Two girls in the office were trying to get the printer to print on headed paper via manual feed.

R: It’s not going in!

T: What do you mean?

R: It’s there but it’s just not sucking it in!

T: Right, now try again.

R: Ok, I’ll try and push it in this time.

T: Yeah, push!

R: Oh, it’s sucking!

I know, anything for entertainment in the office…

PBIO’s new office decoration include putting here and there this tough and resilient species of Dracena Sanderiana.

The Chinese say Lucky Bamboo improves Feng Shui and creates a space where you feel safe and more energized. It brings luck, fortune, and prosperity to your loved ones – not  to mention the beauty and color it brings into your home!

My boss has invited me to take up the challenge of arranging our department Christmas party, when I say invited I mean ordered, I don’t get a choice – those of you that know me will realise this is about as clever as asking Myra Hindley to baby-sit. This is a ridiculously bad idea for two key reasons, firstly I don’t really like Christmas and secondly I don’t really like the majority of the witless dribbling unwashed masses I am forced to interact with at work, a recipe for festive related disaster me thinks.
The princely sum of £20 per head is available for me to blow on this soirée so an evening at the Ritz is out, incidentally the term ‘per head’ is on the conversational ban list here as it is seen as being derogatory to minorities who were born without heads and also latterly victims of Al Qaeda like that scouse bloke Ken, anyway as usual I digress.
So, I have decided to come at this from a multi faith ethnically diverse and non exclusive approach which for those of you who do not work in directorate three of the thought police (ethnic festival management) means I am going to make it as un Christmassy as humanly possible. Not for the benefit of the PLO sleeper agent in our architecture team although he will be pleased but more because its my party and I don’t like Christmas.
In Bygone years Christmas in an office environment used to be a time of long pub lunches paid for by grateful management, time to bond as a team, to buy each other presents and if your luck is in or you have a spare fiver a ten minute knee trembler in the stationary cupboard with Janet the bike from accounts, all before going home to get ready for the big gratis evening dinner dance, partners welcome.
Christmas isn’t even called Christmas anymore, the ‘Festive period’ is no longer about peace and good will to all men (sexist statement) nor is it about management making that extra effort to make staff feel appreciated and included. It’s all about making sure your dates don’t slip, projects still march inexorably forward and people who know what they are doing are on call over the holidays to assist our offshore friends. As for the knee trembler with Janet well, the stationary cupboard has been rearrnaged into a windowless office with 8 desks crammed into it and even if it wasn’t Janet and her Yule tide duties are now being carried out by someone called Ranjeet in India, at least the post it note ordering part is anyway.
All in all celebrating Corporate Christmas is crap (alliteration mega streak!) its more about making sure work isn’t effected and minority groups aren’t in some way offended, not that any of the ‘minority’ individuals I work with care, the cynical amongst us might say its our paranoid directorate three friends keeping themselves in work and I would have to agree.
All that said at least my boss will be pleased that his year and probably slightly suspicious as I have for once decided to tow the company line, embrace our mission statement and ethos and pull in the same direction as management – in other words I have arranged for our department Christmas to be at our local curry house! Pint of Kingfisher anyone?

During my ten or so years in the corporate world I had the distinctive pleasure of observing and occasionally meeting some fantastic creatures. Being part of IT companies it would be very easy to single out the “geek” persona. These and other corporate characters (suck-ups, rebels, smellers) you already know pretty well. I’m going to direct your attention to other types you might already know, but didn’t quite figure out how to name, let alone understand their behavior. Hopefully my musings here will help you deal with these creatures when you next encounter them.

Corporate Copycats

Suck-ups are a dime a dozen in any company. It’s safe to say wherever there’s a boss, someone’s face is attached to his ass. The copycat is a different creature. You might say copycats are enhanced versions of suck-ups. Their utmost desire is to become a person other than themselves, so they pick their target (usually his / her boss or a member of upper management) and basically copy their behavior to the extent of their possibilities.

I’ve come across these creatures in more than one occasion. They not only back-up whatever their bosses say, no matter how stupid or unreasonable it might be, they usually adopt it with a passion and blind eagerness to obey more suited to the military than to a business environment.

It is a very dangerous thing to follow rules without thinking, that’s why copycats are potentially dangerous individuals. In case you encounter one and you happen to disagree on a particular subject, be mindful that since copycats have no mind of their own their mind cannot be changed. You will never succeed unless you manage to convince their object of desire (i.e. the person they emulate) of changing his mind instead. This strategy could mean jumping the chain of command, so it must be used wisely.

The Un-feedback-able

I’ve spent half of my professional life as a manager, and as such delivering periodical feedback has always been one of my duties. In all of my teams without exception there has always been a person that no matter how much I tried to explain things to, would always wind up not listening or not caring and ultimately doing whatever they wanted to. Also, they would rebut every single piece of negative feedback, finding a very reasonable justification for every single thing you dare consider a flaw in their performance. These are the un-feedback-able.

Coincidentally or not, in my teams, these were always brilliant people with authority issues and stubborn to the bone. I remember dreading the moment in which I had to deliver them feedback and in more than one occasion I would purposely schedule the appointment at the end of the day because I knew my mind would not be good for much after it.

Finally (after a few years) I came up with the formula to deal with the un-feedback-able: pulling rank. If you know me or have read my previous post on management you’ll know that I discourage this type of method unless necessary. This is one such occasion.

I found that time and brain cells could be saved by using phrases such as: “I can see you are not in agreement with my position, but I’m your manager and I will be evaluating you according to what I just told you.”

Sadly, most times they carried on doing exactly what they wanted to, but at least, if on their next evaluation I had to shave points off their final score I could do so without so much as an “I told you to do things in a different way”.

Showoffs

In a recent comment to one of my posts, one of you inspired the species I’m about to describe. The comment described those developers that just can’t do something in a straightforward fashion and wind up unnecessarily complicating things in order to prove to others their vast knowledge. These are the tech showoffs you can find in almost all development teams.

The behavior of these creatures is clearly derived of insecurity. Not long ago men resorted to their cars to make up for their shortcomings elsewhere. Later, cars were replaced (or accompanied) by gadgets such as laptop computers, cell phones or smart-phones. Nowadays, for developers, penis size can be measured by the amount of unnecessary frameworks they are able to pile up in order to create a single “Hello World” application.

