the short version: Six Sigma is a methodology designed to eliminate defects and improve efficiency. The name “Six Sigma” comes from being six levels of standard deviation away from the mean of a process on a normal distribution graph. Boring, right? Basically Six Sigma means you’re operating at 99.9997% efficiency.
Like many other things in the corporate world, Six Sigma is full of pseudo-words (things that would be acronyms ..read more
Seriously. You want to know what I’m working on right now? The same thing I was working on five seconds ago when you last asked.
And when you ask again in another five seconds, I’ll probably still be working on the same thing.
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SWE is yet another corporate acronym that stands for “Satisfying Work Experience.” Your manager can’t just ask you “how do you like your job?” Instead, they have to ask you “How is your SWE?” (pronounced like “swee,” as if it were actually a real word).
At my first job, we had all been working ridiculous hours and weekends (as per usual), and one of the managers took a few members of my team into a conference room and asks us:
“You guys have all been working really hard. What can I do to improve your SWE?”
At this point, my friend and coworker ..read more
I want you to get rid of the idea that you have to work hard in order to get a good review. I have gotten my worst reviews ever when I was busting ass, working 12+ hour days, fixing code that no one else understood, turning in projects and closing out tasks left and right, making a ton of progress. And conversely, I have gotten my best reviews when I was hardly doing anything at all! In fact, at one job, I had only been there for 3 months and I literally hadn’t done anything yet, and my manager pulled ..read more
I have my own stuff to do. I have to go to the gym. I have to make dinner. I have to go to the grocery store. I have to take a look at my portfolio’s performance. I have to do dishes. I have to catch up on my reading. I have to balance my checkbook. I have to check my email. I have to surf the net. I have to play guitar. I have to watch TV. I have to relax. I have to go to bed.
I don’t want to listen to you complain about your job. I don’t ..read more
Have you ever been to a meeting that ended on time? I haven’t (not including meetings that I run). I should note that if you ever have the privilege of being in a meeting that I am holding, you will be kicked out when the meeting is scheduled to end, if not earlier, because being forced to stay in a meeting that is going longer than expected is the most annoying thing in the world.
It wouldn’t be so bad if you weren’t already overworked, but when you are already going to have to stay late, you don’t need to waste ..read more
I was talking to someone the other day who told me that her company doesn’t allow you to use sick days. If you call in sick, it is an unexcused absense, you get written up, and it goes on your record.
That means if you are in the hospital with food poisoning, or if you get in a car accident and are in the operating room having surgery to save your life, or at the orthodontist having your teeth pulled, you are going to be penalized by your employer.
She then went on to say that employees were given PTO (paid time ..read more
I love corporate cheerleaders! They provide endless amusement when I’m having a boring day at work. A corporate cheerleader can be anyone, male or female, who goes around the office singing praises of the company. You can’t even stop to ask this person how their day is going without getting an earful about changes to management policy, or new distribution nodes, and how it’s all wonderful or something of that sort.
The place where the corporate cheerleader really shines, however, is in meetings. At my last job, once a year everyone in management would be sent to this “retreat” for a ..read more
You are here because corporate life sucks. You hate your job, you hate your work environment, and you probably hate your coworkers, too.
