Pliablemoose's daily beating thread

[Pliablemoose]

I was informed how badly I suck @ workplace politics by my boss today

Anyone have terminal fvcked workplace politics skillz or lack thereof like me?

 

[Monoman]

Well, I had a bad day too if it makes you feel any better.

 

[Kalvin00]

:laugh:

 

[cressida]

tiring today at work and school as well.

 

[cucumber]

Not lately, but once a few years back I called my entire Orchestra a bunch of Commie Faggs. This was when the US had just atacked Afganistan.

Now I'm not some nutty religious right winger, but I'm disgusted the extreme left, and it seems most musicians (or artists in general...) are waaaay left. Many of them actually communist. Any ways. The group was discussing with the conductor about how horrible the US is and how racist any act against the Middle East is. In their eyes any kind of effort to prevent an other 9-11 atack is nothing more than a racist agenda against the non Christian brown people. They were claiming how we deserved it and had it coming for all the racists sh_t America does.

This pissed me off. I said to the guy next to me (a friend. The only one I had there...) "Pinko commie fags!" Well, since everyone was ranting so loudly I had to say it loud so he could hear it. I just happened to say it when everyone shut up. The whole group including the conductor turned to me completely slack jawed with suprise.... I spent the next couple of years there mostly hated by everyone. Oh well. F them.

 

[T2T III]

You might have to read up on: "Workplace Politics for Dummies" - if such a book exists. Plus, some work cultures are not worth trying to learn.

 

[Red Dawn]

Yeah I don't play well with others either!

 

[Fingolfin269]

Originally posted by: cucumber
Not lately, but once a few years back I called my entire Orchestra a bunch of Commie Faggs. This was when the US had just atacked Afganistan.

Now I'm not some nutty religious right winger, but I'm disgusted the extreme left, and it seems most musicians (or artists in general...) are waaaay left. Many of them actually communist. Any ways. The group was discussing with the conductor about how horrible the US is and how racist any act against the Middle East is. In their eyes any kind of effort to prevent an other 9-11 atack is nothing more than a racist agenda against the non Christian brown people. They were claiming how we deserved it and had it coming for all the racists sh_t America does.

This pissed me off. I said to the guy next to me (a friend. The only one I had there...) "Pinko commie fags!" Well, since everyone was ranting so loudly I had to say it loud so he could hear it. I just happened to say it when everyone shut up. The whole group including the conductor turned to me completely slack jawed with suprise.... I spent the next couple of years there mostly hated by everyone. Oh well. F them.

Didn't you know? In order to be 'artsy' you have to be liberal. I'm not saying that I know the WHY behind that statement or anything, I'm just saying that's how it is.

 

I just tend to agree with everyone and no one's the wiser - everyone thinks I'm on their side, and I never get confronted about it!

 

[imported_Cheeseburger]

Keep your mouth shut and your head down and just smile and nod at what anyone says and you will be fine.

 

[CChaos]

I also suck at office politics and it's one of the reasons I like the relative automony of my current position. Esentially, I never know when to keep my mouth shut, so I've adopted the policy of being 100% honest about everything. This way I may say some stupid things, but at least I'm consistent and everything is out in the open.

 

[cucumber]

Originally posted by: Fingolfin269

Originally posted by: cucumber
Not lately, but once a few years back I called my entire Orchestra a bunch of Commie Faggs. This was when the US had just atacked Afganistan.

Now I'm not some nutty religious right winger, but I'm disgusted the extreme left, and it seems most musicians (or artists in general...) are waaaay left. Many of them actually communist. Any ways. The group was discussing with the conductor about how horrible the US is and how racist any act against the Middle East is. In their eyes any kind of effort to prevent an other 9-11 atack is nothing more than a racist agenda against the non Christian brown people. They were claiming how we deserved it and had it coming for all the racists sh_t America does.

This pissed me off. I said to the guy next to me (a friend. The only one I had there...) "Pinko commie fags!" Well, since everyone was ranting so loudly I had to say it loud so he could hear it. I just happened to say it when everyone shut up. The whole group including the conductor turned to me completely slack jawed with suprise.... I spent the next couple of years there mostly hated by everyone. Oh well. F them.

Didn't you know? In order to be 'artsy' you have to be liberal. I'm not saying that I know the WHY behind that statement or anything, I'm just saying that's how it is.

Yeah

It's damned horrible. This is why the vast majority of my friends are completely removed from anything remotely artistic. They're mostly computer/ audio geeks (this includes me. I love this sh!t), business types or doctors. I've never gotten along with others in my field of work (or study. This was even worse through out school + college...) I'll find the occasional rational person but it's rare.