It doesn’t matter if something that could be done in fifteen minutes took five months to build, or that it has the hardware requirements of an electric power plant; showing off to your peers justifies almost anything.

When confronted with one of these creatures you need to know this is almost always a sin of youth and will eventually fade away. Anything you can do to speed up the learning process could help, but remember no matter how much you try to teach life experience, there is nothing like experiencing by one-self. Working a five-day rush will teach any showoff that sometimes a smart architectural or design choice will pay off big at a later stage.

Self Promoter 2.0

I know self promoters are no novelty, but social networking has helped engineer a completely new breed of this fascinating species. They don’t just brag about their accomplishments (whether real or invented) in office halls anymore. They have expanded their domain and now spend most of their time building their 2.0 personas to be the very reflection of the perfect professional, something of course they could accomplish by doing some actual work once in a while, but… why bother?

This creature is cunning, let’s face it, there is no way a person with no smarts can pull this off. However, they tend to build as much enemies as fans, since subordinates or peers of these individuals often feel social self promoters are full of it and take credit when they don’t deserve it or just plain don’t do the job they are supposed to and more work falls on their laps.

I have yet to figure out a way of dealing with social self promoters. I can’t say I have had direct interaction with any of them, but I keep hearing about them from acquaintances. Boy, do they sound pissed off. I eagerly await to see what happens when one of these individuals falls from grace. I believe that given their exposure they could immediately become pariahs. The bigger they are…

Flavor Combination

Any one person could simultaneously be more than one of the creatures described above. Surely a showoff has some traits of an un-feedback-able individual, and a traditional suck-up or self promoter could easily have the characteristics of both a copycat or a social self-promoter.

If you see a person that combines the four, please send a picture to both me and National Geographic. You could have an amazing discovery on your hands.

Shuje

On my next post I will explain why you should not feed developers after midnight. In the meantime, I would very much like to hear about the fauna in your workplace. Any creatures I should know of? Comment below or e-mail me at shuje@holoom.com

This morning I was click on someone’s facebook unintentionally. She works in the same place with me but I am not her friend. Why not? Well, let me tell you why….

She and her friend are kindda a popular girls. Whenever ther is an office party, they took the role as the singers, or main dancers to whom people’s eyes would look to. In day conversation they were talking about many different glamorous ~~at least looks glamours to me~~ things like places to go, hip hang-outs clubs to be in, branded outfits to wear and so. I rarely able to follow the flow of those conversation since I am just a simple girl with a simple life. The whole impression that I got from them is: that they are happily single girls with happy colourful life with dynamic never-ending energy to hold the world with those cool friends in their wide networks.

I won’t be able to be a friend with a person like that.

But this morning I got different opinion after seeing what in her facebook. I saw her picture with some of her friends, I saw her picture traveling to other part of the world with her close friend and her boyfriend. But, other than feeling envy, I feel sick. Weird huh? Tell me, why people posting their pictures in the facebook? Because they want to tell the world about their proud life ~~and hopefully to make people envy~~. Why people put a picture of them in front of the statue of Liberty or in the Giza pyramid or in Eiffel Tower other than post a picture taken when they in their backyard? Surely because them, and I and all, want the world knows that we were visiting those cool places so we also looks cool because not everybody in this world lucky enough to be able to go.

Okay, back to the topic. Seeing her collection did not makes me envy, at all. From those proud pictures I could see a girl who her life is less colourful than what I thought. She ~~and her friend~~ is only a girl that had limited life and dream and small circle of life. Her picture is not funny is not cherrie is not alive. It was not more than just people smiles to the camera without much soul. I don’t feel like I think her days are cool or funny and I know for sure that what I had is much more better than those. Somewhat I feel pity of her. If she is a simple girl just like other, why she had to pretend ~~or maybe not pretend~~ or acted like she is a glamour one?

I don’t get it.

Proud?

So I told you earlier how you might want to avoid going to the bank on Friday, now I’ve got some information for you on the increase in office thefts.

These days thieves are really reaching. As traditional targets for theft have beefed up their security and the recession has driven people to desperate measures, robbers are infiltrating corporate offices. Many of the incidences involve small companies with ground-level offices that offer easy access. And sometimes the perpetrators are armed, heightening fear among office workers who thought their sleepy cubicle farms were safe.

While the total number of robberies in general decreased slightly in 2008 from 2007, according to estimates from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, there was an estimated 10.1% increase from 2004. In 2008, there were an estimated 2.2 million burglaries—an increase of 3.6% when compared with 2004 data.

During the third quarter of this year, Crisis Care Network Inc. provided crisis counselors to employees at 206 workplaces—including offices and retail stores—following incidents of armed robbery, up from 185 during the same period in 2008.

In the past year, ComPsych Corp. , a provider of employee-assistance programs, has seen a 21% increase in the number of requests for crisis counseling at offices that were robbed while employees were present; requests from banks rose 16%.

But the crimes may be more widespread than that since counselors typically are called in only following incidents in which employees’ lives were actually threatened, says Richard Chaifetz, chairman and chief executive officer of the Chicago firm, which services more than 11,000 organizations and 29 million workers world-wide.

And of course, the little Hollywood ring was recently busted. Paris Hilton can leave her stuff strewn about her place once again.

BRAND NEW GOSSIP IN MY OFFICE!!!! THEY BREAK UP!! WHAT???!!!!

secepat itu kah?? sesingkat itukah??? what happen…what happen??? ada apa ini, ada apa?? kok bisa???

saya baru dapat kabar ini tadi pagi, saya KUAGET PUOL LHO!!!! SUMPEH GUWE!!!

sumpah mereka pacaran masih dalam hitungan minggu, 3 bulan pun sepertinya belum. wait!! ni ngomongin sapa sih??? Angelina Jolie??? ups sorry! hihihihi….ni lagi ngomong si cewek ramah and adiknya pak bos itu. yang dengan suka hatinya saya caci-maki di tulisan saya sebelumnya. heuheuheuheu…..

