If you can't attend the meeting, and the meeting is about art work, and you are on the conference call and can't see the artwork...Don't issue an opinion.
That way, you won't say anything silly, resulting in the entire room silently laughing you.
That's one of the worst things that can ever happen to you, getting a room full of silent laughs while you are elsehwhere, pretending to be involved in the meeting via telephone.
Showing posts with label meetings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label meetings. Show all posts
Monday, August 30, 2010
Saturday, August 28, 2010
The Nothing Meeting
Warriors, sometimes during your Cubeland adventures you will be bewildered. You will leave a meeting scratching your head and muttering “WTF?” (Because saying "fuck" too much looks bad and "WTF" is kind of funny in a hip, self-knowing, “I’m on my Balcberry too much” way.)
It won’t be the content of a meeting that causes your confusion, but rather the lack of any content whatsoever, the vacuum in the middle of the room that opens up seconds after you sit down, a vacuum spawned by everyone in the room wondering “Why am I here? What is this meeting really about?”
When this happens, you have experienced The Nothing Meeting. And like all meetings, you must know how to manage it accordingly.
You can tell you are in a Nothing Meeting if your boss starts by saying something like, “I just wanted to check in and see if everything was okay with (Blank).” The blank could be filled with “budget” or “planning” or “forecasting” or “hiring” or “unicorn wrangling” or anything at all, because it doesn't really matter.
The answer to your boss’ question should be, and probably is, “Everything is fine. Can I go now?”
But you can’t say that, because it’s your boss, and even though he has called a nonsensical meeting and is wasting your time, you need to remember your job, your true job – Make your boss glad you work for him.
So explain that everything is fine, then ask a few questions, seeing if you can figure what this meeting is really all about. It could be he was just lonely and felt like having a chat. It could be he heard something that concerned him, but he doesn’t want to tell you about it, so he’s asking generic questions to disguise what information he’s really after.
And sometimes, I swear, he will call a Nothing Meeting just because he can, because it makes him feel relevant, gives him a little buzz of empowerment. Perhaps the thought process is something like… “God, I am totally worthless, irrelevant and completely shit at my job. In fact, I can’t even figure out what my job really is. You know what I’ll do? Call a meeting. That’s a boss thing to do. Let’s get everyone in a room and talk about some stuff.”
So go in the room. Smile. Talk about whatever he wants to talk about.
It’s a Nothing Meeting, but if you increase your boss’s happiness in you working for him by smiling and chatting for an hour about nothing, it’s a Something Meeting.
It won’t be the content of a meeting that causes your confusion, but rather the lack of any content whatsoever, the vacuum in the middle of the room that opens up seconds after you sit down, a vacuum spawned by everyone in the room wondering “Why am I here? What is this meeting really about?”
When this happens, you have experienced The Nothing Meeting. And like all meetings, you must know how to manage it accordingly.
You can tell you are in a Nothing Meeting if your boss starts by saying something like, “I just wanted to check in and see if everything was okay with (Blank).” The blank could be filled with “budget” or “planning” or “forecasting” or “hiring” or “unicorn wrangling” or anything at all, because it doesn't really matter.
The answer to your boss’ question should be, and probably is, “Everything is fine. Can I go now?”
But you can’t say that, because it’s your boss, and even though he has called a nonsensical meeting and is wasting your time, you need to remember your job, your true job – Make your boss glad you work for him.
So explain that everything is fine, then ask a few questions, seeing if you can figure what this meeting is really all about. It could be he was just lonely and felt like having a chat. It could be he heard something that concerned him, but he doesn’t want to tell you about it, so he’s asking generic questions to disguise what information he’s really after.
And sometimes, I swear, he will call a Nothing Meeting just because he can, because it makes him feel relevant, gives him a little buzz of empowerment. Perhaps the thought process is something like… “God, I am totally worthless, irrelevant and completely shit at my job. In fact, I can’t even figure out what my job really is. You know what I’ll do? Call a meeting. That’s a boss thing to do. Let’s get everyone in a room and talk about some stuff.”
So go in the room. Smile. Talk about whatever he wants to talk about.
It’s a Nothing Meeting, but if you increase your boss’s happiness in you working for him by smiling and chatting for an hour about nothing, it’s a Something Meeting.
Friday, August 27, 2010
When drawing and quartering isn't quite punishment enough
Warriors, I‘m trying to think of a good punishment for people who schedule 9 a.m. meetings. Is there anything more annoying? Can someone be more inconsiderate and selfish? Maybe someone who schedules 8 a.m. meetings, but no one ever attends those, so they don’t matter.
However, you have no good excuse not to be at a 9 a.m. meeting. Legally, technically, according to HR, you should be at work and ready to go, with a smile.
But the truth is you need a good 30 to 60 minutes of coffee, chit-chat about True Blood, and YouTube video surfing before you’re actually ready to think about work, much less talk about it. Everyone in Cubeland should know this by now. It’s an unspoken agreement, “No 9 a.m. meetings!” And yet, they happen, scheduled either by the clueless or the evil.
In a 9 a.m. meeting this morning, I was literally daydreaming about the Starbucks I wasn’t visiting right then, about whether I’d get a plain latte or something more fancy, something with syrup, maybe vanilla. A muffin perhaps? Meanwhile, some jackass was yammering away about metrics and pick-ups and tie ratios and some kind of Internet-y thing about a new smart technology that will send some kind of hook on a wire out of a hard drive and pick the pockets of website visitors.
