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39 minutes ago, tokyojoe said:

Her Indoors has just been made redundant. Brilliant management decision as she basically holds the place together.

All the wankers survive though.

 

Sorry to hear that. Made even more shitty by being just before Christmas. Fingers crossed she gets sorted quickly.

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3 minutes ago, General Dryness said:

It's all a load of shite. Just corporate box ticking so they can spout a load of shit about how they develop their staff.

 

Means fuck all in the long run. In my experience of course.

Couldn’t agree more mate, it’s complete and utter horseshit. At the end of every year I have to tell my line manager how boss I am and what my rating should be against my peers (most of whom work in different countries, so how the fuck am I expected to do that?)

 

It’s just complete nonsense.

 

End of year appraisal should be your boss telling you what you’re doing well and what you can do better, it’s completely the wrong way round in my industry.

 

We get rated against “our values” which are all noble ventures but the problem is we’re always getting fined by various regulators for fucking people over. You couldn’t write it really, it’s corporate bellendary at its finest.

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30 minutes ago, Brownie said:

Couldn’t agree more mate, it’s complete and utter horseshit. At the end of every year I have to tell my line manager how boss I am and what my rating should be against my peers (most of whom work in different countries, so how the fuck am I expected to do that?)

 

It’s just complete nonsense.

 

End of year appraisal should be your boss telling you what you’re doing well and what you can do better, it’s completely the wrong way round in my industry.

 

We get rated against “our values” which are all noble ventures but the problem is we’re always getting fined by various regulators for fucking people over. You couldn’t write it really, it’s corporate bellendary at its finest.

At my old place they installed a new CEO who was from a banking sector, so he decided to apply 'comparative performance'  to everyone. 

 

Basically that means for every team, someone has to be outstanding, most have to be average, and someone HAS to be shit, even if you're all doing well. 

 

It was a farce. You can measure performance in banking because it's easy to see who's made the most money, but this was things like graphic designers and shit. Loads ended up getting pissed off and leaving. Managers used to say you had to 'stand out in the crowd', so you had people joining fucking gospel choirs and Christmas focus groups and shit rather than being sat at their desk doing their jobs.

 

When I left the boss said she was going to give me our team's 'failing' grade, because I was leaving anyway and it means she wouldn't have to give it to someone else. 

 

One of the biggest problems in our society is that the people at the top who believe in free markets and private sector efficiency have undoubtedly never working in an actual business, at least not below boardroom level, because if they did they'd know it's all bollocks.

 

In all the businesses I've worked in, everyone was just pretending. The company pretended it gave a fuck about you, the manager pretended they gave a fuck, you pretended you gave a fuck about the company, but nobody gave a fuck. All we wanted was to not get laid off, the managers just wanted you to not make them look shit so they could keep their jobs, and the company just tolerated you until they could either fuck you off for a robot or sell up. 

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Exactly that.  My boss is the Marlo stanfield of bosses. I don't mean he kills people and shoves them in vacants. Just that everything he does is about work, so fucking ruthless no wasted motion.

He even showed up at one other managers dad's funeral. He ( the guy who's dad had died) thought it was sincere. I knew it's just to make him look good on the "people skills" side

 

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4 hours ago, Section_31 said:

At my old place they installed a new CEO who was from a banking sector, so he decided to apply 'comparative performance'  to everyone. 

 

Basically that means for every team, someone has to be outstanding, most have to be average, and someone HAS to be shit, even if you're all doing well. 

 

It was a farce. You can measure performance in banking because it's easy to see who's made the most money, but this was things like graphic designers and shit. Loads ended up getting pissed off and leaving. Managers used to say you had to 'stand out in the crowd', so you had people joining fucking gospel choirs and Christmas focus groups and shit rather than being sat at their desk doing their jobs.

 

When I left the boss said she was going to give me our team's 'failing' grade, because I was leaving anyway and it means she wouldn't have to give it to someone else. 

 

One of the biggest problems in our society is that the people at the top who believe in free markets and private sector efficiency have undoubtedly never working in an actual business, at least not below boardroom level, because if they did they'd know it's all bollocks.

 

In all the businesses I've worked in, everyone was just pretending. The company pretended it gave a fuck about you, the manager pretended they gave a fuck, you pretended you gave a fuck about the company, but nobody gave a fuck. All we wanted was to not get laid off, the managers just wanted you to not make them look shit so they could keep their jobs, and the company just tolerated you until they could either fuck you off for a robot or sell up. 