what happen?? donno, no one knew it. duo saya itu bilang kalo dia (adik pak bos.red) akhirnya hanya menganggapnya adik saja. pantas saja kelakuan si cewe super ramah itu semakin aneh belakangan ini. itu bukan coz mereka lagi hot-hotnya, tapi coz mereka putus. sikap overwhelmingnya itu karena untuk cover up how though and strong she is?? it might be. tapi sumpah overwhelmingnya itu lho yang nyesek abez. mungkin coz masih satu kantor and satu proyek jadi mungkin itu cara dia nunjukin bahwa she’s fine. but still, one more, OVERWHELMING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

yah itulah kalau terlalu sombong. maksa banget untuk jadi nyoya wakdir, baru juga itungan minggu pacaran. sadar-sadar dirilah, diri sendiri itu sebagus apa kok yo mekso banget. what a trully social climber. and guess what?? fall before next step! iiihhh kalo akyu yo malu yo!!!

hasil didikan orang tua itu memang pengaruhnya besar banget dalam hidup kita, itu sangu terbaik yang di berikan orang tua untuk seumur hidup kita. aku selalu diajari untuk tau diri. jangan maksa untuk nail level kalo merasa itu bukan tempat kita. naik level itu pun gak membuktikan kalo kamu bagus, baik. semakin tinggi level kita di mata orang, semakin tinggi tanggung jawab yang kita emban. kalau belum siap, itulah hasilnya jatuh duluan sebelum melangkah.

poor you, social climber.

You know it’s another Monday morning in the office, when this is all you can think of.

ada quotes yang bilang gini :

“sekali kau memanjat anak tangga terus keatas dari anak tangga yang paling bawah, kau tidak akan pernah berhenti melihat kebawah, ke arah mereka yang tidak seberuntung dirimu”

and saya akan menjawabnya “kalau lu ngotot nge push diri lu terus untuk berada di tingkat yang paling tinggi, watch ur step, darlink. kalau jatuh, sakitnya sih emang, tapi malunya itu naudzubillah!!!”

mama saya sering bilang kalau orang yang berada di tingkat ekonomi yang agak bawah, terus mereka sedikit dicicipi how live as a the have one, mereka akan ‘maksa’ untuk dapat lebih, NO MATTER WHAT!!!

di keluarga saya aja ada yang seperti itu. but now i wont talk about ma famie,  now i want talk about THE PACARNYA BOS!

and the story begin: she was start to work at the same office with me one day before i start. kami berdua sama-sama sukritaris. bedanya dia sukritaris kepala proyek, yang proyeknya menghidupi kantor pusat. sedangkan saya adalah sukritarisnya bapak direktur utama.

kantor tempat saya kerja itu adalah kantor pusat yang membawahi langsung 17 proyek yang menyebar di hampir seluruh Jawa Timur, Jawa Tengah, Kalimantan dan saat ini Lombok. selain seluruh staff kantor pusat yang berada satu kantor dengan saya, ada juga beberapa staf dari proyek lain. biasanya mereka staff keuangan.

dari awal kerja, saya berusaha mengakrabkan diri dengan semua orang, remaining saya newbie in this office and short off those job desc are totally brand new things for me. saya mengakrabkan diri yoooo dengan cara sayalah. bila nanti pada akhirnya ada masalah dengan approach itu, i knew what to do. i’m kind of girl yang always strainght to the point. saya marah, ya marah. saya tidak suka, ya saya bilang kalau saya tidak suka. i’m sorry darlink, i’m not tipical yang suka bermanis-manis sama siapa aja pada saat hati saya merasa itu tidak perlu. buat saya itu buang-buang energi. keep your energy for important things, honey. *senyum jahat aaahhhh*

well, approach tiap orang tidak akan pernah sama. begitupun dengan gadis manis berkerudung yang merupakan sukritaris bapak proyek lain itu. i’m keep on wondering why she’s here, in my office??? she’s a sukritaris, she must follow her bos and her bos stay in office which lies an hour away from my office. alasannya waktu itu adalah bahwa kantor yang di proyek itu belum siap. still, not making any sense for me if you see the “kantor yang belum siap” itu.

she so young, younger than me arround 4 years. so still fresh and have a lot of energy. she so ramah. kenapa sampai saya kasih mark di kata ramah? coz its SOOO OVERWHELMING, DARLINK!!! i knew what the meaning of ramah and polite with anyone, tapi kalo yang satu ini super over dosis. betewe, perusahaan saya itu tergolong perusahaan keluarga coz ada beberapa anggota keluarga pak bos yang ikut bekerja mempertahankan kelangsungan hidup perusahaan ini. salah satu anggota keluarga pak bos itu adalah kepala perijinan dari proyek  yang menghidupi kantor pusat ini and dia adalah adik kandung pak bos. yang coinsidence nya adalah ternyata dia adalah teman sekelas saya waktu di kelas 3 saat SMA dulu.

well coz adik dari pak bos itu masih single, he’s a high quality jomblo getow loch. thank God he’s not my type. coz orangnya kalau becanda sumpah garing banget bo!! dari awal cewek ramah itu sepertinya sudah di pdkt in sama adiknya pak bos ini. si ramah ini pinter lah, secara ya adiknya orang no 1 di company nyoba pdkt sama dia. kliata aahh…apa sayanya memang sensitif ya sama hal-hal yang berbau-bau fake biti palsu gini?? dunno lah.singkat kata-singkat cerita, mereka pacaran.

baru 2 minggu jadian dah ada rumors kalo keluarga si cewe minta cepet-cepet dilamar. WOW!!! gosh! slow down, baby! you know what terlalu sadar diri  itu kadang akhirnya jadi keliatan super kampungan banget!!! so  sekarang mereka dah pacaran and si cewe ramah itu mulai ‘membersihkan’ profile fb nya dari teman-teman yang dia anggap gak ok buat dia, salah satunya saya dan duo saya itu.

kemarin si cewek ramah itu mau di move ke kantor proyek tempat seharusnya dimana dia berada and guez what, SHE FUCKING CRY, HONEY! nangisnya itu coz farewell tears gitu katanya. let me tell you, im not a dumb-dumb that you can lie with this idiot crappy things,ok? ya mana mau lah dia di move ke kantor proyek itu, kan jadinya dia gak bisa ketemuan sama sang adik bos, gak bisa lagi pamer ke tetangga-tetangga di kampung kalo punya pacar adiknya bos, gak bisa lagi dianterin pulang naik honda jazz gold. see, who’s the idiot here??? pake bilang kalo itu farewell tears lah! plis honey! and guez what setelah ‘idiot farewell tears’ itu, dia teuteup aja ngantor di kantor pusat. she never move to her real project.