Every web agency sounds the same when they talk about their magic money-sucking technology. And I swear they invent new acronyms and buzz words every time they present. Flyby, Buzzclick, Eyepopper, Smartdot, Invisopixel, Tastycookie…just a few samples.
Anyway, back to the punishments!
Let’s go with, if you schedule a 9 a.m. meeting, you must name your first born an internet agency pseudo-English buzzword…Pixellint (for a girl) or Ramdrop (for a boy).
If you schedule a 9 a.m. meeting for a Monday morning, and you sent out the meeting invite over the weekend, let’s just agree you get the death penalty. Sorry, but you have got to go. I have dibs on your chair.
If you have other suggestions, let me know!
However, you have no good excuse not to be at a 9 a.m. meeting. Legally, technically, according to HR, you should be at work and ready to go, with a smile.
But the truth is you need a good 30 to 60 minutes of coffee, chit-chat about True Blood, and YouTube video surfing before you’re actually ready to think about work, much less talk about it. Everyone in Cubeland should know this by now. It’s an unspoken agreement, “No 9 a.m. meetings!” And yet, they happen, scheduled either by the clueless or the evil.
In a 9 a.m. meeting this morning, I was literally daydreaming about the Starbucks I wasn’t visiting right then, about whether I’d get a plain latte or something more fancy, something with syrup, maybe vanilla. A muffin perhaps? Meanwhile, some jackass was yammering away about metrics and pick-ups and tie ratios and some kind of Internet-y thing about a new smart technology that will send some kind of hook on a wire out of a hard drive and pick the pockets of website visitors.
Every web agency sounds the same when they talk about their magic money-sucking technology. And I swear they invent new acronyms and buzz words every time they present. Flyby, Buzzclick, Eyepopper, Smartdot, Invisopixel, Tastycookie…just a few samples.
Anyway, back to the punishments!
Let’s go with, if you schedule a 9 a.m. meeting, you must name your first born an internet agency pseudo-English buzzword…Pixellint (for a girl) or Ramdrop (for a boy).
If you schedule a 9 a.m. meeting for a Monday morning, and you sent out the meeting invite over the weekend, let’s just agree you get the death penalty. Sorry, but you have got to go. I have dibs on your chair.
If you have other suggestions, let me know!
Thursday, April 29, 2010
How To Make People Mad While Trying To Save The World
Warriors, there are times in your career when you’ll asked to be on something called a “strike team.” Sometimes these are called SWAT teams or action teams or “that thing I’m obligated to send someone too, but which I don’t give a shit about, so I’ll send that guy.”
These teams are temporary gatherings of people from around the company brought together to solve a problem or improve a process and, as always, to make PowerPoints. I’m coming to suspect that that is indeed the purpose of all corporate existence, to produce PowerPoint presentations.
The particular strike team I’m on is made up of wonderful people with smart ideas and if the company would listen, it would hear answers.
But it is deaf. Any noise that might cause a change is ignored. Any suggestion that might cause a shift in thinking is politely declined. A whispered hint that we might need an alteration to the way things are done is greeted with gritted teeth and a, "Go fuck yourself.”
But here I am anyway, on the team tasked with making noises, suggestions, and whispers about change.
What to do when you are being paid to flog a dead horse?
Crack that whip. Crack it good.
These teams are temporary gatherings of people from around the company brought together to solve a problem or improve a process and, as always, to make PowerPoints. I’m coming to suspect that that is indeed the purpose of all corporate existence, to produce PowerPoint presentations.
The particular strike team I’m on is made up of wonderful people with smart ideas and if the company would listen, it would hear answers.
But it is deaf. Any noise that might cause a change is ignored. Any suggestion that might cause a shift in thinking is politely declined. A whispered hint that we might need an alteration to the way things are done is greeted with gritted teeth and a, "Go fuck yourself.”
But here I am anyway, on the team tasked with making noises, suggestions, and whispers about change.
What to do when you are being paid to flog a dead horse?
Crack that whip. Crack it good.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Processing the process of process
Summary of a meeting I just had (edited to protect the frustrated)…
“So, we are going to recommend a new process.”
“Yes. But we can’t recommend a new process.”
“How’s that again?”
“If we recommend a new process, we’ll imply that the existing process is broken.”
“It is.”
“You can’t just say that. It will make people defensive.”
“So, we are not going to recommend a new process?”
“No.”
“But we need a new process.”
“Yes.”
“How are we going to do that then?”
“We’ll recommend a process to evaluate the current process and then recommend that we implement a new process.”
“Isn’t that what we just did? Isn’t that why we are having this ‘process improvement’ meeting?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Lunch then?”
“Sounds good.”
“So, we are going to recommend a new process.”
“Yes. But we can’t recommend a new process.”
“How’s that again?”
“If we recommend a new process, we’ll imply that the existing process is broken.”
“It is.”
“You can’t just say that. It will make people defensive.”
“So, we are not going to recommend a new process?”
“No.”
“But we need a new process.”
“Yes.”
“How are we going to do that then?”
“We’ll recommend a process to evaluate the current process and then recommend that we implement a new process.”
“Isn’t that what we just did? Isn’t that why we are having this ‘process improvement’ meeting?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Lunch then?”
“Sounds good.”
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Recession cured! Through the magic of PowerPoint!
Warriors, it’s becoming clear that the way to cure this recession is more meetings, lots more meetings.