That’s exactly how it is in my work. I’m lucky that i’m surrounded by mostly like-minded people who realise that it’s all just a big game. I work in the financial sector and it’s exactly as you say; the senior leadership preach about values yet their decision making is entirely based on profitability over anything else.

 

They preach about personal development, to the point where senior managers who are on around £75k a year sit at their desks organising raffles and cake stalls as opposed to actually doing anything tangible to justify their salary, just so that they are placed higher on the performance curve that you described.

 

It’s farcical but it pays the bills.

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Ooh this appraisal business sounds just like my work.

Every year we have to write our end of year comments earlier and earlier. I’ve just found out we have to have them in by 3rd December!! Even worse I only work Monday-  Wednesday and I’ve booked the Tuesday and Wednesday off the week before! So I have to do mine by 26th November.

Worse still we were told last week we’re being made redundant next year. Between April and June is all we know so far. To say my heart won’t be in it is an understatement.

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10 hours ago, Anubis said:

The longer I’ve worked in an office the more I regret not paying attention in woodwork and metalwork classes, so that I could upcycle furniture and sell it to people working in offices who have more money than sense.

This, approximately. 

 

If I could talk to my 16 year old self I'd tell myself to get a trade. I know guys who didnt give a fuck at school but went on and did their apprenticeships. They're currently doing a fuck sight better than I am.

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Another for the 'get me off the corporate/office bus' here. I'm sick of it and recognise the shit you all mention in my own place.

 

I'll just add in the notional attempts to address mental health in a lot of workplaces. Every so often we get an email about mental health, with so little compassion and practical advice it borders on pathetic. What I find interesting is that people don't want to seem to address issues such as working too many hours, not being paid/rewarded enough, being exhausted, uninteresting work, job insecurity, etc, etc. There is a poster on the wall though, if we fancy doing a bit of colouring in.

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I have my development review next week. In the six months since my last one Mrs nephew died,  my dad's been diagnosed as terminally ill with cancer,  he's nearly died at one point due to sepsis,  my mum's been told she needs an aortic heart valve replacement , my dogs dropped dead.

 

Add to this work and money stress I've done fuck all on my "plan "

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Another one being made redundant here. We got about 2 months notice, about 2 weeks after my 10 year anniversary, so at least I get that extra year for my payout. So in December I will be jobless and I detest applying for jobs, interviews are not too bad but the CV and covering letter writing sucks camel dick and is partially why I have been at the same place for 10 years. 

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3 hours ago, suzy said:

Worse still we were told last week we’re being made redundant next year. Between April and June is all we know so far. To say my heart won’t be in it is an understatement.

 

12 minutes ago, Remmie said:

Another one being made redundant here. We got about 2 months notice, about 2 weeks after my 10 year anniversary, so at least I get that extra year for my payout. So in December I will be jobless and I detest applying for jobs...

 

 

Hope you can both get sorted quickly. 

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Sorry to hear about redundancies, hope everyone gets sorted.

 

I’ve been dodging the redundancy bullet for years, i’m expecting that it will get me in the end.

 

These big companies don’t give a flying fuck about the local communities they base themselves in, if there’s cheaper resource to be had in India or the Phillipines then it’s onto the scrapheap we go...

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2 hours ago, Karl_b said:

Another for the 'get me off the corporate/office bus' here. I'm sick of it and recognise the shit you all mention in my own place.

 

I'll just add in the notional attempts to address mental health in a lot of workplaces. Every so often we get an email about mental health, with so little compassion and practical advice it borders on pathetic. What I find interesting is that people don't want to seem to address issues such as working too many hours, not being paid/rewarded enough, being exhausted, uninteresting work, job insecurity, etc, etc. There is a poster on the wall though, if we fancy doing a bit of colouring in.

Yeah this has started popping up in our place as well. Posters all over the place with advice (which condradicts the culture of the place) and special mental health first aiders, who haven’t got a clue how to operate Microsoft applications, never mind understand something as complex as mental health.

 

All great PR for the company though and something for individuals to add to their personal development, so everyone is happy (apart from poor Dave who is having a break down and being told by mental health first aiders to stop checking his emails at home).

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Thanks for good wishes all and sorry for the others in the same boat. Not many jobs for life nowadays- I’ve been there 17 years so the thought of interviews etc scares me.

oh yeah my place likes to go on about mental health as well , what a joke! 

 

Onwards and upwards hopefully 

 

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18 hours ago, tokyojoe said:

Her Indoors has just been made redundant. Brilliant management decision as she basically holds the place together.

All the wankers survive though.

Really sorry to hear that. What a kick in the teeth. I hope things work themselves out for her

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