one thing, setelah dia pacaran sama adik pak bos, tingkahnya yang super duper overwhelming ramah itu, aje gile, semakin menjadi-jadi, bo!!! swetie-huney, TAMBAH KELIATAN FAKE NYA, dodol!!! palsu!!! keliatan banget kalo dibuat-buat. uuuhhhh…seramah and sekiyut mungkiiiinnn dah pokoknya. aduh sumpah saya mau muntah!!! pake acara teriak-teriak imut pula kalo digodain sama sapaaaaaaaaaa gitu. but you know what dalam beberapa occasion which no one notice, dia akan sangat cemberut!! lebih ancur dari saya kalo cemberut.

saya kesel dia remove saya dari fb nya? ya!!! coz saya gak pernah merusuh apalagi mengobrak-abrik fb nya. saya gak pernah mengata-ngatain dia, yang ada saya malah nasehatin dia saat dia ‘cry me a river’ dateng ke saya minta nasehat coz dicuekin sama adiknya pak bos itu. lha wong saya ini ramah, baik hati dan tidak sombong kok…lho ya saya kasi to, nasehat gitu loh, hal yang paling suka saya bagi-bagikan gratis. sekarang setelah mereka steady, kok jadi saya yang dibuang??? itu lah yang seperti ibu saya bilang. orang-orang dari kalangan yang kurang have gitu, kalo dicicipi sedikit living large, mereka akan berusaha terus untuk bisa mencapai level tertinggi, they are the trully social climber. meskipun itu artinya dia harus membuang teman-teman yang selalu mendampinginya disaat-saat sulit.

kebahagiaan yang tidak dibarengi dengan sikap tulus dan ikhlas, buahnya pahit sekali, darlink. you will fall and its totally shame on you.

no darlink, ni bukan lagunya tante Celine Dion *tante jare!!*

its about office creature!

seperti Synyster pernah koment di tulisan saya yang saya posted di ngerumpi.com:

kantor bukanlah wahana untuk berteman kalo saya boleh jujur..

kantor adalah hutan belantara

dan layaknya dihutan,
cuma satu aturannya..

makan atau dimakan..
dan yang harus pertamakali di bakar idup2 serta dimutilasi adalah..
- para penjilat atasan
- para pengecut yang berani ngomong di belakang
- para pengadu yang berlindung di balik ketek penguasa
- para “teman” yang menusuk dari belakang

hmm sebenernya kalo di jumlah..
ini udah hampir 97% dari isi kantor..

disini adalah bagaimana kita harus extra hati-hati kalau bicara. and disini saya mau ngomongin hati-hati kalo bicara sama siapa aja di kantor!!!!

dunno why akhir-akhir ini saya merasa quite unsecure kalau mau curhat-curhat sama duo saya itu di kantor. satu-satu duo saya itu crita kalo si cewe berdukun nand ang kalo ketawa kayak cewek murahan itu teryata anak emasnya pak komisaris. terus si calon nyonya wakdir itu sekarang kok tambah dibuat-buat ya gayanya. eneg gitu liatnya. sejak dia jadian sama adik pak bos saya, gaya bicaranya tambah…….tambah kemenyeklita endelwati lah pokoknya.

you will knew which one is fake and wasn’t.  how??? you just knew it.

sekarang mbak kasir kantor pusat dah masuk kerja lagi after cuti hamil selama 2,5 bulan. and guez what??? dia selalu mau tau apa yang saya and duo saya bicarakan itu. ini worst partnya kalau si mbak itu mau tau, si U Know Who juga ikutan mau tau. rese part II!!!

sekarang malah ada si mr. u know who, itu nickname buat pak HRD yang masih bujangan di usianya yang sudah kepala 4 itu. yang ngasi nickname gitu duo saya itu. si pak ini adalah manusia paling garing seabad jagad, bukan coz dia kewrren tapi coz rese and nyesek. oh ya satu lagi mayorayang merupakan efek dari OCB saya, saya paling benci sama orang yang kalo ngomongnya diulang-ulang. buat saya orang seperti itu adalah orang yang menganggap saya bodoh and siapa yang mau dianggap bodoh??!! GAK ADA!! kemarin saya sampe harus menulis di status saya di situs jejaring sosial itu bahwa kalau saya diam terhadap apa yang ditanyakan, itu artinya saya JIJIK SAMA PERTANYAAN ITU!!!! bukannya saya gak dengar tapi saya MUAK DAN JIJIK SAMA KUALITAS PERTANYAAN YANG BEGITU RENDAH ITU!!

uuhhhh…saya kesal sekali dan kalau sudah begini. so, saya bawaannya pingin curhat-curhat and ngerasan-rasan sama duo saya itu. saya kemarin ngingetin duo saya itu untuk hati-hati kalau mau bisik-bisik tentang sumwan yang sekantor sama kami berdua, coz kalo yang dirasani itu gak berada di satu ruangan sama kami, tapi kami justru dengan orang lain yang gak dirasani, orang itu bakal ngerasa “hhmmm..sumting” meskipun kami berdua gak ngomongin si dia yang seruangan itu *mulekaedotkodotaidi*

eehhh…hari ini duo saya itu yang mengingatkan saya untuk lebih extra hati-hati kalau rasan-rasan di kantor sekarang ini. coz tembok saja bisa bicara. OH NO!!!!!!

sudah ditanya-tanyain hal yang gak pwenting, gak bisa bebas lagi rasan-rasan. office, so uncomfortable place anymore. saya mulai bosan dengan rutunitas yang begitu-begitu terus. saya terkenal tidak awet bekerja di ssatu tempat yang sama untuk waktu yang lama coz konflik dan yang paling tidak bisa saya lawan: BOSAN!!!!

remaining ini pekerjaan pertama saya sebagai sukritaris, jadi saya tidak pernah bikin notulen. jadi pembuatan notulen rapat yang memang seharusnya jadi makanan saya based on my job desc, sampai hari ini belum selesai juga. satu, saya MALEZ!!! dua, saya tidak tau gimana bikinnya. tiga, pada saat beberapa proyek presentasi saya tidak ada di ruangan itu. ya yang sayanya memang sengaja out dari ruang rapat yang panas, jenuh dan membosankan itu atau memang ada keperluan lain. keperluan lain itu ya macem-macem, ya males, ya di suruh bookingkan tiket para kepala-kepala proyek itu (yang ujung-ujungnya ya males balik ruang rapat juga), ya coz saya harus ke toilet (yang ujung-uungnya saya males lagi balik ke ruang rapat). banyak kan?? ujung-ujungnya juga males.

jadinya ya gitu deh…sampai hari ini notulen itu hampir tidak saya sentuh sama sekali. kecuali ada bapak bos duduk di meja di belakang meja saya. baru deh saya kerjakan notulen itu. sukritaris model apa saya ini??? malesnya gak ketulungan, jahat binti judesnya selangit, moodynya gak karu-karuan… *nyengir imoed*

A trip to Las Vegas:

LaGuard: No news is good news. I think this applies, I’d be more concerned if I woke up with a 4am missed phone call, and I’d have to talk to through how to bury a stripper.