It must be, because that seems to be my company’s way of dealing with it, scheduling more meetings, with more worldwide travel, more conference calls, with more PowerPoint creation, more rehearsals, more late night meetings to prepare for the meetings, more rounds of feedback on presentations, which results in more working on presentations.
We’ve decided that instead of speaking to customers, and figuring out better products and better ways to talk to customers, we are going to talk to ourselves, often, and through an animated slideshow program with pictures clipped from Flickr and funny moves from YouTube. What are we telling ourselves? Basically, when you boil it down, we’re telling each other everything is going to be okay. We have products. We are going to market them. We will remain employed. Probably.
All these meetings? It’s the same thing as getting a hug from your mother after you scrapped your knee. And as about as helpful.
Well, not really. It’s less helpful. It is more like your mom is so intent on your listening to her that she won’t let you up so you can spray antiseptic on your bleeding wound and bandage it. Instead, she’s going to hold you down and scream meaningless into your face until your knee gets gangrene and has to be amputated.
(Helpful PowerPoint tip: If you need pictures of people who look kind of like your target market, just search on Flickr!)
It must be, because that seems to be my company’s way of dealing with it, scheduling more meetings, with more worldwide travel, more conference calls, with more PowerPoint creation, more rehearsals, more late night meetings to prepare for the meetings, more rounds of feedback on presentations, which results in more working on presentations.
We’ve decided that instead of speaking to customers, and figuring out better products and better ways to talk to customers, we are going to talk to ourselves, often, and through an animated slideshow program with pictures clipped from Flickr and funny moves from YouTube. What are we telling ourselves? Basically, when you boil it down, we’re telling each other everything is going to be okay. We have products. We are going to market them. We will remain employed. Probably.
All these meetings? It’s the same thing as getting a hug from your mother after you scrapped your knee. And as about as helpful.
Well, not really. It’s less helpful. It is more like your mom is so intent on your listening to her that she won’t let you up so you can spray antiseptic on your bleeding wound and bandage it. Instead, she’s going to hold you down and scream meaningless into your face until your knee gets gangrene and has to be amputated.
(Helpful PowerPoint tip: If you need pictures of people who look kind of like your target market, just search on Flickr!)
Saturday, March 06, 2010
CHAPTER 2 – Working Hard at Hardly Working
(Note: This is Chapter Two of my book, White Collar Warrior. You can read the chapters that come before this one by clicking on the chapter links to the right. If you are interested in representing or publishing my book, please let me know at whitecollarwarrior@hotmail.com. Thanks!)
Key Lesson: Appear to work longer and harder than everyone else. (It doesn’t matter if you really do or not. The key word in this lesson is “appear.”)
JIMMY’S DAY SEVEN
Jimmy is settling in, hasn’t got himself fired, and managed to get computer passwords and office supplies. Good for Jimmy. So far, he’s proven himself to be useless, but harmless. In today’s world, useless can keep you employed for quite a while, so he’s safe for now. He hasn’t been there long enough to screw up publicly or take the blame for someone else’s public screw up, the two things that will often get you canned.
Jimmy is also working on a few small projects and assignments, mostly low level tasks because Dick doesn’t think too much of Jimmy…yet.
One thing Jimmy did do right, he called the number on that business card. He called the White Collar Warrior, and he got himself a little advice. Not much. The WCW doesn’t give away a lot of knowledge at first. He doles it out to those who earn it, who deserve it, and who pay monthly fee for it. And Jimmy, by making that call, earned a few words of advice.
Those words resulted in Jimmy doing something useful during his otherwise spectacularly unproductive seven days. He’s taken note of Bob’s often tension filled phone calls, and he’s noticed that on the days Bob has one of those calls, Bob leaves the office right at 6 p.m., or even a little early.
And on those days, after he bids Bob a warm farewell, he waits ten minutes, then goes to Dick’s office and asks a question, normally for some bit of information that Bob is responsible for. He never comes out and says: “Bob isn’t here.” In fact, he never says Bob’s name unless Dick says it first. Remember -- be subtle. Your intent must be invisible and your tactics imperceptible.
For instance, Jimmy has asked: “Do you have those 1997 numbers for the comparative graph I’m building?”
“Bob has those. He keeps track of all the archived metrics,” says Dick.
“I’ll get them tomorrow from Bob then.”
“What? Did Bob leave?”
“Yeah, he had to take off. No biggie. I’ll catch up with him tomorrow.”
See? Subtle. This exchange wasn’t a big deal. And by itself, would have no effect positive or negative on Jimmy’s career. However, what if a conversation like that was to be had every week, or two or three times a week? What if it became more and more obvious that Jimmy worked longer hours than Bob?
If you were Dick, wouldn’t you gain just a little more respect for Jimmy. Maybe you’d give him a few of Bob’s duties, a little sliver of Bob’s territory, because you need stuff done and Jimmy is around to do it. At that point, Jimmy has begun winning the battle against Bob, and Bob doesn’t even know he’s in a fight.
I know what you’re thinking. For that to work, Jimmy will actually have to work longer hours than Bob and often more than his boss. You hate working long hours. You’ve got TV to watch, videos games to play, and kids to put to bed. They miss their dad and are growing up without your influence. They call you “the guy who sleeps in the bed with mom” in between exploring your not-so-well hidden porn collection and smoking fatties rolled with your stash, also not hidden so well. (An ice cream tub in the freezer? What were you thinking?). Wah. Wah. Here’s a tissue, you big baby. If you think like that, you’ll never be a white collar warrior.
