Top 10 ways to get fired or get a raise

It looks like the economy is in an official slowdown and some might even call it a recession (but it isn't officially that yet). Whatever it is, Companies are looking to tighten the old belt even further. Back when I worked in corporate Amerika, I noticed that there was a definite pattern to both the people that were getting let go (myself included) and the people that were getting raises. Some people are looking to climb that corporate ladder, while others are looking to survive in corporate cultures that at best could be characterized as the RAT RACE.

For both of you I offer the top 10 ways to get fired/Pastureized/Overtime OR given a promotion/raise/Bonus. Someone asked what pastureized meant. I'm refering to the pasture mentioned in the phrase 'put out to pasture' which of course means you're not particularly productive, but you're kept around anyway. You have not chance of promotion and are probably forgotten for raises, but at least you have a job. Bear in mind that I give you these elements with the assumption that your boss is a good boss that knows what he's doing, and not a self serving Id monkey. Also understand that I'm not going to mention breaking specific company rules but you'll get sacked if you are making out with your bosses secretary while embezzling funds from the company coffers.

To be clear Fired for my list is the same as Layed off . Besides, it feels exactly the same. There will also be Pastured meaning no chance of advancement or raise, and Overtime. If you work a salary position, that's called free work. On the good end, we have Promotion, Raise or Bonus. They are all pretty much self evident.

10. FIRED - Don't do your job. While this one seems obvious, it really isn't always true. In fact, sometimes you will see people that NEVER do their job and still thrive within the company, but lets put it this way. If you don't do your job, they have a REASON to fire you and you never want that. The sad thing is that you are sometimes not given the tools to DO your job. This won't change things. If you can't do it, you won't be there long.






9. PROMOTION - Do your job well - I've never quite understood this one. You are hired to do a job and if you do it well, you get promoted. Quite possibly to a job that you don't do well. This is called the Peter Principle. Originated because Christ (who was perfect) told Peter (who is decidedly NOT perfect) that he would be the Rock upon which he would build his chruch. Talk about high expectations. Giving a person a promotion to a different job because they did the one they are good at well, is a lot like asking a fish to fly because it swims so well.











8. PASTURIZED - Start trashing your fellow employees to your boss - If and when you get some face time with the boss. it is NEVER a good idea to start trashing your co-workers. Some people actually do this and think it will get them a lift by cutting down those around them. The truth is, it's not a good idea to do it with your fellow co-workers either. It will always come back to bite you. It may not get you fired by itself. But when layoffs come around it seems like the complainers are always the first to be 'encouraged to seek other opportunities







7. PROMOTION - Build up your fellow employees - The opposite can tend to be true as well. People that build up their fellow employees are viewed as team players and people willing to compliment others instead of looking for compliments themselves. These people are also the favorites of people to work with.












6. FIRED - Openly display that you don't have anything better to do - This is the opposite of #9. You do your job so well that you have oodles of free time on your hands, so you start wandering around the company causing trouble. I myself have been guilty of this one. You don't really want more WORK, but you are bored to tears. If you couple this one with one of the other fired elements, you can see yourself on the out list really fast.









5. RAISE - Volunteer - Once again, obvious, and yet so many people don't realize it is possible. Sometimes through one or another events there is a whole other job that needs to be done becomes available. sometimes that job will be better than the one you have, and sometimes it will be worse, but puts you on track for a better position.















4. FIRED - Bug people - Hey! they can't fire me just because they are a bunch of morons! I do my job! All this might be true, but the fact is, you're kind of a jerk and people don't like you. If you are not liked by your co-workers, you are likely in for a slow death. If you bug your boss, you can probably speed up this process. Here is a truth of business. Company rules are for people that break them openly and for people you don't like. Otherwise, if you are liked and work well with others, low end rule infractions will be overlooked. If you aren't liked, mind your P's and Q's, because only following the rules to a T will save you.



3. BONUS - Save the Day! - While it is not actually smart for a manger to be rewarding company hero's It happens more often than not. Why shouldn't they reward the hero? Because usually the hero holds back until he can save the day and rewarding THAT effort with anything but manditory time off will only reinforce that behavior. But usually it will result in a low grade bonus of some sort.