Hope the trip is going well.  Come back a millionaire.

Joe: It hurts.

LaGuard: head? wang? be more specific.

Joe: I’m on vacation. Stories to follow if I remember/survive.

LaGuard: I sure hope that isn’t your auto response to email

A Day in the Office…

The young secretary keeps throwing some comments that could have multiple interpretations, all while wearing a jean skirt:

The theory of the short jean skirt. DTF???

“Can I touch it???”

“There’s a ream in the back…”

“Keep the train rolling…”

I’m trying to keep the chuckles to myself, and it’s only 10:30

Harry: I am pretty sure after careful translation, she wants you to do… her taxes.

Three things are certain in life: death, taxes, and inappropriate moments

LaGuard: Oh dirty blackberry fun

A business trip to Texas:

LaGuard:  Hope the trip is going well, enjoy yourself out there spend a little time seeing the city-other than the depository-and unwind a little.

Maybe go to one of those networking bar scenes, and make out with the regional sales manager for tire pros montana.  Give me a call at some point, I’ve always wanted to know what goes on at these things…but if you see my dad doing something i wouldn’t want to know about obviously don’t tell me.

"Can I cup your balls?" This is how business gets done.

Joe:  Thanks for the advice. There’s too many dicks on the dance floor. Good time though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-EN8dpAvBw

Lost phone calls:

LaGuard: I’m sitting at my desk and my phone just lit up with a voicemail from you from last night. It never rang last night because at 7:16 I was sitting in the same spot I am now…fucking phone is on the way out.

Call me after work tonight, we should watch the game.

Joe: I guess I can stop calling you one-way asshole mother-fucking clam-peach muncher douche-bag, or owahmfcpmdb for short.

I’m heading to Harry’s for dinner, but I’m sure you could come by after we eat, and have a beer with us.

I haven`t been very good in writing a follow up post to continue how I ended up in Japan, and I`m sorry to say that this also isn`t going to be the follow up post.  It`s just more of a stream of consciousness thing.

When I arrived this morning at work, I logged into facebook, as usual. Yes, I`m aware of what this states about my productivity at this internship. No, I don`t care.

The significance here is the conversation I had.  I`m not particularly one for dramatic effect, but about 30 minutes ago, the first girl I ever had real feelings for, told me she was getting a divorce.

I`m not sure why this matters to me, but it does.  It affects me in a way I can`t understand.  It`s long since past the time where we had those kinds of feelings for each other, and it isn`t as if I wish to rekindle things in any way, I just feel a weird sense of lost that is inexplicable to me at present.  It feels like some sort of end of innocence era, the same kind that comes with losing your virginity, or smoking your first cigarette, or getting drunk (and subsequently being hungover) for the first time.  I`m 27 now, I suppose it was only a matter of time before the first of my married friends called it quits on the white picket fence plans in order to return to some semblance of sanity.

It also occurred to me how our generation has changed.  This information came to me via facebook.  In all the classic novels I read (my favorites are the Great Gatsby, Atlas Shrugged, and Great Expectations, by the way), this information is usually exchanged by some important confession in an upscale restaurant or some other swanky venue, or at the very least, over the phone.  I read it like I`d read an email, and I couldn`t help but feel a twinge of surreal impersonality to the whole affair.

Still though, I`m sort of in shock.  I suppose part of me feels that divorce is still dirty, wrong, and a sign of failure.  In truth it may be the latter, but part of me thinks it`s more responsible for consenting adults without the consideration of children to admit their inability to continue rather than cause each other undue suffering on the premise of some moral obligation.  This isn`t to say that there are no morals or absolutes, I definitely believe those things exist.  It`s only to suggest that people make mistakes sometimes.  People make wrong turns; people skip classes; people take up smoking; people spend money they don`t have; people marry the wrong person.   Is the last really that different than some of the others?  Is divorce really that grave of a situation?  Sure, both of them have lost some time, and more than likely someone will lose some money.  But between the two of them they`ll probably leave not much to the worse or better than when they came, save the emotional investment to one another being broken, which I`ve learned is a wound that tends to fade with time, and the possible social embarrassment, which tends to last until someone else does something worse that draws the attention away.

As I`m writing this, I find myself sort of relieved for my friend.  Over the course of our conversation I learned how miserable she`d been (she actually did a fair job of not placing blame on him or herself, only that they didn`t do well as a couple), and I feel glad that soon she`ll be escaping it.  They have no children, they`re adult enough to agree that it isn`t working and `just trying harder/working at it more` is unlikely to change things.  They`ve been to 3 counselors in 2 states and still can`t seem to resolve their issues.  Still though, I can`t help but wonder if there`s more to be done, if one of them, deep within themselves has the magic words to rekindle that original spark that drew them together and carried them down the aisle in the first place.

So the question I`m asking myself is.. how do we ever know when love, or any feeling, is actually dead? How do we measure the sway it once gave us against our seemingly immovable current situation? And how can we forecast the likelihood that said sway will someday return, leaving us in mournful regret at a bad situation made worse by our lack of vision? I`ve learned in business that just about anything is fixable with enough effort and a fundamentally solid plan, but I don`t think it`s that easy with people.  People and lives are the summation of an infinitely difficult and complicated set of choices, chances, and circumstances.  I`ve always been a proponent of pulling oneself up by his own bootstraps and making the environment a product of oneself rather than being a victim of it, but I`ve also learned that some things (though VERY few) just can`t be controlled or helped.  Is this one of those things, or are they just not trying hard enough?  Does that even matter if both of them will be happier when they separate?

