I think that actually describes IT to a large extent. There are of course software developers and other branches where you just want to be left the hell alone and get your work done. When I started my current job, it was ****ing great to be relatively an unknown n00b, being able to be heads-down on something for hours with minimal interruption.

The other side of it though, critical issues and support.... I've never found that being in the office matters all that much these days. I've done major go lives and fixing major issues from the office and in my pajamas at 2am, and whether everyone is face-to-face in the same conference room, in their own office, or on a Teams call.... it's all about the same (except the free food for onsite go lives).

Of the 3 you mentioned, I would think HR works significantly better in person... but then again, I completed all of my interviews virtually for my current job (and everyone involved was also working from home) and it was fine. :shrug:

Exactly. If your manager has no idea how productive you are w/o constantly looking over your shoulder, that's a shitty manager.

And I don't know if it's exactly "10% of the people do 90% of the work", but the people who were lazy in the office are now lazy at home, and the people who got shit done in the office are probably more productive at home.

When I worked at the office, I'd see people buying shit on Amazon when their monitors faced outwards from their cube or office.... and they'd be the first person to say they couldn't make it into the office because of a couple inches of snow, then would post pics of their kid playing in the snow at 1 o'clock in the afternoon.

I'm sure there are people who find it harder to work from home for whatever reason or need that kick of accountability of being in the office... but for the most part, I'd guess it doesn't make your productive employees lazy slobs overnight.

I think if you do any sort of school and aren't some sort of complete moron you could be an entry level welder and get $25/hr in a decent sized town/plant. The dudes that know their shit will command $40/hr plus and if you're willing to travel and do the hard shit sure you're gonna hit 100k plus.

I did look around at BFE Ozark country and see what welding jobs were there and it showed a few starting at $18-20/hr so Busby is tracking correctly there. They were bare minimum requirements though, like mechanical aptitude and pass an on-site MIG weld.

One of my first leadership jobs n I.T. I had a guy on my team who would read the newspaper at his desk every morning. Talking paper version of the KC Star. Executives would walk by and see it, then I’d hear how my team was slacking. Thing is this guy was an indispensable rock star. Passionate about his job and the go-to person. I ultimately caved to the pressure and asked him to cut out the paper reading as it was a bad look. He did so but wasn’t happy about it. No big drama, and he went on to lead the team after I left. But I’ve always regretted that I didn’t just tell my leadership to get over it.

What is this "work from home" stuff you guys are talking about? Seriously I guess WFH will cut down on some of these "civil standby's" we do when HR is going to fire a scary/troubled employee - not quite as scary over teams/zoom

Agreed and to expand their needs to be a path for individual contributors to earn people leader salaries. If the only way to advance is to go into management you get shit managers. Someone like me who hates people but takes a manager position for the money.

Also I think monitoring tools can be effective but not necessarily for performance evaluation. Things like download volume of proprietary or consumer data for example. Feel the book is still out on WFH contributing to negative behaviors outside of performance.

Musk will have Twitter running BETTER with 25% or less of the employees he started with.

I was kind of 'that guy' at my first job in IT. It was a help desk and they had very clear metrics for productivity (amount of time on/off the phone and average call length, etc.), and after the first 6 months or so I was routinely at the top of the list.

And it was a very 'we've always done it this way' corporate environment, so you were supposed to wear at least khakis and a collared shirt. They also did casual Friday, which made even less sense to me that you were required to dress up 4 days a week, but not Fridays, and not weekends.

I worked 2-11pm for a while, so after a couple hours, all of the managers and regular shift would leave, so it seemed largely pointless to dress up for that... plus on the weekends we could wear whatever we wanted.

After a while I started introducing black jeans or the occasional 'nice t-shirt' to my wardrobe when working the 2nd shift... I'd mostly just sit in my cube, so outside of walking into the office, it's not like you'd even know.... but one person in particular who would always dress like he was going to Christmas service at church took exception to it and would make passive aggressive comments and so forth.

My manager had to fight some battles on that and other things that could be seen as favoritism, which I felt bad about, but they also didn't really see the big deal either and we'd laugh about the petty shit behind closed doors..... they were far more concerned with my productivity, just like I was.

<div class="tenor-gif-embed" data-postid="4706446" data-share-method="host" data-aspect-ratio="1.785" data-width="30%"><a href="https://tenor.com/view/jim-car-disappear-theoffice-gif-4706446">Jim Car GIF</a>from <a href="https://tenor.com/search/jim-gifs">Jim GIFs</a></div> <script type="text/javascript" async src="https://tenor.com/embed.js"></script>

I was talking entry level unskilled and that figure wasn't weighing in benefits.

What does that look like? Have one of those chest pockets or?

Sometimes without wrinkles, holes or armpit stains.

Sometimes.

Right, Accounting dorks will be the ones to adopt that shit. Because never work for accountants.

It takes an entire system. HR needs to bring in good people, management needs to be effective, executive needs to be good stewards of corporate finance and strategy. Any one of those things can muck up the works for the other ones.

Plus the job matters. It doesn't matter how good of a manager whoever you want to throw out there, you can't just plug anyone into a job they don't want to be in (let's say...operations of a grain farm) and get effective work out of them.


If a guy is a certified welder, he isn't unskilled anymore. And maybe wages are depressed out there. They are certainly not here.

And it's possible I was unclear. The $15/hr job at the coop isn't welding. It's dumping trucks and sweeping bins. There is a sizable gulf between that dude and a certified welder.

Man, I need to see if any of those guys would be willing to move to BFE Kansas. I don't need a welder, but I could use some base level competency.

I'd have to ask around here, I try not to need anything welded, so I don't really know what welders make. But if they're working for less than $20/hr they need to wise up.

Casual Friday:

https://merchbar.imgix.net/product/1...nc_-_Front.jpg


Monday through Thursday:

https://www.metallica.com/dw/image/v...49_969170.jpeg

Fair enough - for some reason I was thinking bedazzled or one of this "tux" t-shirts :shrug: :p

LMAO

Want to clear up something in case I am leaving the impression that I am making the assertion about Gen Z or Millenials are whiners and loafers....

Loafers and whiners are non-generational...good workers are who they are no matter their age.

Musk is a smart guy, an entrepreneur. Very different mentality than a turnaround CEO that comes in and fixes established companies that are broken. He’s out of his element. He should focus on creating new things.

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Speaking of worker productivity advances. I love how we got 100x more of every piece of technology, but none of the 30-hour work week or month of vacation. We did finally get work from home, but it took a pandemic.

Move to France if you want 30 hour work weeks and month long vacations, lazy shits! /s

You think Musk telling workers they have to agree to long hours and high intensity means 40 hours a week???

LMAO

Yeah, he was like you guys have to work 8-5 with an hour lunch and no OT and no weekends!!! This is the requirement and if you can't do that get out!!!!

Out of his element? That comment is laughable. Yeah, I am sure Twitter will be just in the dumps any day now. Are you suggesting Musk is way to stupid to make money owning Twitter? There are thousands of shitty apps that make money and you think Musk won't with Twitter? Really?

Not all of us can have jobs keeping the community safe. Some of us have to make stuff. :rolleyes: