The Work Thread 2 - Get back to work!

In the office today with a lot of my team, and some guy from another team has plonked himself down at a desk right next to us and joined a conference call on loudspeaker.

ey up let's get some collegiate work morale going on here by working closely together with these very hard working looking people who just want to shut the strawberry float up and do the work instead of talking about doing the work.

The scenario played out daily by offices everywhere.

Congrats on the promo Staydead!

I am unemployed at present. I miss the people in my last job but I do not miss the job itself. It was essentially call centre work. It sucked and doing it for over 6 years has definitely left its mark on me.

I'm leaving my current department for a promotion in the same organisation — next week is my last.

Can't believe it's been five years since the hideous chaos I went through, some of which I documented in this very thread. I'll be sad to leave my current role, and particularly gutted to leave the team I spent the last five years building.

Congrats on the promotion Ob Blob :toot:

Oblomov Boblomov wrote:I'm leaving my current department for a promotion in the same organisation — next week is my last.

Can't believe it's been five years since the hideous chaos I went through, some of which I documented in this very thread. I'll be sad to leave my current role, and particularly gutted to leave the team I spent the last five years building.

What's the promotion to? Congrats!

Thanks guys

. It's going from one head of department job to another, but more senior. I'll be largely removed from line management, which is going to be weird. There'll be more emphasis on strategy/policy development and project oversight.

Green Gecko wrote:Hello did you receive the previous email

Please send the file in this format

OK thank you but could you please send in the specified format

OK thank you for letting us know, if you could confirm by x time please

Unfortunately as we did not receive x thing in y time to fulfil your requested time line we will need to delay. Please send the thing thanks

Hey do you want the thing you asked about recently

Hello this thing you decided to come back to at a future time, it is the future time now, please update

Over and over again forever.

Heard this on the radio earlier today and thought of you gecko

https://axelkacoutie.com/work/white-noise/

OrangeRKN wrote:
Green Gecko wrote:Hello did you receive the previous email

Please send the file in this format

OK thank you but could you please send in the specified format

OK thank you for letting us know, if you could confirm by x time please

Unfortunately as we did not receive x thing in y time to fulfil your requested time line we will need to delay. Please send the thing thanks

Hey do you want the thing you asked about recently

Hello this thing you decided to come back to at a future time, it is the future time now, please update

Over and over again forever.

Heard this on the radio earlier today and thought of you gecko

https://axelkacoutie.com/work/white-noise/

That sounds amazing, I'm going to listen through tomorrow.

"Did you get the email?

"We don't have the budget.

"It's too long.*"

*strawberry floating christ on a stick :slol:

Here's the latest one. Good chance I was referring to them at some point. There are well over 5.35hrs tracked on this ticket since the 13th October (SEVEN MONTHS with no decisions and no sales) and I believe there are a lot more unaccounted for. My PA has contacted them about 5 times in different ways and I've produced a bunch of mock-ups.

Sorry for getting back to you so late. We discussed all our options with the studio owner** and decided to print the merchandise ourselves as this would be the most cost-effective option as we aim to sell the products. Thank you so much for all the information in the emails and wishing you all the best.

Kind regards,

OK bye...

Nah I'm going to offload on this and variations of this. Right so after 7 god damn months of discussing your options with me you've decided to just go back to where you were originally and do it yourself, thank you for coming to this conclusion so expediently so I can do something else.

** I am not the key decision maker and this was my pet project, I never had the agency to say or do anything actionable or meaningful during our entire 7 month conversation, it was just me bouncing to and fro between a bunch of other people who also make either no decision or weak decisions, in some strange mirage of collective brilliance.

strawberry floating timewasters.

For the sake of my own sanity I have to think, good luck with that, seeing as they're demonstrably incapable of making decisions or any progress on their own even with literally hundreds of pounds worth of good faith consultation and options. I'm sure nothing at all can go wrong. You know like everything I have learnt about apparel printing in the past 10 years since I started and made all of those mistakes before, if I hadn't avoided them entirely. I'm not sure these people even understand graphical file formats or resolution and gooseberry fool like that. Like the absolute basics. Since it took, oh like literally SIX MONTHS to get a hold of those.

Nothing of value there. I wont even get into the equipment costs and the huge traps of buying gooseberry fool equipment on Amazon/eBay or even strawberry floating ironing on some transfers and just expecting it to magically compare to a retail ready product you can sell, wash and not have your customers come back to you with hell's fury in their eyes because your shitty product was printed at the wrong temperature, for too long, at the wrong pressure, or you printed on a polyester garment that dye migrated into the white print that turned purple because there was no poly blocker, or all kinds of other gooseberry fool.

By all means just go on YouTube and figure it out, I guess. That isn't going to take like 300 hours of your time at your own expense and frustration.