These are the things I find myself asking at 11:22 am at an office in Osaka, Japan.  Life really is complex.

The atmosphere in the office this week has been one of electric anticipation although unfortunately not because someone has connected up my esteemed leaders swivel chair to the mains and is running a book on how long it will be till his ears burst into flame.
We have someone from the mothership visiting to give us a shot of morale in the arm and a good kick up the arse to boot (pun intended) just in case we thought someone has started caring. This is the smiling, teeth whitened, Grecian 2000 velvet glove which encases the iron fist of day to day stalag luft management of summary executions, public beatings and forlorn, forgotten hope.
This guy looks like an extra from the Sopranos and has a name to match, Jimmy ‘The Spreadsheet’ Ravioli or something equally New Yorky and minority without being too minority. The easy manner and predatory smile of a second hand car salesman or loan shark are offset by the sort of ‘trust me’ ‘man of the people’ mannerisms that defined Tony Blair or at least would be offset if it wasn’t for the fact that Blair is about as trust worthy as a randy Necrophiliac in a Morgue and about as much of a man of the people as PolPot was the 1988 face of spec savers or Nick Griffin is going to be the next poster boy for United Colours of Benetton.
As we are all corralled like reticent sheep towards two hours of total atrophy there is a very unseemly rush and tangle of the usual arsekissers trying to secure front row seats – it reminds me of the herd of thirty something lonely fatties at my wedding clambering over each other to catch my wife’s bouquet – note: I have been married for 5 years, the sad spinster who elbowed and bit her way to bouquet triumph is still single and will remain so, forever.
Jimmy the Spreadsheet greats us all with a cheery wave and a beaming smile – he reminds me slightly of an Italian Kim Jong Ill. Any minute this guy is going to start making a pistol mime with his hands and start picking off people in the audience – pow pow pow! I have decided that if he does I am going to mime running up on stage and setting off a suicide vest – boom boom boom! – I reckon he’ll see the funny side.
The next two hours pass in a blurred mixture of management bullshit, false bonhomie, thinly veiled threats and dictat- rather like Hitler’s Reichstag speech of December 1941 but marginally warmer and cuddlier, if I wasn’t such a cynic I might even have been drawn in.
Now comes my favourite part of these events, its question time! I love this. Its rather like feeding time at a zoo for retarded animals but being compared by a convicted child molester (that might not be true) with a hand held microphone and a comb over. Some of the dribble that these people come out with, have even practised the delivery of in front of a mirror beggars belief, its like car crash T.V.!

‘Hi Jimmy, I have a question, I notice that quarter 3 earnings are up 1.2 percent on quarter 2 earnings, does this mean that soft tip fineline pens will be back in stock in our stationery cupboards?’

‘Hi Jimmy, Welcome to England, I noticed whilst stalking you online that your facebook page lists you as being interested in water sports, for a small rise in grade I will let you wee on me as much as you like….. please Jimmy, pleeeeeeease, I love you!’

Well Jimmy, I have a question to which you won’t have a down pat twee politicians answer, put this in your management pipe and smoke it!

‘Mr Ravioli, I won’t presume to address you in the familiar, I don’t know you from Adam (alarm bells have started ringing and the smile is sliding off his smug fat Wop face) Answer me this…. How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if you hadn’t made him redundant and outsourced his role to India??’

Queue red faced head explosion……..

Beware the gangs of IT. They might not wind up being as mean as street gangs or bands of hooligans but they might put up a decent performance of Nerd Side Story.

When you start your professional path it is only logical that you group with people who tend to think and act like you do, while some people with somewhat opposing worldviews become your natural enemies. All around the world IT shops are the perpetual battleground for traditional enmities that come with the trade. It’s unavoidable and in fact quite necessary because the opposing characteristics of these gangs generally prove useful for the overall goals of the company they work for. I submit to you the ones I’ve experienced firsthand.

Creative vs. Pragmatic

People such as graphic designers are a creative bunch. They constantly bet on the muse for their everyday work and if they can’t they start to feel uneasy. On the other hand, developers are practical people, they like to get their jobs done with as much efficiency as possible and will gladly let go of any flamboyant solutions if a very practical shortcut will do the job. Have you ever seen a user interface devised by a developer? They are only usable by well… other developers.

In the old days it was very common to hear a developer yelling because he or she despised the inconsistency infested, poorly formatted HTML received from the graphic designer who undoubtedly produced it with the graphic view of IDEs such as Dreamweaver. Designers used to not care for HTML standard compliance at all and churned out pieces of unintelligible spaghetti code full of missing close tags (to say the least).

I understand the overall adoption of CSS as not only a developer but a graphic design standard has somewhat proven beneficial for this particular interaction, by setting a common language that facilitates cooperation. Also IDEs have gotten a lot better at identifying non compliance to standards, but this was just an example; you will always find room for argument between such opposing types.

Sales vs. Operations

Until I started working in presales a common phrase I used to hear (and sometimes used) was “How can these idiots have sold this?” After starting my presales management experience the phrase slightly changed to “How can you idiots have sold this?”

It’s a very old and common enmity and yet one of the most explicit symbiotic dependencies. They need each other but don’t really care for each other.  Sales people have a sales goal which more often than not, does not include the outcome of the project execution. Operations on the other hand is in charge of executing within reasonable profit margins, schedule and quality.

A very common misconception is that at the end of the day sales should care about what they sell because their clients will be unhappy if the outcome is bad. More often than not, they just don’t and here’s why:

1. The project’s end line is so far ahead in the future that it looks like a dot to them.
2. Sales quotas are usually very cruel and competition is fierce.
3. The end price for a project is not set by your sales team, it’s usually set by the market (i.e. if someone is willing to bid on a project for the price of a pair of socks, then your sales rep must bid for the price of just one sock)
4. In order to maintain their good rapport with the client they can always fall back on the fake indignation card when things go to the crapper. “My operations team is not delivering? OH NO!!! I will raise some hell.”
5. Most times operations has no influence and no real presence during the sales process.
6. Sales people are compulsive yes-sayers.

Companies stand to benefit from the clash of wills between these two clans if they were to introduce mechanisms that encouraged cooperation:

1. Bonuses for sales if projects are finished in time and budget.
2. Penalties for sales when the latter does not occur.
3. Operations assisting sales in the sales process with an equally strong voice.

