Imentioned in another thread that I have a few jerks at our work. They make life real pain. So, I figured to ask : how do you guys SURVIVE this ???

As I said in the other thread... one of my colleagues ALWAYS jumps to help me regarless if I needed help or not. Even if I needed someone's help it won't be him. He always argues before doing anything. He always changes things without asking. I just want him to leave me alone and pick another job to do.

Another jerk , the boss. The other day, he interrupted our urgent job to ask me to attend to items that should be arranged and made obsolete. Not only that is not urgent, this job usually means dealing with beaurocrats in the sorehouse and office services. I hate dealing with office-bound beaurocrats who live in ivory towers. They want us to pile things in the middle of the office before they come. And they will need about a week to come AFTER we made the items ready !!!!

So, we have to suffer a week ( or maybe more) of junk in the middle of our office while our original urgent work is being delayed. I asked the jerk, boss, to postpone this nonesense, but he said it was postponed long enough.

Now, two other hard working colleagues are leaving on vacation and work will be further condensed, yet, priorities and common sense seem to be something unknown to our jerks.

Do you have such stories to share ???
It helps relive anxiety a little to see others are also having similar experiences

Those "obsolete items" !!
I tried to tell him that some are in working order and we should keep them as backups. He said we have enough junk and these were not used for lone time , so they should go.

OK. I told him about other stuff that is NOT working, why they were not included in the list ??? He said : let's keep them and try to fix them.

So, we are keeping the non-working stuff, and throwing the working stuff !!!! Absolutely no logic, no system, no common sense.

What I started to do, is to focus on MY own interests there. So, I beefed up my office PSK to contain more tools. Reason ?? To enhance my capability to disassemble some items and take what I need out of them. Example : one field instrument has to be thrown. It is cased in a sturdy box with rubber seal. I unscrewed the istrument , pulled it out of the box, and threw it (the instrument) in the pile. The box itself has become my new tool box. A very nice and sturdy box that is about 12x6x5 inches, with rubber gasket.

I think this is the only way to survive jerkdom.

I think most of us have been there, at one time or another. Some years ago I was trapped in a poorly led, paper shuffling office that was driving me nuts. On the other hand, it was steady work and it was supporting my family.

I was able to transfer to a different location within the same organization. It wasn't easy, it was disruptive, and I had to give up some things, but it turned out really well.

So I would say, don't just sit there and take it, but change something. But think your changes through.

Well, this comes in the middle of other things happening like my daughter getting married in a few months ..etc. I need a work life that steady enough to be able to concentrate on home/family events ... but those jerks make it so hard.

Interesting. A couple questions if you will indulge me.

Does your job have some criteria for your performance that are being adversely affected by jerks?

Are your job duties and specific daily assignments in writing?

sorry if this sounds harsh - get another job and then quit the one you have now. It's not like you're in North Korea and your job is assigned to you.

Beyond that, gripe. complain, moan, make a stink - whatever you want to call it. If you're not happy, then make the whole world know it. People around you will change to accommodate you or, if they don't, it will steel your resolve to get the heck out of there.

I'm sorry if this sounds harsh. I'm not trying to put you down - just trying to answer your question in an honest way.

Sounds like you just have typically woeful management incompetence. Whilst working for an electronics company (involved in manufacturing microwave communication products for space/defense and cellular communications) a group of the production staff where brought into the offices by the quality control engineer (a nice enough lady who liked plastering the productions area with lots and lots of Excel charts ) to be told that the company had shipped millions of dollars (UK sterling) of components, that when the isolators were installed in the cellular towers would overheat and fail within a minutes after being powered up at full power. The fault was a tracked down to the batches of 50 ohm load (100W) resistors manufactured by another electronics defense company.

Anyway as the meeting progressed the quality control engineer was talking/implying that the issue was a failure of the production team who manufactured/assembled/tuned the isolator and circulator devices. It was actually quite a funny attempt at passing the buck, which failed miserably, when the one of the production team asked the direct question, 'Why did YOU let $2 Million worth of kit out of the door, without power soak testing the units using statistical process control?'. The meeting ending shortly after that question was raised.

Even funnier was when I suggested that the load resistors might dissipate the heat from the failing load resistors into the heat sink body if the production engineer would allow us to use some heat sink compound, only to be told that the surface finish was smooth enough not to warrant the use of heat sink compound. 2 weeks later we were using heat sink compound!! Problem apparently solved but of course guess who gets the credit.

And to think these folks sent kit off to NASA on be put in their comms modules for their spacecraft for their Mars and Jupiter space missions.

I left the company soon after being restricted (or escorted) where I could go on the premises after a holiday to Cuba.

If we want to talk about incredible statements by management types, I fondly remember a statement by one (the technical area was preservation of prehistoric pueblo dwellings, a fairly arcane subject) to the effect of "We never make mistakes, because every time we do something, we learn." This after "learning" that application of an untested chemical to a prehistoric wall actually accelerated erosion....

I work for a company whose poor judgment (upper management) seriously injures and kills people. Everyone else can see it, but they can't (even after 20+ years of making the same mistakes).

And then they have the gall to tell us that the source of the problem and the result are the same thing.

Sue

Thanks everyone



#1 No
#2 No

Actually , I used to have the baddest, meanest attitude before where I could tell anyone $%^$## and leave .. I threw out a big boss from my office when he he tried to take some of our equipment, and threw my gloves in the face of my former boss when he came from his ivory tower and told us to change the way we do things to a way that we knew to be wrong. I threw the gloves and asked him to do it himself.

However, I am now near 60 and want to live peacefully. I promised myself to just do my job and go home , no matter what they decided . I would do it their way and &%^$%^$#^% whatever happens. It's their money, their problem, and my salary would be the same.

In addition. I like this job because it is flexible. I can finish manual work, then take the rest ( computer work, writing reports ..etc. ) to my home where I attend to my family needs and then find a peaceful time to do the computer work.

Theoretically, the way it should have been done is to list all work to be done and divide it among us for the whole week. A few days later, each of us send a report to the boss. I like it, but it doesn't go like that. One jerk messes up the priority list , and another jerk distracts me from what I am doing. I have thought of shifting gears and &%^%&^% ing both jerks but I really cannot take it anymore ( I mean I cannot take plowing through life with a mean attitude , I prefer kindness and friendly relationships)

There is another jerk in the department, but luckily our boss is dealing with him , and if he becomes our direct boss, life will become a survival situation. Already three employees have resigned because they couldn't work under his supervision. I can smash him if he pisses me enough, but I am too tired to fight anymore.