I’m not saying be an idiot about it. Feel free to leave right after all your co-workers leave. Also, if you want to spend time in a restroom reading the newspaper, or playing craps with the security guards or chatting up the cleaning lady, feel free to do that too. Being at work long hours doesn’t mean actually working long hours. Fill those hours however you want, but just don’t get caught.
Do your goofing off during the day and then actually work during the evening, when you have some peace and when your superiors will better notice it. Sending in a report at 3 p.m. is no big deal. But send one in at 8 p.m., and you’re a big hero because you “put in the extra hours to get the job done.”
How do you do that? How do you stave off actual work during the day so you actually work at night? Meetings. Not real ones. But the ones you tell people you’re going to.
In a company with lots of departments, you’re going to have lots and lots of meetings. They are the curse of the modern workplace (along with the hellish invention of email, of which there is a chapter in this book called Email – Proof That God Hates Us), and you’ll have days when you do nothing but sit in a chair in a room full of people who will say nothing remotely interesting or relevant to you. (See the chapter Meeting Masturbation for how to get the most use out of them.)
You can take advantage of this plague of the corporate world by declaring you’re going to a meeting and then taking off for an hour or two. Everyone will believe you because everyone is besieged by meetings. And what’s really great is that when your boss comes looking for you, or your spouse, or your mother, or your creepy kids, the word is given from someone who is quite sincere: “He’s in a meeting.”
Back in the olden days, when fax machines printed on thermal paper and office administrators were secretaries chased around by martini-swigging bosses, you had to lie to get out of work, faking a soar throat or complaining about nausea or diarrhea. (If you were good at it, you called with your head actually inside a toilet bowl, in order to get just the right echo while you poured canned beef stew into the water. It sounds perfect. Try it sometime and see.)
But today, the business gods have given us the curse of meetings, and the blessing of having the perfect excuse to disappear for an hour or two.
Important note on that: Be sure and take a pad and paper, or even better, your laptop computer. You go to and from fake meetings with crap in your arms and a worried, determine look in your eyes. You don’t trot off empty handed and smiling. Don’t be an ass and say “I’m off to the planning meeting” without so much as a pen and pad in your hand. And please, don’t forget to write something on the pad before you get back. Two pages of doodles, fake notes or death threats to members of Congress per hour you were gone should be sufficiently convincing.
And what to do during this free time?
Take an early dinner at 4 p.m. at the restaurant that always crowded after 5 p.m. Visit the bookstore across the street. Get a lap dance or two if an exotic entertainment establishment is close by. Sleep in your car. Sleep in a bathroom with your head on the toilet paper dispenser. Do whatever it is you need to do to feel like you aren’t working.
Then, return to work, where your co-workers are watching the clock waiting for 6 p.m., getting ready to shoot out the door like someone received an envelope full of white powder. With them finally gone, you can settle in for some actual productivity. As they trot out, there you’ll be, hard at work for all to see.
That will earn you “midnight oil” points, which you’ll be able to spend during your performance review self-appraisal, when you write: “I work late into the night when it’s called for and don’t leave until the job is done.” And that will be true, though you will be leaving out this line: “…but during the day I watch The Sopranos on DVD in the back seat of my SUV.”
What about those other points, the less popular, more unpleasant-to-get points…the “early bird catches the worm” points?
Yeah, I hate them too, but you need them, especially at the start of your career. You need to be the first one in AND the last one out. You need to be sitting in your cube, typing away, LOUDLY, so that people hear you. (It would be really dumb of you to come in early and not make sure people noticed.)
You need to see that look in their eyes when they arrive at work to find you already at your desk, that look that says: “What the fuck is that guy doing here all ready? He’s making me look bad.”
And more than being early, make your presence felt. Put on the coffee so it’s waiting for people when they arrive, so the rest of the morning they’ll be drinking your coffee. Put out donuts every two or three weeks. There’s nothing as tempting as a free donut, and with each deep-fried apple fritter they bite into, they’ll know it was you who paid for it
When you show up before everyone else, the building is yours, the company is yours, the stash of Girl Scout cookies in your co-worker’s cube is yours. You’re the boss and you’re making critical decisions. About what? How does being early give you power?
If you are the first one in, you can drop meeting invites on people while they are still sipping weak coffee from their travel mugs in rush hour traffic. By logging into the meeting maker first, you can set up meetings concerning your projects before anyone else has a chance. First one to schedule a meeting wins. And when you set up a meeting, you’ve established that meeting room as your territory, the domain you rule. (Again, see the chapter called Meeting Masturbation.)
So, you’re coming in earlier than everyone, leaving later than everyone and even though you’re taking advantage of some free time during the day, you’re still unhappy. It still feels like work if you aren’t at home eating ice cream out of the carton and watching Oprah in your own living room.
I can’t help you if that’s how you feel. You think Donald Trump didn’t put in some hours? You think Bill Gates kept up to date on his soaps while he was making his first billion dollars? You think Bush Jr. got to be president by being a spoiled brat and coasting through life on his family fortune and political connections? It’s true, that is exactly what W did, but unless you’ve got an oil field or two on the family ledger, you aren’t going to get by like W did.
You’re going to work your ass off. Take your pleasures when they come, but if you think you can do this without doing some actual work, forget it. I’m promising to help you to work smarter, but I’m not saying you don’t have to work.