I'm moving to California soon (becoming a studio hired gun. at least for now....) and I dread the massively leftist outlook I'll be surrounded by. I've lived mostly in the South (except for Chicago) so if I'm seeing this hard core lefty sh!t (in the land of crazed right wingers) I can only imagine what it will be like there......

 

[Orsorum]

I'm actually very good at workplace politics... just horribly bad at politics where I have no authority whatsoever. I'm very good at my job, but apparently I suck at weaseling out of consequences.

 

[Maggotry]

Originally posted by: Cheeseburger
Keep your mouth shut and your head down and just smile and nod at what anyone says and you will be fine.

That's pretty much my take on it. I just show up, do the best job I can, and go home.

 

[Pliablemoose]

Sigh,,,

This one was a classic, 2 levels of management told me repeatedly to do things 1 way, surveyors come around, I tell them what I've been told to do, management backs away from what they told me to do & lets me take the hit...

If I fuss about it, I get a higher "asshole profile" & call my boss a liar up the chain of command, but I'll win, because I can prove what they told me.

 

[DurocShark]

I hate office politics!!!

Job 1: One of 2 IT guys in the whole company. We were kicking butt and converting the old IBM dummy terminal Twinax networks to NetStation/PC/Ethernet TCP/IP networks. Things were going so well the president of the company decided we needed a director (we were reporting to accounting at the time). So he hired his nephew. The guy, while friggin smart as heck, had no common sense and no clue how to test systems before putting them into production. Nothing like 5am calls because email is down cuz the director changed the mail server without telling anybody. Plus he'd promise crap to people there was no way we could provide.

With my complete and usual lack of restraint, I bitched about him loudly and constantly. He finally fired me (with a very nice severance package) to get rid of me.

Job 2: Worked for a mortgage company that was bought by WaMu. Help Desk went from 7 people including a manager, to just me. Supporting the same number of people. At least I reported directly to the IT Director who rocked. Then the politics began in the Network Engineering group. Suddenly, users couldn't change pw's themselves due to screwups by the network guys. I'd spend most of my day just changing people's passwords. Then the network group decided to only allow THEMSELVES to do pw changes. I'd have to send them tickets whenever someone called for a pw change. It would sometimes take 2 days to get that done, with the user making zero money for the company in that time.

Again, I ranted loudly and profusely. The company put a manager between me and the director at this time too. That manager was a wussyboy. One of the "don't make waves" school of management. So I started going over his head to try to get things fixed. No luck. After months of 12+ hour days I gave up and quit.

Now I'm at a job I love, with management that as a rule considers the effect of their actions on the users. They screw up on occasion, but they try. And we have an awesome culture here too. Plus they pay a bit over industry standard...

 

[PatboyX]

Originally posted by: cucumber

Originally posted by: Fingolfin269

Originally posted by: cucumber
Not lately, but once a few years back I called my entire Orchestra a bunch of Commie Faggs. This was when the US had just atacked Afganistan.

Now I'm not some nutty religious right winger, but I'm disgusted the extreme left, and it seems most musicians (or artists in general...) are waaaay left. Many of them actually communist. Any ways. The group was discussing with the conductor about how horrible the US is and how racist any act against the Middle East is. In their eyes any kind of effort to prevent an other 9-11 atack is nothing more than a racist agenda against the non Christian brown people. They were claiming how we deserved it and had it coming for all the racists sh_t America does.

This pissed me off. I said to the guy next to me (a friend. The only one I had there...) "Pinko commie fags!" Well, since everyone was ranting so loudly I had to say it loud so he could hear it. I just happened to say it when everyone shut up. The whole group including the conductor turned to me completely slack jawed with suprise.... I spent the next couple of years there mostly hated by everyone. Oh well. F them.

Didn't you know? In order to be 'artsy' you have to be liberal. I'm not saying that I know the WHY behind that statement or anything, I'm just saying that's how it is.

Yeah

It's damned horrible. This is why the vast majority of my friends are completely removed from anything remotely artistic. They're mostly computer/ audio geeks (this includes me. I love this sh!t), business types or doctors. I've never gotten along with others in my field of work (or study. This was even worse through out school + college...) I'll find the occasional rational person but it's rare.

I'm moving to California soon (becoming a studio hired gun. at least for now....) and I dread the massively leftist outlook I'll be surrounded by. I've lived mostly in the South (except for Chicago) so if I'm seeing this hard core lefty sh!t (in the land of crazed right wingers) I can only imagine what it will be like there......

you should probably go ahead and stop worrying about it.
i have a ton of friends who dont believe the same things i do and every so often we do fight about it (you know, to get it out of the way) but dont let it consume you too much. it could destroy your chance at some good friendships.
by the way, me and all my pinko commie artist friends have never once minded being called pinko commie art faggies. those dudes should lighten up about it. something tells me the artists you have found yourself near are the characature, stereotype, sitting around in cafes all day writing terrible poetry and masturbating with each other about being the new lost generation blah blah blah. ach.

anyway: suddenly finding yourself being tactless at work does, in fact, suck.