2. OVERTIME - Just be around close to a deadline - It's interesting that business seems to think that you should work overtime in the case of an emergency by virtue of it's need. Some companies will pay you for this overtime, other companies think that you should give the company the gift of your time in exchange for nothing. After all, they employ you, you should be on your knees thanking your maker for such a generous institution as to take your free time with their 'emergencies'.





1. RAISE - Work for a different company - I've always gotten my best raises by changing jobs. I've never understood this about companies. Once you work for a company, they will have a company policy (read EXCUSE) that says you can only have a maximum percentage of a raise. I'd be willing to buy that company policy if they agreed that they would only hire new people based on the salaries of the current employees, but then they wouldn't be able to hire anyone would they. The fact is, many companies have this interesting self view that they are in fact the best place to work in the known universe and you would be crazy to leave for more money. Which is why you can leave for more money. Remember, a company is ultimately only as loyal to you as much as they need you. The instant they don't need you, you become redundant and layed off. You are the safest if you ALWAYS think in terms of what skills you have that you are not being compensated for. When you find the job that will appreciate those skills. Jump. It's that simple.

As always thanks for reading! Tell your friends!

top 10 ways we LOOK like we are working

Ok, let me start of by saying, if you are management, this is all just satire and YOUR employees don't do this at all. YOUR employees are practically perfect in every way. They take your assignments and work just a little bit over their daily time completely and in a single minded fashion complete the tasks you have given them. I think I can hear them whistle while they work as well.

Are they gone yet? ok. According to studies, the AVERAGE productive time out of an 8 hour day in an office is roughly 5 hours. (It's actually lower, but I'm rounding up). This means we spend 3 hours a day doing something that isn't work, but is easily mistaken for it. This is just in case you've missed on some methods of loafing.

10. Meeting gone wrong. This one might not even count, and yet it's not productive. First. Meetings as they are are usually a waste of time. They are typically 10% planning and 90% finger pointing. This depends on the corporate culture. At the end of the meeting, the conversation can turn to the weekends events, and the funny thing is, it can come from management. Usually we want to get out of there and talk to our friends about stuff. Since management doesn't have a lot of friends, they do it at the end of meetings.



9. 5 minute question - A great time waster. You have a work buddy that you would like to talk to, but you don't have a reason. well, you build up some kind of question to 'verify' of 'get your ducks in a row' and ask this buddy. the answer is 5 minutes, of course the BS afterwards takes about 35 minutes and is usually capped off by a reiteration of what was said in the first 5 minutes.







8. Good old Clip Board - It's an old movie axiom. If you look like you have a sense of purpose and you are walking quickly, nobody will know that you are not going to any meeting at all, but instead you are getting in 5 healthy laps around the office campus. It's even more effective if you have a grumpy look on your face.







7. 2 hour lunch - the key to this time waster is you can't do it often and you can't eat lunch at the same time every day. once in a while you need to work through lunch to show the boss what a dedicated employee you are. your average? 1.43 hours at lunch.










6. Bio-Break - This one is great but it takes timing and experience to use consistently. Just take a good book or magazine to the can. If you time it right, you can miss one of those yawner meetings. Word to the wise, if you fall asleep in the toilet, you will have dead legs and your snores will probably be recorded and put up on U-Tube.






5. Office Supplies / groceries - For the secretary. Secretary's work hard and you know that they are the organizational geniuses behind any good executive. As such, they can certainly go buy some office supplies and while they are at it, the weeks groceries. Of course they can't buy anything perishable unless home is between the store they go to and the office. hmmmm...








4. Solitaire - I put this one in a separate category because it's in a class all it's own. When windows first came on the business scene solitaire was there to make sure that anyone using that machine would be diverted from the buggy microsoft office software. Ahh the memories. Now a days, there are a LOT more diversions than solitaire and microsoft has put bigger numbers on their software.