Also, I am not giving you a license to complain about working hard. When I say make your boss and co-workers aware of the hours you’re putting in, I’m saying to subtly let them know you are being cheerfully productive while they go home to their families, favorite TV shows and warm, cozy beds. You smile at them and modestly say you’re going to finish up and go home when you can. You are cheerful in the morning when they arrive. You are not grumpy and you don’t snipe at people for not being there when you are.
You are gracious and happy at all times. You love your work, or at least you act like you love your work. And that’s the real threat to everyone around you in Cubeland, and the reason your boss is going to keep giving you hunks of other people’s territory, because you never complain. You’re eager to take on anything and everything because you’d love nothing more than to work every waking minute. If you start bitching, the boss will start taking things away from you just to shut you up. Capisci?
And that brings us back to Jimmy. Look at him. He’s working late on his report. Even Dick is gone, after having said, “Goodnight! Don’t work too late. You’ll make me look bad. Heh. Heh.”
After the building is quiet and it is certain no one else is around, Jimmy types for a few minutes, then closes the file. He was actually done an hour ago.
He sets up his email to send the report at 11 p.m., instead of the current time of 7 p.m. Using an easily downloadable bit of freeware, he will get credit for another 4 hours of work, because all Dick will know is that email was sent at 11 p.m., and Dick will be appreciative that Jimmy put in so many extra hours on his project.
Jimmy then goes into the meeting maker and schedules two meetings, each with three people, each for projects that Dick threw at him earlier. Then, he schedules another meeting, from 3 to 6 p.m., and Jimmy invites just himself. He labels it “High Level Project Planning,” so when people try to find Jimmy, they’ll get the message that he’s already taking part in a highly important gathering.
Actually, he’s going to go ice skating, and will then treat himself to a facial at the spa around the corner. Then he’s going to come back to work and settle in just as his co-workers are leaving, each of them wondering if they should work longer hours as well, because that damn new guy is really putting in some time. Damn him.
Perfect. Good job, Jimmy.
THE WHITE COLLAR WARRIOR’S ADVICE FOR STANDING OUT ABOVE THE COMPETION AT THE START OF YOUR CAREER
1. Work longer than everyone else, but not necessarily harder. You are the first one in and the last one out. Make sure your boss knows. Make sure your co-workers know.
2. Don’t be an ass about it. Remember, be subtle. Don’t sigh and moan about having to work so many hours. Don’t be complainer. The last thing anyone wants to hear is someone bitching about how hard work is. Here’s a little secret: Everyone thinks they work too many hours. Everyone is overworked, or feels that they are. Just about everyone hates their job, and they aren’t interested in knowing that you hate your job too.
3. Scam a few extra hours of credit by using an email delay send program. Don’t abuse it, but once a week or so set up some email to be sent between 11 p.m. and midnight.
4. Use a meeting as an excuse to escape work during the day, when you can have your fun and take a few minor pleasures, just enough to get through your hellish corporate existence.
5. At night, be happily working as your co-workers and boss walk past you and out the door. Say goodnight with a smile, especially to your boss. Get some real work done now that the place is quiet. Or watch movies on a portable DVD player. Or take a nap. Whatever. Up to you.
6. Set up meetings after co-workers have left or before they come in. Take control of their schedules before they can take control of yours.
7. Come in before your boss. Make sure everyone knows you were there first by making coffee, bringing in donuts, and saying good morning loudly to each person as they walk past your cube. Like I said, don’t be a grouch. But if you really are in a bad mood and you need a little morning giggle, lick each the donuts and put them back on the tray. It’s cheap, I know, but it will give you a smile when you need one.
END OF CHAPTER TWO
Key Lesson: Appear to work longer and harder than everyone else. (It doesn’t matter if you really do or not. The key word in this lesson is “appear.”)
JIMMY’S DAY SEVEN
Jimmy is settling in, hasn’t got himself fired, and managed to get computer passwords and office supplies. Good for Jimmy. So far, he’s proven himself to be useless, but harmless. In today’s world, useless can keep you employed for quite a while, so he’s safe for now. He hasn’t been there long enough to screw up publicly or take the blame for someone else’s public screw up, the two things that will often get you canned.
Jimmy is also working on a few small projects and assignments, mostly low level tasks because Dick doesn’t think too much of Jimmy…yet.
One thing Jimmy did do right, he called the number on that business card. He called the White Collar Warrior, and he got himself a little advice. Not much. The WCW doesn’t give away a lot of knowledge at first. He doles it out to those who earn it, who deserve it, and who pay monthly fee for it. And Jimmy, by making that call, earned a few words of advice.
Those words resulted in Jimmy doing something useful during his otherwise spectacularly unproductive seven days. He’s taken note of Bob’s often tension filled phone calls, and he’s noticed that on the days Bob has one of those calls, Bob leaves the office right at 6 p.m., or even a little early.
And on those days, after he bids Bob a warm farewell, he waits ten minutes, then goes to Dick’s office and asks a question, normally for some bit of information that Bob is responsible for. He never comes out and says: “Bob isn’t here.” In fact, he never says Bob’s name unless Dick says it first. Remember -- be subtle. Your intent must be invisible and your tactics imperceptible.
For instance, Jimmy has asked: “Do you have those 1997 numbers for the comparative graph I’m building?”
“Bob has those. He keeps track of all the archived metrics,” says Dick.
“I’ll get them tomorrow from Bob then.”
“What? Did Bob leave?”
