Letters to the Editor
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I knew someone like you
He was my colleague. He worked on a project for about 4 months, and then couldn't get it done. So I was given the task of finishing it. At the hand-off he mentioned he'd be out of the office, as his wife was having surgery. I felt sort of bad for him, having bad thoughts about what an incompetent slacker he was when here he was with this personal crisis. So I told him I'd cover for his *other* projects, too. As for the big fat F as in Failure project that I was picking up and trying to make it an unFailure, I had to re-do his 4 months of work in about 5 days, then bring it home, i.e., cramming another 3 weeks of work in about 7 more days. I worked, quite literally, around the clock, only getting up from my desk to relieve cramps in my feet.
At the end of the quarter we had a company do. My erstwhile colleague was there with his wife. So I went over to her, thinking to ask after her health. She was really bright and peppy - really really bright and peppy. Pretty much was "oh, pshaw" at my expressions of concern for her heatlh. And then she kept being really bright and peppy, turning this way and that as she talked. Gradually I realized she looked...different. Was it the hair, newly dyed platinum? No. Was it the fake bake tan, so strange in December? Not really. Really it's funny that it took me so long to cop to what was new because there it was staring me right in the face: a brand new rack, 38DD. This was the surgery my colleague bailed out of work on - BOOB surgery. He's fucking up his job so bad that the rest of us (mostly me) have to pick up the slack and what decisions is he making, this guy who should have been looking for a job in all of his spare time? He decides to spend a cool $10K to get BIGGER BOOBS.
When the time for input to reviews came along and they asked me what I thought, my input was two words: "Fire him." Since everyone was saying that -even the people that weren't directly affected by his slackerdom, he was. It all came down pretty quick, too.
The axe can fall a lot quicker than you think, LW. Don't confuse the quiet around you with no one noticing or caring that you aren't contributing. Don't think that because no one is talking to you about it, you aren't being judged. If you can't start finding a way to be relevant in your organization, start looking for a new job.
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Insanity and the impact of dead weight
LW,
My experience (as a consultant and employee) with over 30 companies tells me that most workplaces are loaded with dead weight, so much so that if you cut these workforces in half, you’d magically double the productivity.
Your situation is - in part - a by-product of this.
Regardless, one thing is certain: insanity is defined by doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
So, if you want a different result, don’t do the same thing over and over again. If you think you can do something different in the context of your current employer, do it. If you believe that the current context, regardless of your actions, won’t yield different results, then you must leave. Otherwise, you’ll spend the rest of your life dying, not living.
But have an honest conversation with yourself about your energy level before taking action. If you cannot sustain a high level of activity no matter what the context, some new endeavor might leave you even less satisfied and more exhausted than you are now.
Good luck!
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Oh, brother (or sister), how I feel your pain
I couldn't believe when I read the title to this post and was further shocked to read LW's letter. I have been in the same situation for about a year and a half, with some twists.
I sense that maybe, like me, you are a person who, wisely or not, invests yourself in the greater machine you are a part of (to borrow Cary's metaphor). I want to see the business or office, or whatever institution I am a small part of, succeed. It's hard for me to see the potential of my machine wasted by a bad carb or governor (management).
I work for a university as an admin in a small, but influential office. My "moral issue" is that my boss is obsessed with control, self-enrichment and empire building and cares much more for his personal fortune than that of the small department or the students and faculty we serve. I see him wasting INCREDIBLE amounts of money, making bad decisions for our department (and terrible for the students and faculty) but good for him and his interests.
I see people who COULD change that, put a stop to his bad behavior (everyone sees it) but don't. He's too connected, they say, nothing's going to change, they say. No matter how often my boss lies and schmoozes the administration out of obvious, huge fuckups, everyone bitches, but never does anything.
So, in the meantime, my boss is so busy with his grand ideas of enrichment, it is often possible for me to go DAYS without doing anything without him noticing. Often, I do. Then, periodically I pull him aside for a meeting and basically beat out of him the things he is planning and what I can do to help. Then I work hard for a while and slide back into doing nothing.
I almost never work at my most efficient, because I can't bear to. My over-developed sense of justice doesn't allow it. My soul would die. My boss is abusing his position and wasting his opportunity to help students and I can't bring myself to help him too much.
All of this is complicated by the fact that I am diagnosed with ADD, but can't get meds for logistical reasons. But, I was able to secure some not long ago, and guess what I discovered? Even if the ADD is taken away, or at least tightly managed, if your heart and soul aren't in it, you still won't be able to make yourself work.
I am bound to this job because it is paying for me to go to grad school and the university community is too small for me to apply for another job internally without my boss finding out. So, I stay for the duration, not working a good portion of the time, but working fairly hard from time to time.
It's not a perfect solution. There's a lot of stress and frustration. I wish LW the absolute best of luck finding their own solution to the problem.