Work colleagues

[IrishBhoy]

On 19/06/2019 at 14:41, KnightswoodBear said:

Generally as you move up the ladder the amount of arseholes/incompetents increases dramatically.

Unbelievable how true this is. 

When I worked on the tools I believed the guys upstairs knew the job inside out. Now that I’m part of the upstairs I realise they are absolutely incompetent. Being able to talk nonsense in a confident manner gets you a long way in most places. 

[GordonD]

8 hours ago, IrishBhoy said:

Unbelievable how true this is. 

When I worked on the tools I believed the guys upstairs knew the job inside out. Now that I’m part of the upstairs I realise they are absolutely incompetent. Being able to talk nonsense in a confident manner gets you a long way in most places. 

 

[Cardinal Richelieu]

Not a week goes by without a "How are we doing?" type survey getting sent to everyone in the work. 

However, Today's email wasn't a survey. It was an email to whet our appetites - to inform us about a NEW survey that's coming next Monday. It was even accompanied by the hashtag #threedaystogo

Yes, we're now getting a countdown to surveys. The opening line informed us that the survey is BACK (I honestly didn't think it had gone away). And now, instead of giving scores from 1-5, we get to use SMILEY FACES. 

Haud me back. 

[Jacksgranda]

6 hours ago, Cardinal Richelieu said:

Not a week goes by without a "How are we doing?" type survey getting sent to everyone in the work. 

However, Today's email wasn't a survey. It was an email to whet our appetites - to inform us about a NEW survey that's coming next Monday. It was even accompanied by the hashtag #threedaystogo

Yes, we're now getting a countdown to surveys. The opening line informed us that the survey is BACK (I honestly didn't think it had gone away). And now, instead of giving scores from 1-5, we get to use SMILEY FACES. 

Haud me back. 

[Sergeant Wilson]

22 minutes ago, Tynierose said:

 relatively normal people.

Was right with you until that bit.

[Honest_Man#1]

19 hours ago, IrishBhoy said:

Unbelievable how true this is. 

When I worked on the tools I believed the guys upstairs knew the job inside out. Now that I’m part of the upstairs I realise they are absolutely incompetent. Being able to talk nonsense in a confident manner gets you a long way in most places. 

There is a balance though that a lot of people on the front line completely fail/refuse to understand/accept. Management often won’t know the fundamentals of the day to day jobs themselves, but do a lot of stuff (e.g. client relationship management, financial management) that the front line teams don’t have to worry about at all.

The team I have at work are great and definitely know far more about the trades they have and use than me, but I’m sure if I left them to run things that they’d probably spark out the client on day 3 or bankrupt the contract within weeks through relentless spend.

[supermik]

1 hour ago, Honest_Man#1 said:

 

The team I have at work are great and definitely know far more about the trades they have and use than me, 

So, basically, there are a load of people at your work that know a great deal more than you about your job and you are in charge of them!!

Think I will stick to nicking the odd bit of cheese rather than a weekly wage.

 

[Sergeant Wilson]

1 minute ago, supermik said:

So, basically, there are a load of people at your work that know a great deal more than you about your job and you are in charge of them!!

Think I will stick to nicking the odd bit of cheese rather than a weekly wage.

 

Bosses get paid monthly...because we can budget.

[supermik]

11 minutes ago, Sergeant Wilson said:

Bosses get paid monthly...because we can budget.

Well some folks should budget on a weekly wage as they would not have lasted a month with my company.

[IrishBhoy]

2 hours ago, Honest_Man#1 said:

There is a balance though that a lot of people on the front line completely fail/refuse to understand/accept. Management often won’t know the fundamentals of the day to day jobs themselves, but do a lot of stuff (e.g. client relationship management, financial management) that the front line teams don’t have to worry about at all.

The team I have at work are great and definitely know far more about the trades they have and use than me, but I’m sure if I left them to run things that they’d probably spark out the client on day 3 or bankrupt the contract within weeks through relentless spend.

Would agree that the men on the tools wouldn’t last long in that type of environment and doing those type of jobs. 

My current company build and repair pumps for off shore rigs and I could walk up to the procurement manager with a drawing and he wouldn’t be able to point to one component and tell me what it is. Project managers are the same, they might be brilliant when talking on the phone and dealing with customers but when they need to know anything technical they will go and ask the guys on the shop floor. If you are taking a wage of 70k you shouldn’t be asking guys on 35k for information about the product. 

[Raidernation]

What sort/make of pumps?
Used to be my wheelhouse til I took up teaching

[Honest_Man#1]

2 hours ago, supermik said:

So, basically, there are a load of people at your work that know a great deal more than you about your job and you are in charge of them!!

Think I will stick to nicking the odd bit of cheese rather than a weekly wage.

 

No, quite the opposite - they know pretty much f**k all about my job and how to do it. They would struggle with an excel spreadsheet. 