“Yeah, he had to take off. No biggie. I’ll catch up with him tomorrow.”
See? Subtle. This exchange wasn’t a big deal. And by itself, would have no effect positive or negative on Jimmy’s career. However, what if a conversation like that was to be had every week, or two or three times a week? What if it became more and more obvious that Jimmy worked longer hours than Bob?
If you were Dick, wouldn’t you gain just a little more respect for Jimmy. Maybe you’d give him a few of Bob’s duties, a little sliver of Bob’s territory, because you need stuff done and Jimmy is around to do it. At that point, Jimmy has begun winning the battle against Bob, and Bob doesn’t even know he’s in a fight.
I know what you’re thinking. For that to work, Jimmy will actually have to work longer hours than Bob and often more than his boss. You hate working long hours. You’ve got TV to watch, videos games to play, and kids to put to bed. They miss their dad and are growing up without your influence. They call you “the guy who sleeps in the bed with mom” in between exploring your not-so-well hidden porn collection and smoking fatties rolled with your stash, also not hidden so well. (An ice cream tub in the freezer? What were you thinking?). Wah. Wah. Here’s a tissue, you big baby. If you think like that, you’ll never be a white collar warrior.
I’m not saying be an idiot about it. Feel free to leave right after all your co-workers leave. Also, if you want to spend time in a restroom reading the newspaper, or playing craps with the security guards or chatting up the cleaning lady, feel free to do that too. Being at work long hours doesn’t mean actually working long hours. Fill those hours however you want, but just don’t get caught.
Do your goofing off during the day and then actually work during the evening, when you have some peace and when your superiors will better notice it. Sending in a report at 3 p.m. is no big deal. But send one in at 8 p.m., and you’re a big hero because you “put in the extra hours to get the job done.”
How do you do that? How do you stave off actual work during the day so you actually work at night? Meetings. Not real ones. But the ones you tell people you’re going to.
In a company with lots of departments, you’re going to have lots and lots of meetings. They are the curse of the modern workplace (along with the hellish invention of email, of which there is a chapter in this book called Email – Proof That God Hates Us), and you’ll have days when you do nothing but sit in a chair in a room full of people who will say nothing remotely interesting or relevant to you. (See the chapter Meeting Masturbation for how to get the most use out of them.)
You can take advantage of this plague of the corporate world by declaring you’re going to a meeting and then taking off for an hour or two. Everyone will believe you because everyone is besieged by meetings. And what’s really great is that when your boss comes looking for you, or your spouse, or your mother, or your creepy kids, the word is given from someone who is quite sincere: “He’s in a meeting.”
Back in the olden days, when fax machines printed on thermal paper and office administrators were secretaries chased around by martini-swigging bosses, you had to lie to get out of work, faking a soar throat or complaining about nausea or diarrhea. (If you were good at it, you called with your head actually inside a toilet bowl, in order to get just the right echo while you poured canned beef stew into the water. It sounds perfect. Try it sometime and see.)
But today, the business gods have given us the curse of meetings, and the blessing of having the perfect excuse to disappear for an hour or two.
Important note on that: Be sure and take a pad and paper, or even better, your laptop computer. You go to and from fake meetings with crap in your arms and a worried, determine look in your eyes. You don’t trot off empty handed and smiling. Don’t be an ass and say “I’m off to the planning meeting” without so much as a pen and pad in your hand. And please, don’t forget to write something on the pad before you get back. Two pages of doodles, fake notes or death threats to members of Congress per hour you were gone should be sufficiently convincing.
And what to do during this free time?
Take an early dinner at 4 p.m. at the restaurant that always crowded after 5 p.m. Visit the bookstore across the street. Get a lap dance or two if an exotic entertainment establishment is close by. Sleep in your car. Sleep in a bathroom with your head on the toilet paper dispenser. Do whatever it is you need to do to feel like you aren’t working.
Then, return to work, where your co-workers are watching the clock waiting for 6 p.m., getting ready to shoot out the door like someone received an envelope full of white powder. With them finally gone, you can settle in for some actual productivity. As they trot out, there you’ll be, hard at work for all to see.
That will earn you “midnight oil” points, which you’ll be able to spend during your performance review self-appraisal, when you write: “I work late into the night when it’s called for and don’t leave until the job is done.” And that will be true, though you will be leaving out this line: “…but during the day I watch The Sopranos on DVD in the back seat of my SUV.”
What about those other points, the less popular, more unpleasant-to-get points…the “early bird catches the worm” points?
Yeah, I hate them too, but you need them, especially at the start of your career. You need to be the first one in AND the last one out. You need to be sitting in your cube, typing away, LOUDLY, so that people hear you. (It would be really dumb of you to come in early and not make sure people noticed.)
You need to see that look in their eyes when they arrive at work to find you already at your desk, that look that says: “What the fuck is that guy doing here all ready? He’s making me look bad.”
And more than being early, make your presence felt. Put on the coffee so it’s waiting for people when they arrive, so the rest of the morning they’ll be drinking your coffee. Put out donuts every two or three weeks. There’s nothing as tempting as a free donut, and with each deep-fried apple fritter they bite into, they’ll know it was you who paid for it
When you show up before everyone else, the building is yours, the company is yours, the stash of Girl Scout cookies in your co-worker’s cube is yours. You’re the boss and you’re making critical decisions. About what? How does being early give you power?
