It’s the weekend!!!!!!! Which means what …
nothing ….. well nothing to me. I worked last weekend so this weekend I’m being
more lazy than normal. I woke up this morning and realized it’s nearly time for
my social media break (March 6 - April 20th). It’s a rough time to go on a social media break to be
honest. In March alone I’m going to North Carolina for a SMPS conference
(Ashville) and then going to spend a few days afterwards with my cousin and a
friend who just moved to the area. Other interesting things of note for the
lent season: my Auburn Tigers will join the rest of the SEC for the Gymnastics
Championship in New Orleans (the weekend after my trip or I’d be there); my
boss is planning an employee appreciation night at our local college’s baseball
game which was really fun last year; my SIL has a birthday; then in April my
friend Katie and I are going to see Kiss in Birmingham, and I personally think
Baby Sussex will be here sometime in March cause I don’t think Meghan is making
it to April, but that’s just my opinion. I’m sure there’s other fun things in
the mix I haven’t even thought about yet.
It should be a fun and relaxing month or so,
and I can’t begin to tell you how I need it. The last month at work has been
beyond insane, and I know I say that a lot but this past month nearly broke
Marcy. A submittal I should have had over a month to work on solid, ended up
being crammed into a week and a half and in that timeframe, I also had another
one to get out the door, and assist with two others. The week to get it done
would have been ok but I had a Subconsultant that just wouldn’t send me their
information. I finally got it the DAY BEFORE I HAD TO PRINT. That’s not good.
That did not make for a happy Marcy. The submittal ended up being 5 pages shy
of 200 pages. Not gonna lie almost added some fluff to get me there but I ran
out of time. It’s a good submittal. Do we have a snowballs chance in hell of
getting the contract? Time will tell. I can honestly say that I did my part.
That’s all I can do.
As you know dear reader, I’ll give my job
everything I have all week long, I do my best to NOT work a weekend. I think
it’s good for me and good for my company for me to have those two days. However,
as I recently told a co-worker sometimes you do what you have to do to get it
done. Her response to that made my blood boil. She basically told me to my face
that I “Shouldn’t be working on Saturdays” then she sent me a link to an article that said “Always leave office on time” saying “you really should read
this.” I guess implying that I needed the wisdom of this article in my life. To
summarize the article this random dude on Linked In had shared an image of 7
points about why someone should always leave the office on time, then he gave
his own 2 cents about each of those points after of course telling everyone how
surprised he was that his post nearly went viral, whatever dude.
Look don’t get me wrong I get it … balancing
work and life is a struggle everyone has. Some have kids, husbands, pets, that
require their attention at certain times, I myself like my quality time with my
TV and adult beverages. I get that I totally do. However, I would argue I’m paid,
quite well I should add, to do a job. It’s up to me to get that job done.
Literally whatever it takes to get that job done is what I’m going to do. If I
need to work a couple extra hours during the week to make that happen then
that’s what I’ll do. If a Project Manager isn’t getting back with me the way I
think he/she should then I’m going to start putting together pieces and parts
knowing that when he does finally engage it may change but at least I’ll have a
start of something. . . . anything. The deadline doesn’t change cause she/he
isn’t doing his/her part. What my coworker fails to realize is that that PM is
usually doing actual work work. Don’t get me wrong our work is important too,
but the work HE/SHE does pays my salary which in turn allows me the benefits of
enjoying my life away from work. That same PM likely works many a weekend and
doesn’t get to complain about it, then again that PM makes way more money than
I do for that privilege. Hell last week we had a PM who ended up in the
hospital last Friday after spending 3 days walking around unable to breathe.
Like for real guys he was not able to take a breath but he did a presentation,
had 3 conference calls, visited two offices and then on Friday his coworker
drove him to an Urgent Care and the Urgent Care put him in an ambulance. He’s
better now but Friday night it was scary wondering if we were ever going to be
able to talk to him again. So that’s an extreme that I don’t condone but I can
totally understand the mentality behind it. YOU DO WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO TO GET
IT DONE! Then you lie down, recharge, and start back up again. If these guys can
put that effort into it, then I can sacrifice a couple of hours a week and an
occasional weekend for them. It’s only fair.
However, I was talking about this asshat’sarticle, feel free to read it if you wish. The article is a lot of “feel good
comments and clichés that really just justified his ass being able to go home
at 5.
His points are shown below …
Then as I said he justifies each of these
points with his own bouts of wisdom which frankly sound good on paper but
that’s all …. It’s not always practical. I do agree with him that work never
ends, if it did we’d all have to find new jobs. However, I’d argue that tasks
do. If I can stay an extra 30 minutes or and hour at the end of the day to
finish something so I can move on to the next task then I’m going to do that
cause it will make my tomorrow better. The best part of my job is that the
deadlines are hard. Once that deadline gets here the job is done cause if I
haven’t submitted then submitting late isn’t going to get us anywhere. So at
some point I get to move on no matter if I am ready or not.
