Let's bitch about our stupid, annoying co-workers

^^^

It can be so freeing to sometimes just own a mistake and say "i got it wrong, what can I do to repair this?" and not make any excuses.

^ this is actually one of the best ways to gain a reputation for competence and reliability, ironically

Good apologies and good acceptance (focused on solutions, dispassionate) are beautiful and the inspire so much respect. Three of my co -workers/bosses are really great at both and that makes up for a ton of quirks.

OTOH, my direct boss is terrible at both - on my the rare occasions she apologizes, it's hyperbolic and irritated ("That was my stupidity"). Usually she doesn't own up to mistakes, but says, "This didn't get done right. It needs to get done."

Anyway, that sucks, J. What a bizarre accusation. Like you're a shill for cranberry.

Yeah this is true, I remember I got massive respect from the QA manager at one of my previous jobs because I owned up immediately to breaking something and fixed it straight away, from then on he trusted me over most of the other devs, who he said would've just denied all knowledge of it.

The co-workers on my immediate team range from fair to good at this. But the department as a whole is about as bad as it can get while still staying on the pass-agg side of aggressive. We're not all in one big open plan office, but cutbacks mean that soon we might be. I wonder if the pass-agg blamers will learn to do that less, or will the 'good' colleagues learn to blame?

Good apologies and good acceptance (focused on solutions, dispassionate

I've done this on several occasions even when I wasn't to blame, simply because it brought things out into the open and stopped a potentially long series of recriminations and counter-recriminations. It's interesting the effect doing that has on pass-agg people, particularly the 'office politics' type. It's like they're gradually winding up to the point where they're saying "I'm going to tell your boss", but their whole gameplan gets short circuited when I take responsibility.

ive a few coworkers that rode good apologies all the way up the promotion ladder, despite the apologies being numerous and warranted.

Like one time my boss emailed me while out of town, "Email this FOIA request to the X city department and copy the client," so I emailed it and CC'd the client.

She called me in a state a minute after I sent it b/c she hadn't wanted the city dept to have the client's email address. I said I was sorry but "that was not apparent from your email." (There was no apparent confidentiality issue (the client's name was on the request) and it would be normal to CC the client, especially since she said "and copy the client.") She responded, "I meant 'send a copy to the client'! You should ask for clarification of yiu don't understand my directions."

Like ayou're a shill for cranberry.

Lololol

my God, having "a team" at work, how do u ppl stand it?

it's just laundry

they do all the work its great

So it's that time of year again when we think about vacations. I have to take mine at a time convenient to everyone else, even ignorant, lazy people who don't leave town for theirs, even though economics are not a factor.

WTF is going on with people who have the means and opportunity to travel and don't? Travel educates you and makes you a more worthwhile person. One would think employers encouraged such a thing.

*SOBS*

travelling is definitely awesome but being a dick about it is not

imo

ya - if people don't want to travel, it's their loss – but really doesn't affect anyone else. maybe they just really like their beds and their cooking. even worse than a non-traveler, is a shitty/grouchy traveler.

I'm basically a shut in except for work and i HATE when people say, ooh, taking a staycation? yes i am, co-worker, mind your own beeswax

for me, travel for travel's sake is pointless and a waste of money, and anyone who has a problem with that can fuck themselves in every way possible

Depends on what country you live in. And if you want to work in a creative field like publishing, but won't leave your city, it's a narrow-minded and provincial thing to do. It smacks of entitlement if you expect a job in academia or publishing, but won't travel.

Might not be so bad if you don't work in publishing or academia.

You think that's entitled? Wait until they start telling you how to spend your time and money!

Lolol just1n3 that is so weird and petty!! Like "YOU just want YOUR favorite colors and MOM SAID IT WAS MY TURN WITH THE REMOTR AND STOP HOGGING ALL THE COOKIES! MOOMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!l"

I work in publishing and haven't left the state in over five years.