If you are the first one in, you can drop meeting invites on people while they are still sipping weak coffee from their travel mugs in rush hour traffic. By logging into the meeting maker first, you can set up meetings concerning your projects before anyone else has a chance. First one to schedule a meeting wins. And when you set up a meeting, you’ve established that meeting room as your territory, the domain you rule. (Again, see the chapter called Meeting Masturbation.)
So, you’re coming in earlier than everyone, leaving later than everyone and even though you’re taking advantage of some free time during the day, you’re still unhappy. It still feels like work if you aren’t at home eating ice cream out of the carton and watching Oprah in your own living room.
I can’t help you if that’s how you feel. You think Donald Trump didn’t put in some hours? You think Bill Gates kept up to date on his soaps while he was making his first billion dollars? You think Bush Jr. got to be president by being a spoiled brat and coasting through life on his family fortune and political connections? It’s true, that is exactly what W did, but unless you’ve got an oil field or two on the family ledger, you aren’t going to get by like W did.
You’re going to work your ass off. Take your pleasures when they come, but if you think you can do this without doing some actual work, forget it. I’m promising to help you to work smarter, but I’m not saying you don’t have to work.
Also, I am not giving you a license to complain about working hard. When I say make your boss and co-workers aware of the hours you’re putting in, I’m saying to subtly let them know you are being cheerfully productive while they go home to their families, favorite TV shows and warm, cozy beds. You smile at them and modestly say you’re going to finish up and go home when you can. You are cheerful in the morning when they arrive. You are not grumpy and you don’t snipe at people for not being there when you are.
You are gracious and happy at all times. You love your work, or at least you act like you love your work. And that’s the real threat to everyone around you in Cubeland, and the reason your boss is going to keep giving you hunks of other people’s territory, because you never complain. You’re eager to take on anything and everything because you’d love nothing more than to work every waking minute. If you start bitching, the boss will start taking things away from you just to shut you up. Capisci?
And that brings us back to Jimmy. Look at him. He’s working late on his report. Even Dick is gone, after having said, “Goodnight! Don’t work too late. You’ll make me look bad. Heh. Heh.”
After the building is quiet and it is certain no one else is around, Jimmy types for a few minutes, then closes the file. He was actually done an hour ago.
He sets up his email to send the report at 11 p.m., instead of the current time of 7 p.m. Using an easily downloadable bit of freeware, he will get credit for another 4 hours of work, because all Dick will know is that email was sent at 11 p.m., and Dick will be appreciative that Jimmy put in so many extra hours on his project.
Jimmy then goes into the meeting maker and schedules two meetings, each with three people, each for projects that Dick threw at him earlier. Then, he schedules another meeting, from 3 to 6 p.m., and Jimmy invites just himself. He labels it “High Level Project Planning,” so when people try to find Jimmy, they’ll get the message that he’s already taking part in a highly important gathering.
Actually, he’s going to go ice skating, and will then treat himself to a facial at the spa around the corner. Then he’s going to come back to work and settle in just as his co-workers are leaving, each of them wondering if they should work longer hours as well, because that damn new guy is really putting in some time. Damn him.
Perfect. Good job, Jimmy.
THE WHITE COLLAR WARRIOR’S ADVICE FOR STANDING OUT ABOVE THE COMPETION AT THE START OF YOUR CAREER
1. Work longer than everyone else, but not necessarily harder. You are the first one in and the last one out. Make sure your boss knows. Make sure your co-workers know.
2. Don’t be an ass about it. Remember, be subtle. Don’t sigh and moan about having to work so many hours. Don’t be complainer. The last thing anyone wants to hear is someone bitching about how hard work is. Here’s a little secret: Everyone thinks they work too many hours. Everyone is overworked, or feels that they are. Just about everyone hates their job, and they aren’t interested in knowing that you hate your job too.
3. Scam a few extra hours of credit by using an email delay send program. Don’t abuse it, but once a week or so set up some email to be sent between 11 p.m. and midnight.
4. Use a meeting as an excuse to escape work during the day, when you can have your fun and take a few minor pleasures, just enough to get through your hellish corporate existence.
5. At night, be happily working as your co-workers and boss walk past you and out the door. Say goodnight with a smile, especially to your boss. Get some real work done now that the place is quiet. Or watch movies on a portable DVD player. Or take a nap. Whatever. Up to you.
6. Set up meetings after co-workers have left or before they come in. Take control of their schedules before they can take control of yours.
7. Come in before your boss. Make sure everyone knows you were there first by making coffee, bringing in donuts, and saying good morning loudly to each person as they walk past your cube. Like I said, don’t be a grouch. But if you really are in a bad mood and you need a little morning giggle, lick each the donuts and put them back on the tray. It’s cheap, I know, but it will give you a smile when you need one.
END OF CHAPTER TWO
Monday, March 01, 2010
The Lost Weekend
Alcohol. Pot. Smack. Shrooms. Bolivian marching powder. Illicit sex (with or without other people being involved). Gambling. Watching every episode of Dancing With The Stars on DVD while gorging on mint chocolate chip ice cream.
All are horrible, debauched and pathetic ways to spend a weekend. But none of those match the shear sadness of a weekend spent PowerPointing. And all of them are preferable, even the Dancing With The Stars weekend, because at least that comes with ice cream.
PowerPointing has made writing a simple product plan just so much more than putting your best ideas into a document and sending it around. That would be just too easy, too effective, to old school.