Although I’ve seen some pretty decent efforts in that direction I have yet to see these pair working together as a unit.

Security Specialists vs. Everybody

I’d rather shovel guano for a living than be in charge of the network security of a company. These guys have a well deserved bad reputation. They are often ill mannered, unpleasant and generally bad ass to everyone around them. And that is precisely what they need to be. Show me a nice CSO and I’ll show you a company with security issues.

While your average office person does not give a crap about nothing and just wants to come to the office, read their personal mail, blog, tweet, chat via IM, browse Facebook, read the online news, download that tasty Paris Hilton video and oh… yes… get the occasional hour of work done; a good security specialist needs to be able to see the five thousand or so security violations your everyday working habits hold.

As an average Joe you will want to work and be comfortable at your workplace whereas a security specialist will try to maintain a network running and operational for everybody to be able to work comfortably and sometimes that just requires that they be mean to you.

I do not foresee any changes in this particular clash of wills because whenever security has evangelized a flock, new heretics will surface with virus infested pen drives at the ready.

Opposites Construct

The setting of opposing goals will usually result in confrontation between the different factions in IT. However, while the developer will push towards a faster, more efficient user interface, the creative department will make sure that it’s not an eye sore. If done respectfully, through clear channels and with room for balanced opinions, these little everyday battles will result in the benefit of the whole team.

If, on the other hand, a company was to take sides in these disputes by supporting one over the other, no good will come out of it. As an example, check out Microsoft’s product policy. It’s better to get to market presto and then put out a series of annoying service packs and updates than to spend one extra month in the kitchen. It’s greed over quality. And that’s a song more popular than the happy birthday.

Shuje

On my next post I will explain why the chicken went across the road.

ni melanjutkan tulisan saya tentang orang-orang di sekeliling kita yang ngotot pingin dianggep.

kalo yang satu ini tentang temen sekantor saya, cewek. hhhhmmmmm ni bukan si miss u know who tapi namanya si nad, gitu aja deh namanya.

dia cewek yang biasa aja. pertama gabung di kantor dia lebih banyak ngerokok di belakang, coz stres. wahahahahahaha….teman-teman saya yang rata-rata berjilbab agak-agak shock juga dengan adanya cewek yang merokok di kantor kami. kalo saya mah biasa aja tuh, meskipun saya tidak merokok. yang penting dia gak ganggu gue ajah ato waaaaataaaaaaaaaaa!!!! *sok jagoan*

so karena dia perokok aktif, aktif dalam arti sehari bisa habis  2 pak rokok, sama HRD meja dia yang awalnya dekat dengan meja saya, di move ke belakang yang lebih open door, dia ditempatkan dengan para perokok aktif lainnya.

fine, she’s fine, anaknya terkesan cuek. cuek dengan penampilan, yang buat saya agak-agak selebor. dia bahkan pernah ngobrol panjang kali lebar sama dengan luas sama saya, coz dia pingin gimana kliatan girlie?? hhhmmm…did i look girlie??? NOPE AT ALL!!

tapi entah sejak dia berteman dengan sesama newbie di kantor, the jangkung rath, nad jadi merubah penampilannya. yang awalnya selebor dengan rambutnya yang sebahu itu di ikat seadanya, sekarang di potong pendek, so edgy! terus cara berpakainnya juga gak selebor lagi. tapi ada yang jauh berubah, cara bicaranya.

dia sangat kelihatan pingin dianggap gaul sama kami-kami teman sekantornya.

setiap hari omongannya selalu di mana dia akan hang out nanti sepulang kantor, dengan sapa saja dia bakal clubbing nanti malam.

kalo diliat-liat, nad tidak secantik the jangkung rath, yang berwajah eksotis asli Indonesia dengan kulit tanned, rath berbody pramugari n model gitu deh. dengan perawakan seperti itu, rath membekali dirinya dengan make up-make up, gadget, dan aksesoris mahal yang melekat di tubuhnya. wajar lah. dia cantik, berbadan proporsional seperti itu, sayang kenapa ‘terdampar’ di kantor saya, kenapa tidak di agency model international saja?? ooohhh…life is a choise.

back to nad yang kalo mau main kompare siih, sama rath yo juauh buanget!! nad berperawakan kecil, bahkan cenderung terlalu kurus, seperti kurang gizi. berkulit gelap dan karena kebiasaan merokoknya yang mengalahkan kereta uap, bibirnya hitam.

she’s not as good looking as rath, tapi seperti saya bilang tadi, dia ngotot banget pingin dianggap eksis sebagai anak yang gaul and hip banget sejak dia dekat dengat rath. padahal rath juga bukan termasuk anak yang hobby clubbing. dia tipe anak yang patuh dengan kedua orang tuanya dan sopan.

si nad kemarin terakhir bertemu sebelum pulang kerja, dia bilang ke saya kalo dia mau cepet-cepet pulang coz mau clubbing buat malam mingguan. waktu kami pulang, timingnya hampir bersamaan karena saya masih harus membersihakn meja saya yang berantakan. dia bilang awalnya kalau dia di jemput oleh sang terkasih. tapi kenapa dia di jemput di tempat yang cukup jauh dari kantor?? padahal temen-temen pada heboh diantar and di jemput sama pacarnya masing-masing. setelah saya amati coz dia jalan lebih jauh lagi dari kantor, dia pulang tidak dijemput, tapi naik angkot. pacar yang dia ceritakan itu tidak menjemputnya coz memang dia gak punya pacar.

kenapa bilang punya pacar kalo aslinya gak punya?? kenapa selalu ingin mati-matian dianggap sumting sama orang lain. be yourself itu lebih oke kok. kalo single, ya bilang aja single. kalo memang gak gaul, itu bukan berarti akhir dari dunia kan??

Look at this, what I bought yesterday…

It’s a netbook, and it’s smaller than a, than a, than a … desk diary (sorry, I closed it over there to get some idea of what I could say it was smaller than, and turned the bloody thing off).

We do have a desktop at home, and I also have a laptop. It’s a Panasonic Toughbook, bought when I was self-employed and had to bring it around a lot, and it’s the size and weight of a paving slab. Apparently it would withstand a bomb-blast, which is of dubious value since I probably wouldn’t, and in any case it’s unlikely that my gentle posts would attract such retribution (if the Greens, to name just one bunch out of many potential perps, haven’t tried it on Twenty yet, I reckon I’m fairly safe).

