My boss’s boss resigned yesterday. If I had to sum him up in one sentence, I would say — and I think he would take this as a compliment — that he made Machiavelli look like a goddamn amateur . . . Thus spoke The Programmer. Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Work
Medical Front Office Ass
The job ads on the right were dropped into a business article I was reading last weekend. Evidently the job titles get truncated after 24 characters, which is probably a bad idea, given the unintended consequences . . . Read more →
Whale Cams
The guy in the next cubicle is spending the afternoon looking at animal cams on the web. “Look at this whale cam,” he says. “It’s underwater!” Read more →
Summer Vacation
It’s the first morning of summer vacation and my boy is on the computer loading up his iPod . . . “And what might you be doing?” he says as I walk by. “Getting ready for work,” I say. “Oh yeah . . . work.” Read more →
The Great Chair Race
We’re having a fundraising event at the office today. Executives will race around the parking lot in office chairs. Wagering is permitted, with proceeds going to the United Way. Here’s how I handicap it: The CFO is pretty fit and looks like a winner. On the other hand, the Sales VP is a Snidely Whiplash type who’s probably loosening the wheels on the other guys’ chairs as we speak, which makes him a dangerous guy to bet against. No one else in the race looks remotely capable of winning any sort of athletic contest. It would be fun to run a side pool on which fat-ass will be the first to go down with a torn ACL or other crippling injury . . . Read more →
I Know Lots of Different Languages
My son is looking over my résumé, including the part where it says I’ve worked with lots of different languages. “You don’t know a lot of languages,” he says. Read more →
Women Leaving IT Considered Discouraging?
Women represent nearly half the workers in the U.S. — 46.6 percent. However, they always have been underrepresented in I.T. Even more discouraging is the fact that the percentage of women working in I.T. jobs is not growing but dropping. — Why Women Leave I.T. Why is that discouraging? Who exactly is discouraged by it? Here’s a simple explanation: Maybe women don’t want to work in IT. Is there nothing more rewarding that a woman can do with her life than work in IT? IT in the post-dot-com era is a stagnant industry. A lot of people in it would like to get out of it, but they need the money. I don’t encourage my son to get into it, nor would I encourage my daughter to get into it, if I had one . . . Thus spoke The Programmer. Read more →
Soul-Crushing Email of the Day
I swear to God this is a real email from a once-promising manager with degrees from Brown and Princeton, who recently accepted a new position as Chief of Staff to the CEO, and now uses her Ivy League education to put out emails like this: Effective immediately please ensure that all written communications at [insert company name here] have a minimum font size of 12. In particular, [insert CEO’s name here] has asked me to convey that he will be ‘throwing away’ any communication he receives (over email or on paper) that does not meet this criteria [sic]. Please call me with any questions or comments, and hope everyone has a great weekend! I always say if you’re going to misuse the word “criteria,” at least do it in a highly readable 12-point Verdana font . . . Thus spoke The Programmer. Read more →
Profiles in Management: The Baffled Bigwig
Our Sr. EVP dropped by today for a meet and greet . . . he was 45 minutes late, and when he arrived, it was obvious he had no idea who he was talking to. “Is this the IT group?” he asked. It was explained to him that some of the people were from IT, but some were from the call center and tech support. “And do they all report to you?” he asked the senior manager in the room. Here’s a little trick I’ve picked up over the years: When you’re addressing a group of people, take a few minutes beforehand to learn who they are. It will make them feel less insignificant. After this fiasco, he went off to a catered meeting with other highly compensated executives, and I went out to buy my own lunch. Prediction: This meet and greet will be mentioned in at least two… Read more →
My Next Career
Somehow at dinner the subject of moving to Texas comes up . . . not a discussion so much as a stream of consciousness monologue by my wife, who has relatives in Texas, and it’s much cheaper to live there than it is here, and so on. “But what would you do for a job?” she asks me. Read more →
Structured Procrastination
I have been intending to write this essay for months. Why am I finally doing it? Because I finally found some uncommitted time? Wrong. I have papers to grade, textbook orders to fill out, an NSF proposal to referee, dissertation drafts to read. I am working on this essay as a way of not doing all of those things. This is the essence of what I call structured procrastination, an amazing strategy I have discovered that converts procrastinators into effective human beings, respected and admired for all that they can accomplish and the good use they make of time. — John Perry Read more →
Christmas at the Office
I’m in receipt of the following “Secret Santa” email: Please come by my desk to pick a name. Then go buy (and wrap) a new toy that represents that person. Humor is the key here! Get creative and have fun! We’ll open the toys, have a laugh with each recipient, and then donate the toys to charity. Translation: Buy something that confirms the recipient’s worst suspicions about what people really think of him (or her), and then we’ll all go home and hang ourselves. Read more →
The Meaning of Golf
But what do I get from existence? If it is full I have only distress, if empty only boredom. How can you offer me so poor a reward for so much labor . . . — Arthur Schopenhauer Another weekend approaches, bringing leisure hours that we don’t know what to do with. As the busy work week winds to a close, we have a couple of days in which to ponder the emptiness of our lives. How dreary! How much more pleasant if we could fill up the time with other activities. Hence: Golf! Intoxication is another option. Or both at the same time! Read more →
My Fantasy Football League Fantasy
My workplace is teeming with idiots who know more about some steroid-amped freak and how many yards he ran with a ball in his hands than they do about their own family members and whatever babysitter is raising their kids for them. Kee-rist! I wish I could go back in time and strangle them all in their cradles . . . Read more →
Now That You Mention It
From a Wall Street Journal article on excessive lender processing fees: An application fee? Charges for document preparation? An “administration” fee? They even want you to pay their postage. I’m surprised lenders aren’t charging for in-office backrubs for overworked loan officers. Ho Ho! Actually, the mortgage bank I work with does subsidize 50 percent of the cost of in-office massages . . . Read more →
Wasted Time
There was a profile of Jerry Buss, the owner of the Lakers, on TV the other night . . . Buss spent very little time with his family when his kids were growing up. When he and his wife separated, they didn’t tell the kids, and it was five years before any of them noticed the difference. True story! Clearly, I have not been nearly as ruthless as I could have been at disregarding my family in my pursuit of success. Read more →
Inspired Idiocy
It’s amazing how much havoc a person can wreak in the workplace by applying a certain kind of inspired idiocy to every situation: follow all procedures to the letter, do exactly what you’re told, and respond to all questions exactly as asked. One-word answers are ideal. The latter technique is especially effective via email. Thus spoke The Programmer. Read more →
Working Late
Sometimes when I’m working a little late, my boy calls me at the office . . . Read more →
Life’s Work
The company intranet has profiles of the Six Sigma team members, including their responses to the following fill-in-the-blank question: If I weren’t in banking, I’d be . . . Here are the answers: Read more →
A Pat on the Head
We come to work, have lunch, and go home. We goose-step in and goose-step out, change our partners and wander all about, sashay around for a pat on the head, and promenade home till we all drop dead. — Joseph Heller, Something Happened Read more →