The bane of my existence

I take boredom over stress any time. At the end of the day, I want to go home on time and have enough energy for my real life. If you work too hard, it is not appreciated but expected from then on. My boss also noted in my recent review that he does not think I give 100%. If he expects that I will be there 80 hours a week, be pager accessible during weekends/vacation/evenings and attend every damn meeting there is, he is absolutely right.

I have seen my dad drudge along in his academic job for about 25 years. When things became almost unbearable (politics/people), he started for himself. First it was on the side, then he quit. He was in a niche market and he made it big in a year. He is getting sued left and right but he could not be happier having control over his own daily life.

Half of my family is an entrepeneur. I also want to go my own way. About half a year I started on the side an I am taking in a extra few thousand every month (all going into my and hubby's SEP IRA). However, I can't rely on this being very steady. I am also not ready to quit the daily drudgery job because of the good benefits. Guess I am too greedy. I will ride that gravy train until they walk me out. Since layoffs happen every few months, it is not a question of if but when.

I have always had a lot of interest in real estate. I just had an inspection done on a house that I want to buy. This is the second time I hired the same inspector in a short time. Again he asked whether he wanted to work with him. He was an engineer at a big company for 20 years until he could not stand it no more. I am considering it for the future and I am also looking for other opportunities. There is so much out there, it just requires a different mind set looking at things and actually some time to explore it as well.

[Eagle43]

I retired a year ago from a large corp, where I had lasted 22 years. Funny thing is, almost the day I walked in I noticed that a lot of the job was make work. You know, you initial this paper and pass it on. This was before the computer became ubiquitous. Today, PowerPoint allows managers to indefinitely prolong and increase banality.

I have seen meetings go on and on. It looks like a barrell full of monkeys. Nothing gets decided. And the next meeting turned into a scintillating discussion of what happened at the last one.

Now, I was in the Defense Industry, which is a quasi-government business. I stuck it out, but don't recommend that method if you have alternatives.

Question: Is the non-Defense business just as bad? If it is, how does anything get done? Are we all just players in a Dilbert strip??

You ARE all just "players in a Dilbert strip", which proves that God has a sense of humor

JG

Quote:

... Funny thing is, almost the day I walked in I noticed that a lot of the job was make work. I have seen meetings go on and on. ... Nothing gets decided. And the next meeting turned into a scintillating discussion of what happened at the last one.... Question: Is the non-Defense business just as bad? If it is, how does anything get done? Are we all just players in a Dilbert strip??

I worked for 3 non-defense, technology companies since 1974 and the amount of nonsense was proportional to the size of the company. The largest company was just like you described.

There was little margin for error in the small (100 employee) company. Employees had to be productive or be gone within 2 or 3 weeks.

Wow! "The amount of nonsense was proportional to the size of the company." I agree 100%

JG

[Otis]

Quote:

Otis, now that I am out of managment I am hoping the boredom level increases.

I'm hopeful that I'll be able to do the same thing in 1-2 years. I need to "check the box," then either get the company to transfer me someplace nice, or take an internal lateral move out of management at my site. Last fall I took a promotion to middle management, and going in I knew my clock would be ticking. Hopefully then I can sit back and enjoy a 40 hour workweek.

[Nords]

Quote:

I am hoping the boredom level increases.

I learned in the military that boredom is the best of the alternatives.

I like to be bored at work, not at home. The last thing I need is to get home exhausted.

I just talked to somebody who used to be very high up in a large chemical multinational. He said the higher up you are, the easier the job especially with large companies where all of it is fluff and BS. The most important part of the job is to ensure you are not seen in the office because a manager is supposed to be in important meetings. So a lot of these guys are hanging out in the mall, gym, golf course or whereever and then 'work late' at night to do at least something like reading email or so.

He walked out the minute he qualifited for medical retirement.

I never worked for a large company but my experience
at the biggest I worked for confirms "all fluff and BS".
Compared to running my own business, it was a walk in the park. I recall working up a report on the state
of our EDP/software systems. The GM took one look and
wrote back "Bullshit and platitudes!" I had to agree.
Anyway, when I bailed out they practically begged me to stay. My heart wasn't in it though, and I knew it.

JG