The problem is that Mrs Tin’s many committees force her to spend most of her time on the desktop, and Tinson1’s laptop, used in a perpetual rota by the three Tinkids, takes up the Internet Cable in the kitchen, so I wasn’t getting to use my laptop much in the evenings. As a result I was having to write my posts in the office, which is of course not ideal because it’s likely to get me fired totally unfair to my employers.

So this is an attempt to get me to do my blogging in the evenings. I borrowed one from a friend for a couple of days, got hooked, and went and bought one. I’ve set it up, charged it up, and read the warning specially written for people like me, those who wear an Intel-like sticker saying “Pacemaker Inside” (I would so love to get that on a T-shirt, or even just on a badge). Apparently I’ve to keep it at least 6 inches away, which oddly enough I had fully intended doing. I know it has a very small screen, but I’m not feckin’ blind.

I’ve written before that I’m a bit of a luddite when it comes to geek stuff (Microsoft actually have a paperclip that knows more about Word than I do), so I was probably the only person on earth who didn’t know that Windows 7 was being launched yesterday. I’ve been meaning to buy the netbook for the last week, but it was only yesterday that I found time, so it was by pure co-incidence that I ended up owning a piece of technology on the very day that it came out. This does not happen to me often. Only once have I owned a make of car that was still being advertised on TV when I bought it. I got a photocopier just as people moved to multi-printing, got a fax machine just as people moved to email,  and took up blogging just as people began to Twitter (I wish you’d take it up Tinman, I can hear some of you say, this post would have been over 431 words ago).

Yet suddenly I own Windows 7 (look, they gave me a T-shirt, it’s on the right of the picture) and all my kids and workmates are very impressed.

I have to say I don’t understand the fuss about Windows 7. Back in the last century I had a computer with Windows 98 on it, which I’m assuming was 14 times better.

I may not know a lot about computers, but I know how to do maths.

The Past:

The phone rang, then the cell phone, a texts came in, there is a conversation happening on Facebook, Ping – something from twitter, a co-worker just IM’d me, the emails keep popping up in the corner of the screen, and then someone walked into my office.

Now –

I work from home. I can control my environment! Yet much of what interrupted me still exists. Writing takes focus as does researching. So as an exercise in procrastination I thought I would research the science around interruptions. The way most of us handle interruptions is to swear that we are multitasking. We aren’t.

The Myth of Multitasking

Most of us now know that we don’t really multitask – what our brain does is switch between tasks very fasts. So fast in fact that it looks like we are doing two things at the same time. Like all human traits – some of us do this switching better than others. However, it isn’t optimal behavior and on some level we all know this.

But there is hope – a recent study published in the journal Neuron states that we can train our brain to get better at multitasking. But we are still simply learning to switch between tasks quicker – we are not developing dual core processing.

So we can get better but then there is the problem that too much multitasking causes breakdowns in our decision making.

Our lives are full of interruptions and processing interruptions can become difficult. That too is a task and one that we have to process quickly. Research is showing that the more people use tools of interruption (CrackBerry’s make it high on the list although all you iPhone lovers your there too) the more trouble they have deciding when to focus on an interruption or let it go.

Does that mean that interruptions are addictive? That the constant change in direction is somehow stimulating something in the brain?

A fascinating study published in 2006 exploring the “Social Implication of Ubiquitous Wireless Email Devices” looked at a small company that provided BlackBerrys for nearly 90% of their staff since 1999. What they saw was a burling of the lines between business and home, and expectation to be “always-available”, at the same time as partners in the firm found it a way to get more done, achieve more transparency in their business dealings and have more control. Yet the BlackBerrys became a device of constant interruption, effecting meetings, vacations, and general business life.

We don’t have to react to everything – but often we try to.

That stream of emails, tweets, texts, and IMs that come into us – how many are actually time sensitive and project related as opposed to all those other pieces of information that clutter our lives. Yes – the cute pictures of animals doing funny things with witty captions is a nice way to bring a smile to our day but how much time did we just lose? And did you go back to what you were doing or did you decide to read some more emails, send a text, tweet something, or surf the web?

The general rule of thumb is that once interrupted it takes between 20 to 40 minutes to get back to the level of concentration that you were at when the interruption occurred. (Different studies have different time factors – personally I think it has to do with the complexity of the core task.) The interesting thing is – how many of us go through our work lives these days able to commit 20 minutes to a specific task. An article in Newsweek puts the amount of time the average High Tech worker focuses on a project before being interrupted at 11 minutes. Worse off, IT workers are switching direction every 3 minutes. The research done with the company full of BlackBerry addicts had people checking their BlackBerrys every “every seven or eight minutes”.   

Who closes the office door, puts the phone on silent or do-not-disturb, closed down Outlook and works?

I tried – and it backfired on me. Within one week I was getting feedback that I was “unreachable” and “not in the office” because I wasn’t seen and being seen. But I was getting lots of work done… but no one noticed because in our environment face time was used to measure productivity and cooperation. “Drop everything and help me!” was not an uncommon cry. But I’m uncertain of the productivity value it brought – it may have build a can-do lets dig in and get it done atmosphere – but it also led to very long days for those who had highly complicated projects. They could only get them done early in the morning or late at night.

So then work-life balance goes out the window. Wasn’t this what we thought being connected anywhere any time help us with. We wouldn’t have to make the choice between family and work – we could do both. But in doing both we are engaging in neither. Several of the studies and articles I read discussed a sense of “partial-participation” in life. We never sink down to a level of true focus, we are multitasking so fast that we don’t focus or take time to connect with others, we use the buffer of the iPhone, Facebook, or Twitter to find some strange place between closeness and distance.

It will take us time to figure out how to deal with this – the overwhelming amount of information flowing under our fingertips, the blurring of lines between work and home, and adapting to a world where we are interrupted every 8 minutes.

Personally I love the access to information, the feeling of having my finger on the pulse. But I also like to ponder things. That takes time, silence and a closed door. I’m not sure where we are going with all of this and I am sure that we are not thinking much about the social and physiological consequences of it. All the new toys are just too much fun!

~ Tess