This article stresses time management as the
reason most people don’t leave the office on time. I’d argue that is true to an
extent. However, is it my lack of time management that I spent say 3 hours of
my day helping coworkers get their stuff done then have to cram my stuff into
the rest of the day? Is that on me or them? When they are walking out the door
at a quarter to 5 after me spending time on their work am I the idiot here? Yeah
I guess I am. Again, I’d argue that’s the role I’ve risen to in my 15 years at
the company. My boss trust me cause he knows giving me a task means he doesn’t
have to worry about that task anymore. I take pride in that. I hate when I have
to lean on him during a submittal (that 200 pager required him a lot more than
typical and I felt bad about that cause every time I left his office one of my
coworkers was walking in behind me). So should I be more selfish of my time so that
I can increase my “time management” ? Hold that thought ….
The guys second point was that family enriches
your life more than a client ever will. I agree with that too cause clients can
be nothing of a headache cause clients rarely call when they are happy. However
keeping clients happy is important to. I’d wager a guess that if you aren’t
available when a client needs you he will soon stop calling you at all. This asshat also fails to realize you spend far more time with coworkers than family in a given week. What I truly love about my place of business is we rally in times of need and support one another in a way that family does. We are after all one big dysfunctional family. I’d
also argue that family often let’s you down, so yeah on this one he can suck
it.
The one I took huge objection to was the
person who stays late is not a hard working person, mostly cause he went on to
say that person is not working effectively or a benefit to the company and is
frankly a fool. See previous statement about helping others with their work
while I have to do mine after the “time limit” this guy has established has
passed. He states planning your day is a major factor in getting your stuff
accomplished on time. I make a to do list daily. Sometimes the day before and
it starts with the things I need to accomplish (including tasks left over from
the day before) in order to meet my given deadlines. Then throughout the day
other things get added to that list in another color. It’s always interesting
to me at the end of the day seeing what’s crossed off and what’s not and
typically it’s the things that get added to my day that are crossed off first.
The ironic thing is when I do blow people off so I can focus on my stuff I’m
told I’m not a team player, or called not nice names that often rhymes with
witch because for one day … one mfing day I’m not being helpful when someone
says jump. Again maybe he’s right maybe I am a fool. A fool for coming in on a
Friday when what I really wanted to do was take that day off, and for staying
until 4 when what I really wanted to do was leave at 3. What was I doing on
this day? I spent half of it creating a section for a coworker and writing an approach for a submittal
that wasn’t mine, then I pulled resumes for another office and helped a
different office with language for a different submittal. However, that’s right
it was my choice to not take that day off but if I had who would have
handled all that other stuff … my coworkers?! I doubt it. My boss was on vacay
with his family Friday so he couldn’t have done it … .so again I ask who!? So
Mr. Go home on time guy … whose doing everyone else’s job when I’m being
selfish and working on my stuff? Huh?! Ever think about that?! Maybe I am a
fool.
His next point … you didn’t study hard or
struggle in life to become a machine. Again he’s correct in theory. No one
grows up as a small child thinking man if I could only get a job that requires,
I work 40-50 hours a week that’s the dream! Mr. Asshat states you have 24
hours…. 8 hours to sleep (who the hell is he kidding), 8 hours for work, and 8
hours on your own. So he’s stating that essentially there are 16 hours to play
with here. Cause let’s face it find me an adult who sleeps 8 hours and I’ll
show you an adult who is not adulting at all. Then his 8 hours of “my time”
does that include say the hour or so it takes to get ready for work in the
morning, for the record I can do it in 30 minutes, it aint pretty but I can. What
about life time … groceries, taking kids to various appointments, dr appointments, what about
commute time, say that takes an hour a day both ways five days
a week that’s 10 hours a week right there. What I’m saying is it’s a cute idea
and a cliché premise but it’s not practical. That’s my issue with this entire
article. Nothing in this article is practical and it might be what’s wrong with
this generation.
Lastly the comment about a boss forcing
someone to work late. I’M SORRY BUT YES SOMETIMES PEOPLE NEED TO WORK LATE.
THAT’S CALLED LIFE. However, I can tell you I have the best boss on the planet
and he’s often begging me not to. He told me one time he had one employee he
couldn’t get to leave the office and one he couldn’t get to stay in said
office. The truth is my boss has never once told me to stay. He’s told me to
leave but he’s never once said you need to stay. He gets that I have this thing
that makes me want to succeed and this thing in my brain that if I leave
without finishing something I might as well stay cause I’m not going to enjoy
wherever I go. AKA I could leave a task unfinished and pick it back up tomorrow
and go home but I’m going to be at home stressing about said task being
incomplete so 30 minutes here or there will allow to me 100% be at home
unstressed about my work life. Plus I’ll sleep better for the 3-4 hours a night
that I do get. I will also add that stress dreams about work suck super hard and I don't reccomend them at all.
My point is this …. I work hard, I am very
good at my job, I wish others around me understood and were able to also state
those things before they send links to me about how I need to reevaluate
how I do said job.
That is all.