They are far better than me at the technical bit, and I’m far better than them at the management side. They’re happy coming in bang on time in the morning and leaving bang on time at night every day, so fair play to them and as I say I know they’re good at their jobs. A lot of technical front line staff I’ve met have had a “management do nothing and get big wages for f**k all” attitude, but fail to appreciate the numerous things they do that keep the place running (my team actually do get that management do a lot, but I’ve met plenty who just refuse to accept it).

Edited June 22, 2019 by Honest_Man#1

[IrishBhoy]

39 minutes ago, Raidernation said:

What sort/make of pumps?
Used to be my wheelhouse til I took up teaching

All different to be honest. The contract is with companies like Shell, ConocoPhillips and the like to service all pumps on their rig. Weirs and Sulzer are the main larger pumps but also repair Rams, submersibles and smaller centrifugals. I was about 15 years on the tools working on them so I suppose that’s why I get annoyed when I need to sit in meetings with daft uni graduates who know nothing about our product. 

[IrishBhoy]

7 minutes ago, Honest_Man#1 said:

 A lot of technical front line staff I’ve met have had a “management do nothing and get big wages for f**k all” attitude, but fail to appreciate the numerous things they do that keep the place running (my team actually do get that management do a lot, but I’ve met plenty who just refuse to accept it).

This is still my attitude tbf. Appreciate all companies will be different but I don’t see how some of these people can justify their wages  

[Cardinal Richelieu]

2 hours ago, oaksoft said:

Fucking hell, I'd be dusting my CV within the hour.

Joking apart, why do people work at companies like this?

Serious question.Life is too short surely?

I never said it was a bad company to work for. Yeah - that survey thing is a bit of a joke but there a lots of other benefits ... e.g. decent money, private healthcare and of course, working from home. 

 

[Hillonearth]

On the subject of surveys, we've recently been hit with an online survey for what we want to do for the work Christmas lunch.

In June.

No idea why, because like every year it'll end up being in some middle-range hotel where you get packed in like sardines and dished out turkey for three times what you'd consider paying for it in a restaurant....like you'd ever order turkey anyway.

I'm guessing the movers and shakers are panicking a bit on account of last year's being embarrassingly poorly attended - it's now down to just higher management who were pretty much told to go and a smattering of those middle-aged wifies who have zero going on outside of work, go out twice a year and for whom this is the highlight of their social calendar.

[parsforlife]

I know they’re good at their jobs.

This is absolutely the key part here. I don’t think we can expect management to know everything about what their staff do day to day but if your going to be semi-competent then you need to have a fair understanding that you don’t know everything and that it’s worth listening to those that do(about that specific thing), even if they are lower down than you. Far too many try to implement things based on their 10% knowledge or use that 10% to try and act like that’s all you need to know.

On the subject of surveys, we've recently been hit with an online survey for what we want to do for the work Christmas lunch.
In June.
No idea why, because like every year it'll end up being in some middle-range hotel where you get packed in like sardines and dished out turkey for three times what you'd consider paying for it in a restaurant....like you'd ever order turkey anyway.
I'm guessing the movers and shakers are panicking a bit on account of last year's being embarrassingly poorly attended - it's now down to just higher management who were pretty much told to go and a smattering of those middle-aged wifies who have zero going on outside of work, go out twice a year and for whom this is the highlight of their social calendar.

Hopefully there’s an option for ‘staying away from you c***s’

I’m deeply suspicious of anyone involved on a social committee.

Trying desperately to arrange a curry Night for 8 weeks time and then chat about it like it’s a big event.

No I won’t be going, I can go out whenever I fancy with people I actually like with minimal notice, find some actual friends you weirdo.

[Melanius Mullarkey]

Been in an open plan office for about 3 weeks now. Mostly enjoying it so far to be honest as most colleagues are decent and like a laugh. 

Working up to getting everyone to the pub at lunchtimes next week.

[Bairnardo]

Been in an open plan office for about 3 weeks now. Mostly enjoying it so far to be honest as most colleagues are decent and like a laugh. 
Working up to getting everyone to the pub at lunchtimes next week.

[Honest_Man#1]

18 minutes ago, parsforlife said:

 

This is absolutely the key part here. I don’t think we can expect management to know everything about what their staff do day to day but if your going to be semi-competent then you need to have a fair understanding that you don’t know everything and that it’s worth listening to those that do(about that specific thing), even if they are lower down than you. Far too many try to implement things based on their 10% knowledge or use that 10% to try and act like that’s all you need to know.

 

Spot on. The technical knowledge provided by front line workers is key to management succeeding. I’ve seen places with front line workers who don’t like management so don’t help them out as “they should know the job inside out” who then complain when decisions are made that don’t suit them, when if they’d helped in the first place it would have been helping themselves.

I’ve also seen places where management don’t have a clue but refuse to accept help from the people with the technical knowledge, which is criminal, and leads to shocking decisions and a bad split between front line and management.