I thought about doing some mild FOMO-esque offer to consult on the common pitfalls of production and ins/outs of the industry but, you know what, I can't be arsed. I have other, better clients.

I mean, they won't even be able to open a wholesale account (I have five) and thus make a reasonable margin on their products, because they aren't printing garments as a bonafide apparel supplier, they are just possibly maybe printing a few things for themselves i.e. a hobby/hustle and their website (which they will be asked for) is obviously a yoga studio with about 10 people in it. So they'll instead be buying from a fake wholesaler which is just a reseller, and then having to account for a garment that costs 3-5x what it should actually cost, thus eliminating the costs and margin recovery they think they are addressing.

Of course the healthy way to think about it is, these people disqualified themselves by vetting out themselves, so I can finally stop wasting resources on them. And looking back it was an enquiry from before I had a much more robust enquiry form that basically says, "You have to tell us your deadline, budget and quantities to get a response" as well as "Tick here to confirm you actually want this thing and will buy it if you are satisfied with the conditions of sale" (otherwise strawberry float off).

My god I am so over people like this. It's the brain vaporising, soul decimating story of every self employed person ever that puts themselves out there with a good faith intention to make an honest living doing a decent trade and then, well the world is nothing like that, at all. You get constantly rinsed all the while you are earning £0 if not losing money just for the privilege to speak to someone about their possibly maybe considering that thing but we have no idea either way.

I may even start charging for quotations (it'll encourage me to actually get them out and discourage people from strawberry floating around, and hell I don't know every 30 days I run a raffle or something and they randomly get their product for free).

What I legit need to do is get all my upfront sales stuff done online but believe me, you will still get emails asking nebulous questions that lead into a dark cave where you hear your own echo on repeat for 10,000 years while they scroll Instagram or whatever the strawberry float.

That was a good response to that art piece, I should email it to them.

Hi

Does anyone know if companies will generally hold it against you for having time of following an operation if it's all signed of by the surgeon?

Hold it against you in what way?

Disciplinary I guess or monitoring it moving forward.

I had some surgery a couple of weeks ago so have had two weeks of but the surgeon said to have 4 weeks of work. I got a doctor's note from the hospital for two weeks initially.

I think I just feel guilty for having time of, the longest I have ever had of is like 4 days I think in 20 years.

Do what your surgeon tells you. It would be completely unreasonable for your work to hold that against you.

It'll go towards your sickness record and you may hit a trigger (depending on your work place). So you may get a sickness absense review (SAR) meeting, to discuss any changes you need to be made to the workplace.

It's different work place to work place. I'm a union rep and I support members when they have SAR meetings.

In your case it's understandable and explainable. Work should have no issues with it. I'd make sure you take off as much time as you need to recover then get back to your normal duties. Worst thing you can do is go back ealry then have to be off again.

Make sure you get the sick notes and that work is aware of when you'll be back and any changes that may need when you get back as it's classes as long term sickness so you may want a phased return.

Work are being fine with me for the record it's more my mind and having never been in this situation before.

Follow the surgeon's recommendation.

How's the recovery?

I had knee arthroscopy so I'm just having to do a lot of laying down and keeping my leg elevated, got some rehab exercises and doing minimal walking.

Compared to a week ago there is an improvement but I think the issue is I would be sitting at a desk all day with my knee bent which I can't cope with yet.

Thanks for asking

poshrule_uk wrote:Work are being fine with me for the record it's more my mind and having never been in this situation before.

We cannot help others if we do not help ourselves.

If we fail to help ourselves and thus fail to help others to the best of our capacity, we do them a disservice and we also generate failures later down the line.

Being a hunter/gatherer type animal, human beings are geared towards immediate results/outcomes rather than long term results;- we can call this striving versus farming outcomes. If you are striving then you are always trying to reach your peak but never quite getting there because you don't have a long term strategy and this wears you out. It's counter-intuitive to the way we are built but also the culture of work we have created which focuses on constant results, all the time. Longer term planning tends to be left to people higher up the chain who just use employees as expendable resources to do the grunt work. If you are instead farming, then you're doing the work you need to do - such as helping your body recover and taking care of your health - so that you can continue harvesting and producing in the longer term. Unfortunately in most work cultures, you need to take this approach on yourself, which goes directly against the way you are wired or have been cultivated yourself, and that means advocating for your own health in a way that some shitty employers don't understand. But you do have legal protections for that sort of thing.

The reason you feel this way is because you are used to delivering short term results, repeatedly. Which can eventually lead to health problems, or it creates an expectation for the same pattern of delivery both in yourself, and from other's perspective (in terms of their expectations of you).

When instead we need to stop and cultivate something (like health) in order that we can keep producing, this can leave us feeling like we're not doing enough or we are inadequate. That's because the actions and responsibilities you have now are different to what you are used to and don't have the same results NOW, but they have a benefit in the future.