3. Talk to the Boss - you walk in, you close the door. Boss, I really just wanted an informal how am I doing. This does so many things for you it's amazing 1. you look like a real 'go getter' and you are getting face time with the boss. 2. you are NOT working! 3. This meeting may actually give you some information that you need about your performance. You can only do this once a month or so, and you have to cough up new reasons to talk. If you are not possessed of the gift of gab this won't be one for you.








2. Time - Shaving time in your favor is a real good way to get your share of that 3 hours a day, and this one is Aces. you make sure you come in at about 8:40 then stay till 5:30. you look like you are staying late and yet you are shaving 10 minutes. You can adjust this play to your best benefit depending on when your boss gets in and leaves.










1. Internet "research" - This used to be a lot easier. Back before offices would completely spy on all of your internet activity you could look completely busy clicking and studying the SI Swimsuit issue online or paying your bills or looking up old high school flames, whatever. The moment someone slides by, you just bring up that REAL work window and no one is the wiser. In fact, there is an invention that is made for this, it's a foot pedal screen switcher. you plug it into your computer and when you see someone coming, you don't have to go to that embarrassing alt-tab, you just click your pedal with your feet and viola! you have the hard at work screen up in front of you. SWEET!

There you have it. I'm sure there are more, but those are the first best 10 that came into mind. As always, thanks for reading!

Yeah, I know it's not my strongest work, you can't hit a home run every time.

Why managers are all asses

When I say that managers are all asses, what I really mean to say is that eventually they will all become asses. New, fresh faced, naive managers of course do not count. This is were I fit in for a while. I post this blog because of my opinions on a prior blog written by my friend and cousin Joseph Dewey (we are distantly related through my Grandmother also named Dewey).

This is the Blog: All managers are jerks <-- This isn't what it's really titled, but I've decided to keep my swearing down to a minimum and it's companion piece: All managers are jerks part II .

Here is the problem. Managers are jerks for the same reason that people talking on behalf of God are jerks. No matter how cool they are, eventually they are going to tell you to do something that you don't want to hear and tell you to do something that you don't want to do, and you will take it and do it, but you won't like it. That's when the manager turns from 'he's ok' to the butt of all authority based jokes.

I have been a manager for about 9 months. In this period of time I've decided that I've learned everything I need to know about managing people. Because of that I've decided that there is a definite reason that all managers are jerks or going to be jerks.

Time

Yep, that's the reason. Nothing more. In my stint as a failed manager, I will say that I went into the position with one extraordinarily misplaced assumption; If you treat people decently then they in turn will be decent to you This is a credo that I've tried to live by my entire life. Much of the time this requires TACT. Unfortunately as a manager I've come to realize that this is not at all true. Many people will in fact return your kindness with a knife in the back. More about that at a different time, or maybe never.

Tact is an interesting skill that I've developed over time. It's the conversational art of getting a difficult point across while simultaneously not making the target feel bad. If you are good at it, you never have to lie. If you are bad at it, you lie all the time. For example:

Aunt Edna has a hideous hat that makes her look like a totem pole. She has worn this hat to the symphony much to everyones amusement.
Bad tact: Edna that hat looks so good on you! It's wonderful!
Good Tact: Edna, you're choice in hats is second to none.

Bad tact was that it was a lie. You didn't believe it and neither did she. Good tact allowed her to think the best of what you were saying but leaving room for misunderstanding that you will leave at that.

The problem is that in either case you haven't solved the problem of Edna's hat. In management, it's different. You have to tell someone that they reek of body oder and that they need to shower on a DAILY basis. If you go the tactful route, it will take you about 1/2 hour to deliver this message, and they will feel bad, but they may not dislike you as a result. If you go the direct route "Hey Frank, listen, everyone has been complaining that you stink and you need to get bathed EVERY day". Frank's feelings will be hurt and he will think you are a jerk for saying it like that. HOWEVER you have saved 25 minutes and more importantly you got your point across in no uncertain terms.

Time is money, especially in management. So eventually, managers will tend towards the abrupt and rude methodology not because it's a power trip, but because it saves them precious time. The problem of course is that they can and often do go too far in the other direction and seem to take a sadistic pleasure in the bad news they are delivering to you. They don't have time for hurt feelings etc. If you want to work for someone nice, get a job from your mom.