Thanks to PowerPoint, you’ve also got to spend time selecting just the right photos from Google images, adding in funny cartoons, worrying over font selection, and staring at your computer screen for hours trying to shorten 10 word sentences into four-word bullet points. Your template needs to be as beautiful. Your jokes need to be hilarious. Your organization needs to flow.
It’s got to please people who will review it without letting you speak, so the words need to convey all the points you need to make. And it’s got to make happy those who think your slides should say almost nothing, and you should be speaking to all your important points. Those people want big pictures, slides that have but a single word in a 72-point font, and an overall "feel" that says more than words can ever say.
What’s truly awesome is when your boss is a PowerPoint minimalist and your boss’s boss is a PowerPoint detailist. How do you please both of them? You don’t. But you spend your weekend trying.
All are horrible, debauched and pathetic ways to spend a weekend. But none of those match the shear sadness of a weekend spent PowerPointing. And all of them are preferable, even the Dancing With The Stars weekend, because at least that comes with ice cream.
PowerPointing has made writing a simple product plan just so much more than putting your best ideas into a document and sending it around. That would be just too easy, too effective, to old school.
Thanks to PowerPoint, you’ve also got to spend time selecting just the right photos from Google images, adding in funny cartoons, worrying over font selection, and staring at your computer screen for hours trying to shorten 10 word sentences into four-word bullet points. Your template needs to be as beautiful. Your jokes need to be hilarious. Your organization needs to flow.
It’s got to please people who will review it without letting you speak, so the words need to convey all the points you need to make. And it’s got to make happy those who think your slides should say almost nothing, and you should be speaking to all your important points. Those people want big pictures, slides that have but a single word in a 72-point font, and an overall "feel" that says more than words can ever say.
What’s truly awesome is when your boss is a PowerPoint minimalist and your boss’s boss is a PowerPoint detailist. How do you please both of them? You don’t. But you spend your weekend trying.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Seems We Don't Need Cold Fusion
Most of yesterday we spent talking a lot about cold fusion and the cure for AIDS, why we need them, what was in the way of getting them, how great life would be if we could have them, and some potential ideas about where unicorns with their life saving farts might be hiding.
At the end of the day, our CEO walks in for a chat, and eventualy let's us know that cold fusion is no longer needed, as the fusion we have is just fine, just perfect, couldn't be better, best fusion ever, why would we even bother with cold fusion? But maybe, if we can find a unicorn somewhere, and if maybe we we can capture some of the wind it might have passed, then perhaps he would take a whiff. Maybe.
Where did I put that unicorn net?
At the end of the day, our CEO walks in for a chat, and eventualy let's us know that cold fusion is no longer needed, as the fusion we have is just fine, just perfect, couldn't be better, best fusion ever, why would we even bother with cold fusion? But maybe, if we can find a unicorn somewhere, and if maybe we we can capture some of the wind it might have passed, then perhaps he would take a whiff. Maybe.
Where did I put that unicorn net?
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Inventing Cold Fusion
There are times when company officers are tormented by the recession devils, poked by declining revenues, prodded by financial analysts, and terrified of a market place that's changing so fast you can barely keep up with the buzz words.
Sometimes when times like that happen, a high-up Ivory Tower dweller will decided to pull together a group of his best and brightest. This action team or strike team or blue ribbon panel will be given the task to figure out how to make everything better, how to sell more stuff, how to make the stock price go back up, how make those recession devils go away.
Today, I will be a part of such a group. And our task, as I see it, is do the equivilant of inventing cold fusion while curing AIDS with unicorn farts. Good luck to us.
Sometimes when times like that happen, a high-up Ivory Tower dweller will decided to pull together a group of his best and brightest. This action team or strike team or blue ribbon panel will be given the task to figure out how to make everything better, how to sell more stuff, how to make the stock price go back up, how make those recession devils go away.
Today, I will be a part of such a group. And our task, as I see it, is do the equivilant of inventing cold fusion while curing AIDS with unicorn farts. Good luck to us.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Can You Make That Meeting?
Please attend the next meeting, the meeting-meeting.
Not that one. The other one. The new one. It's a new meeting. Not the other one from yesterday, or this morning, or the conference call on Saturday morning, or the one Tuesday night where we missed American Idol, or the lunch meeting where whatshisname ate like a pound of potato salad.
I’m talking about the next meeting-meeting, where we need to talk about meetings, the planning of meetings, the scheduling of meetings, the timing of meetings, how many meetings we need, and when food, and what food, is allowed at meetings.
If the meeting-meeting conflicts with a meeting, let me know when you are free, because right now, your schedule looks completely blocked out. Are those all real meetings or fake meetings you scheduled in order to have some meeting-free time?
If you could free up one of your meeting-free hours, I’d appreciate it.
Thanks!
Not that one. The other one. The new one. It's a new meeting. Not the other one from yesterday, or this morning, or the conference call on Saturday morning, or the one Tuesday night where we missed American Idol, or the lunch meeting where whatshisname ate like a pound of potato salad.
I’m talking about the next meeting-meeting, where we need to talk about meetings, the planning of meetings, the scheduling of meetings, the timing of meetings, how many meetings we need, and when food, and what food, is allowed at meetings.
If the meeting-meeting conflicts with a meeting, let me know when you are free, because right now, your schedule looks completely blocked out. Are those all real meetings or fake meetings you scheduled in order to have some meeting-free time?
If you could free up one of your meeting-free hours, I’d appreciate it.
Thanks!
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