Another way of framing it is like this. Say for example you have a lot of bills to pay. Instead of increasing your income or managing your debt by selling off assets or reducing spending, you take out a high interest loan to pay off the debt and decide you will figure out the interest some other time. Over 5 to 10 years the interest becomes many times more than what you had originally borrowed. You enter this cycle of paying bills with borrowing that then creates debt, you have to work hard to service the debt over and over again and this continues on and on forever.

This is an example of a short term solution for an immediate result.

Alternatively you can manage the debt responsibly, increase income, sell off assets or reduce spending. It is much harder at the start, and it will seem like a lot of work to make these changes permanently, but it will save you money in the longer term and it ends the spiral of borrowing and then paying off debt and then borrowing again, when you werestill living paycheck to paycheck and had no control over your finances. Instead you are now actually be richer and have less stress over your finances. That is because of the work that needed to be done over the longer term to solve the problem.

So when you have two scenarios like this, the clanger is that the level of pain and stress you experience is about the same. The amount of work you have to do, the energy you have to expend, is about the same. The only difference is when that happens.

So while you may be uneasy about taking some time off work, which doesn't have to be unproductive time (you could work on your skills or training or take up a new hobby, practice meditation or yoga or find something else to enrich your life), by following the advice of your doctor you can return to work refreshed and having recovered fully from your condition. This is a farming process for a long term outcome, because it takes time and investment to change your approach and your process to achieve a long term outcome. If you go out on a limb and show up to work half able or not 100% recovered, you will get the immediate result (the striving outcome) of feeling loyal, dedicated and committed to your work initially, but then you will probably have to take more time off work in the future or you could become ill or worse off than you were the first time in the longer term.

The outcome is different but the energy expended and the total amount of energy available is the same. It's just entropy (2nd law of thermodynamics). It is expressed in different ways.

Due to the way most people are wired we look for the short term outcome and we want to be fit, happy and healthy NOW so we can fulfil the commitments we believe we have (even if we don't have them). It takes a big mindset shift to pay attention at least some of the time, or the better you get at this, most of the time, l the long term outcomes that can enrich your life, and - here's the thing - enable you to do the best job you can in the longer term.

You might experience a paradox of change where people are surprised that you aren't that guy that goes gallivanting into work despite the fact they are sick. They might say, "this isn't you, you're tougher than this!", indeed you may well tell yourself that. But that's largely because of the expectations you yourself have set by almost never taking any time off work and never being away for long periods of time (which is just a matter of perspective anyway - 30 days or 4 weeks is not a long period of time).

What truly matters is your performance in the longer term and your value to the organisation/company. If you focus on the value you have rather than the way you express that value, and want to keep delivering those results, you have to pay attention to your health and those moments/opportunities that you need for your body (and your mind) to recover so that you can do that.

It's very conflicting for a lot of people who are loyal and committed to their profession, and I also think there are some work culture issues. Anyway I hope this helps because it applies to so many things in life. Just ask, are you looking for immediate short term results or are you looking at the bigger picture. What will this situation look like in 3 months, 12 months, 3 years. The vast majority of the time people are looking for outcomes (they are outcome oriented) but aren't focusing on the process.

The process of your body healing doesn't have immediate results because this naturally takes time and there is nothing you (or anybody else) can do about that. If you ignore that then there is a negative entropy over the longer term where your body breaks down and stress causes further illness.

So the right thing to do is to take your doctors instruction so that you can return to your job without building up a subsequent debt of health problems. For employers that aren't aware of that fallacy, in my opinion they can go to hell, and there are some terrible employers out there, but you should look out for themself. You can have this conversation along the terms, of, say, "I need to take the advice of my doctor and remain off work for X days so that I can return to work in my full capacity. If I were to return now I would feel like I wasn't performing at my best, could create avoidable problems that a fit and well colleague could address fully in the meantime, and I could also potentially exacerbate X condition/problem and set my condition back further. I'll do x things to focus on my recovery in the meantime and I look forward to returning to work at full strength."

Green Gecko wrote:
poshrule_uk wrote:Work are being fine with me for the record it's more my mind and having never been in this situation before.

We cannot help others if we do not help ourselves.

If we fail to help ourselves and thus fail to help others to the best of our capacity, we do them a disservice and we also generate failures later down the line.

Being a hunter/gatherer type animal, human beings are geared towards immediate results/outcomes rather than long term results;- we can call this striving versus farming outcomes. If you are striving then you are always trying to reach your peak but never quite getting there because you don't have a long term strategy and this wears you out. It's counter-intuitive to the way we are built but also the culture of work we have created which focuses on constant results, all the time. Longer term planning tends to be left to people higher up the chain who just use employees as expendable resources to do the grunt work. If you are instead farming, then you're doing the work you need to do - such as helping your body recover and taking care of your health - so that you can continue harvesting and producing in the longer term. Unfortunately in most work cultures, you need to take this approach on yourself, which goes directly against the way you are wired or have been cultivated yourself, and that means advocating for your own health in a way that some shitty employers don't understand. But you do have legal protections for that sort of thing.

