I care about my work because it's my work and I don't want to just collect paychecks. If you're not happy and can leave, just leave. Go do something productive with your life that makes you proud of. Life is too short to play by others' rules.
And not everyone simply has the choice to just find another job when they are unhappy. I know you caveated that with the "if you can" but I'd say the vast majority of people can't.
That and the fact that most peoples work is not actually theirs as you say. Everything you do is part of the company, and managers/execs take credit for the work all the time at many companies.
Most people have a lot more agency than they give themselves credit for. It just doesn’t hurt enough yet to face the cost of making a change.
What’s really the worst that’s gonna happen? You have to do some interviewing while putting in the bear minimum at current job? Oh no.
I've also had a job that I left because I wasn't enjoying because of a lack of challenge and lack of management backing for the projects I was working on.
Life isn't purely black and white and my reasoning is pretty simplistic. There are vastly more complex situations than just my wife went to grad school.
Are you sure? My GF’s company went through two rounds of layoffs this year and she now has such a heavy workload that she works most evenings and some weekends as well, and her stress level has gone through the roof.
Im in maintenance as an industrial electrician.
New plants came to town paying current market rate and snagged most of the top talent.
Then the company started quiet-firing to avoid layoffs. It killed all motivation.
Then they froze hiring as we kept losing people. We are now short on HVAC, mechanics, and electricians.
Lucky me I'm the only guy who can do all three so im running ragged all day.
We have response times we have to meet but our vehicle (an electric GEM) had the charger die, it's only $2k but they won't let me order it so we all walk everywhere. Huge plant I easily bust 30k+ steps and 20+ stories climbed via stairs.
We then had a mechanic and an electrician take paternity leave so we are even more shorthanded. Still wont let us hire.
We lost the maintenance manager and cant get another one for what we pay and the condition the business is in now.
I love my job andy co-workers but I'm sending out resumes and interviewing because I can't take all the extra workload with no extra pay while our administration keeps getting more money and bonuses.
How do companies keep making the same mistakes over and over expecting different results? They don't, they know what's going on and are getting theirs before the bottom falls out.
* needs HVAC, mechanics, and electricians to function and deliver revenue
* your company cannot afford to hire new people, only maintain their current payroll, or are unwilling to raise wages to be able to hire more (not enough talent)
* you are able to do all three, but are being asked to do more than want or are able to do
then there's a simple outcome that to me it seems like you're missing.
you can just say "I can't", or "no, I'm going home at 6" or "cool, that's a great plan but I only have time to do the first half of the tasks you just described today", and most importantly - your company simply won't be able to afford to do anything about it.
What are they gonna do? Fire you and be even more fucked? Seems like if you set firmer boundaries on how much you can work, their best decision is going to just be accepting it. Because their only alternative is to even stupider which would be to fire you and have no work get done at all.
When I brought up I have yet to get my float (4x10s considered the 'easy' shift) I was told there was nothing they could do. All I could think was well how will you handle it when I leave?
Management really is that dense.
They care not one whit about objections nor people leaving.
Imho it's merely a matter of time but the younger guys all hold out hope. I've none left.
You mentioned upthread:
> New plants came to town paying current market rate and snagged most of the top talent.
You should totally get a job at one of those plants and let them hang.
Specifically: task shedding when they exceed available hours
If you're the last one keeping the lights on for a 4 person team, it seems reasonable to let some lower priority things go undone and communicate to your boss that "You don't have time for that."
Trying to ratrace to keep up with an unreasonable amount of work is just rewarding a company for overworking you, by avoiding sending it the hard signal of "too much work."
For a lot of people work isn't a passion project, it's literally the only way to have a roof over your head and food on your table. If you happen to enjoy it that's a bonus and not a requirement.
> If you happen to enjoy it that's a bonus and not a requirement.
I know a few people for who this used to be true. One of them got laid off and went back studying, the other changed jobs but is still ill half of the days.
My point being, passionless job is not a sustainable thing.
They did not give one f for, “the company,” but they were steady and reliable co-workers.
I’ve also worked with passionate “try hards,” that will get upset if they’re not using the latest-and-greatest languages and tools. They’d throw tantrums over architectural decisions. And if they didn’t settle down they’d move on to the next job in a year. Hope they found what they were looking for.
* Professional reliability
* People who don't care about what type of job they do
* Hobbies
* Parenting
* People who don't care about the company, but cared about their job
* Tryhards
* People chasing the latest fad
* People that have opinions about software architecture
* Job hoppers
My initial comment was about people caring about THEIR work, not the company or anything else. It was about people not doing something they dreaded for >8h straight and thinking that's what life has for them.
For me, when I say I care about my work, it implies caring about the company at least to some degree. The mix of caring for other things easily emerges. If I review a peer's code, I care about them, about the code quality, about customer satisfaction, and hence about the reputation of the company I work for. This can be selfish in a way as well, since that mix has some reflection towards how I am perceived and how I am judged as a person.
I think you're hijacking this thread to make your point regardless if its related or not to it.