Corporate Overlords Still Puzzled: Why aren’t Beatings Improving Morale?
As I read HBR, Forbes, and Inc., I’m stunned by the stupidity of these people, er, terrible work situations that everyone tolerated for so long because they had to.
Can I be blunt? This photo is too large, but everyone’s worked for this guy (or gal) in some form or another. Sometimes, he’s just the vibe of the place.
He considers himself a tough guy who pulls no punches, but to you, he’s just the exhausting, delusional dick you tolerate because you need health insurance.
You know that any hint that you consider yourself a human being is a death sentence to your career, and also, that he will steal credit for anything good that you do. At the same time, there is also nothing you can do to get a shred of credit, from him, to get yourself into a better situation at work. Trying to get a new job? Forget about a reference from this person. He considers leaving a betrayal and he’ll shit all over you.
He’ll remember your name, internally, however, when he makes a huge mistake — which you tried to prevent (he called you “negative” and “not a team player”). He needs someone to blame, and you weren’t going anywhere.
That’s how you learned to STFU and keep your head down if you’d like to keep your health insurance for the spouse and children you can’t mention you have (particularly if you are female).
If you have a health condition that you really need the insurance for, make sure they never find out at this place! You’ll be accused of driving up the company insurance premiums, faking illness for sympathy or time off, or exploiting reasonable accommodation policy, before there’s a sudden ‘layoff’ and you’re the only person inexplicably ‘laid off.’
What kind of fool were you, to feel so lucky when you accepted this wonderful position? You’d actually felt special to be chosen.
Well, the process of getting a job is harrowing and, in the professional world, a suited version of WipeOut.
First, you have to have about 25 versions of a resume to upload, which is pretty much useless, but you must have one, specific to the type of job that you’re applying for.
Then, you have to have a professional-grade LinkedIn profile with a picture that makes you look gorgeous but not HOT, with marketing-firm level bio and descriptions of your work, not to mention headshot that has hair and makeup done by a pro, otherwise you look like the hostage you are seeking to become. (You’ll still get unsolicited sexual messages constantly, even if you are a gross old bag like me).
Again, all of this is useless, because each corporate overlord and it’s enforcement department of flying-monkey henchmen, I mean, HR department, takes about 2 hours per application to re-type all of this into super-custom forms when you apply: upon clicking ‘submit’ — and apt turn of phrase, as it turns out, because BOY ARE YOU EVER GONNA, you agree to a background check that allows them to approach anyone who ever met you and ask them literally anything (read it — it says that!) and a credit check, and sometimes, a physical exam and bloodwork. For the length of your ‘relationship’ with them.
This is before they ever speak to you, which, they probably won't. They actually want YOUR BLOOD.
This is merely the cost of consideration.
They will likely never reply (beyond an auto reply), but that corporation now has permission to dig into your finances, scope out your house, talk to people you went to high school with, look into your background, and take your blood.
Creeps.
The pandemic changed some things, but mainly, it changed how risky it is to go through all of this for very little money. Because wages are very, very low, in fact, economists use the expression ‘artificially depressed’ for almost 3 decades. Many people, particularly women, who as we know get paid less, were working for benefits.
I identify as a woman, and I’ve always felt that my bosses felt like my “real boss” was my husband (they say things like “talk this over with your husband”) and my “first job” is taking care of him and his house.
If I’m being very honest, I believe my husband and many of my family members on both sides subconsciously believe this as well (although they would never say it, and aren’t aware of this, it’s just sort of a baked-in, systemic expectation regarding ‘wives’): me losing a job is just not the devestating tragedy that him losing a job is.
Because, you know. Men losing jobs is so HORRIBLE, but women…eh. It’s not so central to everyone else’s conception of my identity. How I feel about it…well, I’ll get over it while I’m cleaning toilets at home with all my newfound spare time. I can finally write or pick up a new hobby. Get some exercise, become more attractive.
Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise.