The reason you feel this way is because you are used to delivering short term results, repeatedly. Which can eventually lead to health problems, or it creates an expectation for the same pattern of delivery both in yourself, and from other's perspective (in terms of their expectations of you).

When instead we need to stop and cultivate something (like health) in order that we can keep producing, this can leave us feeling like we're not doing enough or we are inadequate. That's because the actions and responsibilities you have now are different to what you are used to and don't have the same results NOW, but they have a benefit in the future.

Another way of framing it is like this. Say for example you have a lot of bills to pay. Instead of increasing your income or managing your debt by selling off assets or reducing spending, you take out a high interest loan to pay off the debt and decide you will figure out the interest some other time. Over 5 to 10 years the interest becomes many times more than what you had originally borrowed. You enter this cycle of paying bills with borrowing that then creates debt, you have to work hard to service the debt over and over again and this continues on and on forever.

This is an example of a short term solution for an immediate result.

Alternatively you can manage the debt responsibly, increase income, sell off assets or reduce spending. It is much harder at the start, and it will seem like a lot of work to make these changes permanently, but it will save you money in the longer term and it ends the spiral of borrowing and then paying off debt and then borrowing again, when you werestill living paycheck to paycheck and had no control over your finances. Instead you are now actually be richer and have less stress over your finances. That is because of the work that needed to be done over the longer term to solve the problem.

So when you have two scenarios like this, the clanger is that the level of pain and stress you experience is about the same. The amount of work you have to do, the energy you have to expend, is about the same. The only difference is when that happens.

So while you may be uneasy about taking some time off work, which doesn't have to be unproductive time (you could work on your skills or training or take up a new hobby, practice meditation or yoga or find something else to enrich your life), by following the advice of your doctor you can return to work refreshed and having recovered fully from your condition. This is a farming process for a long term outcome, because it takes time and investment to change your approach and your process to achieve a long term outcome. If you go out on a limb and show up to work half able or not 100% recovered, you will get the immediate result (the striving outcome) of feeling loyal, dedicated and committed to your work initially, but then you will probably have to take more time off work in the future or you could become ill or worse off than you were the first time in the longer term.

The outcome is different but the energy expended and the total amount of energy available is the same. It's just entropy (2nd law of thermodynamics). It is expressed in different ways.

Due to the way most people are wired we look for the short term outcome and we want to be fit, happy and healthy NOW so we can fulfil the commitments we believe we have (even if we don't have them). It takes a big mindset shift to pay attention at least some of the time, or the better you get at this, most of the time, l the long term outcomes that can enrich your life, and - here's the thing - enable you to do the best job you can in the longer term.

You might experience a paradox of change where people are surprised that you aren't that guy that goes gallivanting into work despite the fact they are sick. They might say, "this isn't you, you're tougher than this!", indeed you may well tell yourself that. But that's largely because of the expectations you yourself have set by almost never taking any time off work and never being away for long periods of time (which is just a matter of perspective anyway - 30 days or 4 weeks is not a long period of time).

What truly matters is your performance in the longer term and your value to the organisation/company. If you focus on the value you have rather than the way you express that value, and want to keep delivering those results, you have to pay attention to your health and those moments/opportunities that you need for your body (and your mind) to recover so that you can do that.

It's very conflicting for a lot of people who are loyal and committed to their profession, and I also think there are some work culture issues. Anyway I hope this helps because it applies to so many things in life. Just ask, are you looking for immediate short term results or are you looking at the bigger picture. What will this situation look like in 3 months, 12 months, 3 years. The vast majority of the time people are looking for outcomes (they are outcome oriented) but aren't focusing on the process.

The process of your body healing doesn't have immediate results because this naturally takes time and there is nothing you (or anybody else) can do about that. If you ignore that then there is a negative entropy over the longer term where your body breaks down and stress causes further illness.

So the right thing to do is to take your doctors instruction so that you can return to your job without building up a subsequent debt of health problems. For employers that aren't aware of that fallacy, in my opinion they can go to hell, and there are some terrible employers out there, but you should look out for themself. You can have this conversation along the terms, of, say, "I need to take the advice of my doctor and remain off work for X days so that I can return to work in my full capacity. If I were to return now I would feel like I wasn't performing at my best, could create avoidable problems that a fit and well colleague could address fully in the meantime, and I could also potentially exacerbate X condition/problem and set my condition back further. I'll do x things to focus on my recovery in the meantime and I look forward to returning to work at full strength."

I definitely agree with that, I know my thoughts are self sabotaging and irrational. I will do the right thing by me and take the extra two weeks.

The Work Thread 2 - Get back to work!

Who is online

Affiliates