The Work Thread

Bunni wrote:If only our last meeting wasn't me incredibly drunk at her wedding.

I once went to an interview and was met by the interviewer at reception. We got into the lifts and she suddenly said “Do you remember the last time I saw you?” I said no and she then said “You were running out of a fire exit with a 10 foot cactus under your arm”.



It turned out she was the wife of a colleague. We had had a Christmas party with a wild west theme and there were loads of giant plastic cactus dotted around the room. I was extremely drunk and was dared by my boss to grab one and run out of the fire exit. Like a twat, I did and carried it back to the office (it was only a 10 minute walk away) and left it by my bosses desk.

The interview didn't go too badly though and I was called back for a second interview which I declined as I had already had a better offer.

Sounds like a prickly situation

Do any of you fellow office plebs use any interesting software? Apart from MS Office?

Here are some I use:

PowerBi - could be a good dashboard tool, I am still playing with it.
Asana - Project Management software. Really need a team for this to thrive.
Toggl - Free timer for pretending to be a lawyer. Seriously, weekly dashboards seeing where you are spending your time is great.
Google Forms and Sheets - this isn't very uncommon, although you can do cool stuff with scripts.
Matlab - User friendly "pretend to be a data scientist" tool.

My entire company is pretty much built on Excel. I hate it so much. I desperately need a dashboard/database solution, I am hoping Power BI is on the right track.

1cmanny1 wrote:Here are some I use:

PowerBi -

Thank you for all the advice about my moving to France. I've decided to quit the job and go for it.

Quitting the shitty (but reasonably well paid) role I'm in now is going to be the least difficult part I think. Harder is going to be leaving my lovely flat and the friends/social life I've built up over the past two years. For what is essentially a blank page. I have started building up contacts here, but it's slow going given the language barrier.

We'll see. I'm sure I'll keep you all in the loop!

Decided that with the baby coming next year I'm going to put in a request to work compressed hours. If work approve my request, it'll mean I can spend more time with the baby, my wife can go back to work on the day I'm at home.

Good luck. we have a lot of guys who do similar, and two who have used shared paternity/maternity leave to take months at a time off with full pay. Might be worth looking into your company's policy on that if your wife wants to go back to work quite early on.

Drumstick wrote:Decided that with the baby coming next year I'm going to put in a request to work compressed hours. If work approve my request, it'll mean I can spend more time with the baby, my wife can go back to work on the day I'm at home.

I work compressed hours. It means longer days obviously, but it’s worth it to have that extra day per week at home with the little one.

Moggy wrote:

Drumstick wrote:Decided that with the baby coming next year I'm going to put in a request to work compressed hours. If work approve my request, it'll mean I can spend more time with the baby, my wife can go back to work on the day I'm at home.

I work compressed hours. It means longer days obviously, but it’s worth it to have that extra day per week at home with the little one.

Yeah it was you mentioning it that put the idea into my head.

Drumstick wrote:

Moggy wrote:

Drumstick wrote:Decided that with the baby coming next year I'm going to put in a request to work compressed hours. If work approve my request, it'll mean I can spend more time with the baby, my wife can go back to work on the day I'm at home.

I work compressed hours. It means longer days obviously, but it’s worth it to have that extra day per week at home with the little one.

Yeah it was you mentioning it that put the idea into my head.

Christ don’t go carrying out my ideas. That’s a slippery slope down to absolute ruin.

Moggy wrote:

Drumstick wrote:Decided that with the baby coming next year I'm going to put in a request to work compressed hours. If work approve my request, it'll mean I can spend more time with the baby, my wife can go back to work on the day I'm at home.

I work compressed hours. It means longer days obviously, but it’s worth it to have that extra day per week at home with the little one.

...and compressing all of your GR posting into 4 days, which therefore results in less work for your employer.

Death's Head wrote:

Moggy wrote:

Drumstick wrote:Decided that with the baby coming next year I'm going to put in a request to work compressed hours. If work approve my request, it'll mean I can spend more time with the baby, my wife can go back to work on the day I'm at home.

I work compressed hours. It means longer days obviously, but it’s worth it to have that extra day per week at home with the little one.

...and compressing all of your GR posting into 4 days, which therefore results in less work for your employer.

Despite posting a lot, I still do more work than most of the people in my office. I’m efficient

Tafdolphin wrote:Thank you for all the advice about my moving to France. I've decided to quit the job and go for it!

Don't do it.

Say you applied for a job, what do you answer when they ask you what your current salary is?

and what is the best way to negotiate your salary?

First paragraph: lie about your current salary so it's roughly the same as what they're offering/ should be offering.

Moggy wrote:

Death's Head wrote:

Moggy wrote:

Drumstick wrote:Decided that with the baby coming next year I'm going to put in a request to work compressed hours. If work approve my request, it'll mean I can spend more time with the baby, my wife can go back to work on the day I'm at home.

I work compressed hours. It means longer days obviously, but it’s worth it to have that extra day per week at home with the little one.

...and compressing all of your GR posting into 4 days, which therefore results in less work for your employer.

Despite posting a lot, I still do more work than most of the people in my office. I’m efficient

I pity your company. Is it in the public sector?

Rocsteady wrote:First paragraph: lie about your current salary so it's roughly the same as what they're offering/ should be offering.

I wouldn't recommend this. If they offer you a job and you accept, they will get your salary details and you could end up being dismissed for lying.

Kezzer wrote:Say you applied for a job, what do you answer when they ask you what your current salary is?

and what is the best way to negotiate your salary?

Best way to negotiate salary with current or new employer?

Kezzer wrote:Say you applied for a job, what do you answer when they ask you what your current salary is?

and what is the best way to negotiate your salary?

Add a couple of grand to your current salary.

Always reject the first offer.

Death's Head wrote:

Moggy wrote:

Death's Head wrote:

Moggy wrote:

Drumstick wrote:Decided that with the baby coming next year I'm going to put in a request to work compressed hours. If work approve my request, it'll mean I can spend more time with the baby, my wife can go back to work on the day I'm at home.

I work compressed hours. It means longer days obviously, but it’s worth it to have that extra day per week at home with the little one.

...and compressing all of your GR posting into 4 days, which therefore results in less work for your employer.

Despite posting a lot, I still do more work than most of the people in my office. I’m efficient

I pity your company. Is it in the public sector?

Private. I make them far far far more money than they pay me.