I saw yet another article yesterday in Slate.com (and also on Inc.) about how flabbergasted HR and hiring managers are that interviewees are ‘ghosting’ interviews and not showing up on first days.
It reminds me of parents who are depressed when their 40 year old children are successful without them. “I liked it so much better when little Susie couldn’t poo without me! She was so much more controllable then. We used to be so close!” They mourn, with the self awareness of a Trump.
These are the same self-important hiring managers who have been blowing off desperate applicants who really need income, have risked jobs they already had to interview, have waited patiently for phone interviews that never rang, Zooms that never Zoomed, or have interviewed 3 times for the same position and then never even gotten a rejection letter for over a DECADE — since before the first recession, really…and I’m certain fellow applicants will join me with an incredulous “Isn’t that how YOU conduct business, and have for years?” or an even more hearty, and much ruder, “Boo hoo, go screw yourself.”
I am not moved by their tears, which are only for themselves, their self-pity at having to do work they feel is beneath them, and the impotent rage that they have no one to scare into submission. Their underlings, the ones left, have agency now, and they hate it.
Because, here’s the thing: as with all malignant narcissists, or inherently self-serving systems, they don’t change, but resist furiously when the supply is either used up or gone. Once the bloodbag figures out all they’ll ever be is supply, they have a choice, and they make it.
(If you’re a fan of Mad Max Fury Road, which I hope you are, you’ll recall that the bloodbag is the healthy one being used for personal gain).
Like Nux (not a bloodbag, but someone else being exploited), from Mad Max, Fury Road, we focus on the person we love, and make a sacrifice, and scream, “Witness Me!” before plunging into something awful — or, we leave, and refuse to play the no-win, shitty game, until the rules are changed.
Some of us work for change. Some of us just work. Someone has to do it.
Even someone who starts out with the mentality of a child, like Nux, wants a meaningful life. We want meaningful work. Working in these bullshit jobs, compressing ourselves all day, for these narcissists and bad systems, feels awful.
Can the rules change? Will we ever have fair wages and healthcare that’s not tied to a really shitty job, where corporate overlords demand our blood and credit history and lives be perfect and that we not be human beings with actual families, and all that entails before they “risk” taking the best hours of the best days of the best years of our lives from us, after we’ve invested at least $400,000 into a 4-year degree that now somehow isn’t enough to get a ‘good’ job?
Why is it like this? Why have my bosses always ‘managed’ by disinterest and neglect followed by periods of micromanagement? Why do all of them like to come out of their offices and look over the workers at their desks as if they’re lords of the manor, counting the serfs, slaves, cattle or something?
Do they know we can see them and that’s gross, anxiety producing behavior, particularly since many of us are forced to sit with our backs to them in an awful open-floor plan cubicle farm? Why the open cubicle farm? For torturing? Do male bosses know it’s transparent that they seat the hottest women nearest to their office for cheap thrills and treat them differently? Do female bosses know their misogyny is just as transparent and it’s clear they prefer men and Rottweiler-type women who keep the ‘complicated’ but often correct people at bay?
(“It’s just simpler” the older ones have said out loud, less recently, about working with men. Of course it is! They get paid more, treated as if they’re smart and important, and as if he’s a hero if they go to a kids ball game or school thing, not as if they’re shirking work and doing mom bullshit! Gimme a break).
You don’t need a big government survey to help out these corporate asshats, I’ll tell you for free. Right now.
Hire enough people to do the work, even if people take earned time, or sick time, which is also earned and part of their pay, and pay them actual living wages. Separate healthcare from our jobs, so we can leave it if it’s a bad fit, to something that’s a better fit. Happier for everyone. Address the leadership gap — having an elderly Boomer manage 20-somethings without this is going go be awful, you know this, right? Also, an extremely productive widget-maker does not a manager make. Have a no-jerks policy.
Quite honestly, there are some people I’ve worked with that should have been paid to stay the hell home. They were useless and shouldn’t have been working anywhere, they should have been given medicine and care from mental health professionals. Why were they always in charge?