 

[badmouse]

Originally posted by: Pliablemoose
Sigh,,,

This one was a classic, 2 levels of management told me repeatedly to do things 1 way, surveyors come around, I tell them what I've been told to do, management backs away from what they told me to do & lets me take the hit...

If I fuss about it, I get a higher "asshole profile" & call my boss a liar up the chain of command, but I'll win, because I can prove what they told me.

Yup, you suck at office politics. The proper response to that would have been to back off a bit, say, "I THINK that's what they said to do" - and then call your bosses in front of the surveyors and say "I'm in this position now, what should I do?" thereby throwing the ball back into their court. Or, blame someone down the chain - somebody else took all the management messages incorrectly? The cleaning staff rearranged your papers and relabeled them? Heck, the telephone was malfunctioning so you misunderstook? THIS is proper office politics, and skilled players do this automatically without thinking.

They know you suck at politics, which makes you and easy target - they screwed up, SOMEBODY has to take the heat, so why not you?

If you're not good at this stuff, don't even TRY to do it, because these guys are way better than you. Just go ahead and do your job well, as you always do, and let your talent and integrity speak for you. You won't win at office politics, but you'll sleep at night.

 

[cucumber]

Originally posted by: PatboyX

Originally posted by: cucumber

Originally posted by: Fingolfin269

Originally posted by: cucumber
Not lately, but once a few years back I called my entire Orchestra a bunch of Commie Faggs. This was when the US had just atacked Afganistan.

Now I'm not some nutty religious right winger, but I'm disgusted the extreme left, and it seems most musicians (or artists in general...) are waaaay left. Many of them actually communist. Any ways. The group was discussing with the conductor about how horrible the US is and how racist any act against the Middle East is. In their eyes any kind of effort to prevent an other 9-11 atack is nothing more than a racist agenda against the non Christian brown people. They were claiming how we deserved it and had it coming for all the racists sh_t America does.

This pissed me off. I said to the guy next to me (a friend. The only one I had there...) "Pinko commie fags!" Well, since everyone was ranting so loudly I had to say it loud so he could hear it. I just happened to say it when everyone shut up. The whole group including the conductor turned to me completely slack jawed with suprise.... I spent the next couple of years there mostly hated by everyone. Oh well. F them.

Didn't you know? In order to be 'artsy' you have to be liberal. I'm not saying that I know the WHY behind that statement or anything, I'm just saying that's how it is.

Yeah

It's damned horrible. This is why the vast majority of my friends are completely removed from anything remotely artistic. They're mostly computer/ audio geeks (this includes me. I love this sh!t), business types or doctors. I've never gotten along with others in my field of work (or study. This was even worse through out school + college...) I'll find the occasional rational person but it's rare.

I'm moving to California soon (becoming a studio hired gun. at least for now....) and I dread the massively leftist outlook I'll be surrounded by. I've lived mostly in the South (except for Chicago) so if I'm seeing this hard core lefty sh!t (in the land of crazed right wingers) I can only imagine what it will be like there......

you should probably go ahead and stop worrying about it.
i have a ton of friends who dont believe the same things i do and every so often we do fight about it (you know, to get it out of the way) but dont let it consume you too much. it could destroy your chance at some good friendships.
by the way, me and all my pinko commie artist friends have never once minded being called pinko commie art faggies. those dudes should lighten up about it. something tells me the artists you have found yourself near are the characature, stereotype, sitting around in cafes all day writing terrible poetry and masturbating with each other about being the new lost generation blah blah blah. ach.

anyway: suddenly finding yourself being tactless at work does, in fact, suck.

Yeah. Maybe I've been unlucky in the groups I end up playing in. They are often far beyond any rational realistic thought. (and I don't mean that they justs disagree with my politics,.....they live in a different world. Their own created realities. Of course they also never bother with actual facts or history...)

I'm not saying I dislike anyone who disagrees with me, (I like plenty of people who do) but most of my work surroundings have been very volatile. In any case I thnk I'll have fun in LA outside of work even if it does turn out to be more of the same.

Oh, and this cracked me the fvck up.....: "sitting around in cafes all day writing terrible poetry and masturbating with each other about being the new lost generation blah blah blah. ach" :laugh:

I think you hit the nail on the head with this one.