(Except for this past winter/summer when I went to Australia for three weeks.)

ah our friends with wealthy parents are always telling us about how traveling makes one a better person. How does anyone know about anyone else's means for travel?

And even if you're sure they have the disposable income they may have other unavoidable demands on their free time, anxiety issues, etc

(or in my case chronic disorganisation)

Like, I could probably afford to go away (though it is goddamned expensive to spend a week in hotels and eating in restaurants or w/e, I took my first holiday abroad in years last autumn and was p. shocked by the dent it left in my bank balance) but I'd need to hatch a plan and ask for time off and think about transport and research hotels and make bookings, all preferably months in advance, and it just never happens

better to take a vacation from I M Losted

I go abroad at least once a year and its a fuckload of work to plan and budget for even without kids and with two incomes between us, and if it was my preference alone a few out of those times I'd havd preferred to sit at home in the house I pay for and dont get to enjoy and maybe at 2pm every day I'd go out for lunch in the town I pay to live in and never get to enjoy and as I say I travel abroad as much as Ryanair allows but srsly wtf at the attitude espoused above.

otm. 4 days is my max for travelling, bored after that.

And if you want to work in a creative field like publishing, but won't leave your city, it's a narrow-minded and provincial thing to do. It smacks of entitlement if you expect a job in academia or publishing, but won't travel.

What is this assholish reasoning? Everyone I know in creative fields has exactly two tenths of fuck all money, for starters.

the bigger question is what r u running from with all this endless travel

hmmmmm?

pretty jealous of anyone who has all the PTO to do all this overseas travelling

guilty as charged there tbh yr eyes would pop I'm on about half if what sic gets in terms of leave.

i have plenty of leave because i don't take it but how do people with jobs have the energy to travel? feels like a cruel joke. i'd choose stay home and get some sleep and be dull.

I heard u were afraid of international outrage

Americans are on half what I get, I just saved it up for years

Going to have endless time off from mid-year though!

Friend of mine obsessively travels but she's a bit of a lone wolf (no partner or fam) working out in the desert as an airforce cook, I think that kind of job leaves one with insane amts of spare money given they pay for your accoms and whatnot.

I could go for a bit of that

certainly there's entire weeks I could go for the no partner bit

I meant especially bcz redundant sometime in May, homeless sometime between April and July, and you could get a lot of reading done

sure but I'd go for a drink with you once a week on these desert sojourns

I was gonna say - redundant!? Boh :(

:(

:/

:\

it's alright guys I'm gonna join the air force and live in the desert iirc

how does traveling 'make one a better person' anyway? i believe chonging on ecigs and listening to danny baker podcasts makes for a better person but im not shouting that from the rooftops

actually scratch that, i really do

Tryn 2 think if u know said airforce cook lady sic, as she is good m8s with me and miss Ol1via.

The bitching here is directed at whoever allows this to happen, mostly, but there's a woman in my office who seems to have some quite bad mental problems, and has just been jettisoned entirely by any boss or team. We move from desk to desk (as does everyone) and she keeps annexing desks in different parts of the office, but she sits and talks to herself in a strained argumentative tone all day - and not like "oh I must email Steven" or whatever, it's like this bizarre rambling. She's sitting behind me now and I just heard "but he was holding a child!" - a lot of it is kind of mumbling. She looks at Google Maps with a map of Daventry, all day.

My boss has emailed to try and see what's happening or why she has no team whatsoever - makes me wonder how many people are working in civil service buildings just drifting along having been cut loose from any responsibility or structure, or contact.

What the hell. She needs to be on some sort of disability leave, surely?

As for your last question, as a former employee of a US state government, more than the taxpayers wish, that's for sure. Although IME most people who are ill in some form or another are out on extended disability leave and the people who still come to work and drift along without responsibility are politically connected patronage hires with no ambitions beyond hanging out in an office, looking at the internet, taking long lunches, and leaving early every day.