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Archive for the ‘corporate America’ Category

Work Matters / Career Choices: I’ve Made Up My Mind

06 Sep

I take too long to think about things, but that’s the nature of how I work it out.

I was going to head into the medical field, like nursing, medical research, or clinical trials, but I realized I cannot stand the smell of sick people. I know that sounds offensive, but my olfactory senses are off the charts. I can smell when people are not well. I once had to pick up my Mother from the hospital, and the smell of the place nearly made me gag. I wanted to turn around and leave. I ended up breathing through my mouth.

I am still fascinated by medical news. I follow the theories of causation behind high blood pressure, diabetes and heart disease. It’s interesting to read and watch clips on YouTube as doctors hash out studies and stats on their beliefs that the causes are a result of: lack of exercise, high fructose corn syrup, refined carbohydrates, too much fat, not enough good fats, too much red meat, genetics, and so on. I’ve discovered that dairy and grains (especially breads) do not agree with me. I’ve mostly cut them out of my diet and I’ve not only lost weight, I don’t have indigestion problems anymore.

I will stick with the technical field as my publishing company grows, and I will continue to explore other ventures. Therefore, I’ve decided to master C# (C sharp), refresh my knowledge of Javascript, Visual Studio, Adobe Flash  / Photoshop / Dreamweaver, and the other tools. I will also have to get acquainted with all of Microsoft’s latest tools, which can be heaven and hell.

My biggest complaint with this field is that everyone wants you to be extremely proficient with ALL of these languages and tools, but more than half the time, they really don’t need you to use them on the job. They prefer to draw you into all day meetings. No one seems to understand that programmers need time to think. But then again, most companies have morons in charge – so why expect anything different?

 
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Posted in .net framework, C#, corporate America, jobs, money, programming, work

 

Why Job References Are Stupid

01 May

Testimonials are important. It has the same value as an actor or athelete endorsing a product s/he never used or ever will use. But we buy the soap, the crapsh*t product, anyway, right?

Considering how much gets outsourced: What’s to stop this trend from becoming a provider of  job references? They do everything else – from scheduling our personal affairs to an assistant calling people on our behalf. Why would it be impossible to claim being an independent arm of a foreign entity? Corporations love foreign enterprises and who knows who anybody is anywhere? No matter what people think LinkedIn and Facebook wont help.

I love these articles by HR “Experts” who caution people – in this desperate economy – not to phony baloney up the resume. Sort of like how the ex-CEO of Tyco, Dennis Kozlowski, never actually graduated from the college(s) he claimed to have attended? I’m not talking about his purported crimes. I’m talking about the fact that a number of CEOs, like him, are running companies with phony baloney resumes.

They got where they were based on fabulous job references. They had the right connections, which were so solid no one ever gave their bogus backgrounds a serious look-see. Now, when guys like this commit these offenses the twits in the media go chirping about how honesty will set you free.

No, it doesn’t. Not in this society. Certainly not in this world. The best liars get elected,  hired, and promoted. They win the day.

This crappola about honesty is that it keeps people in low wage jobs with little prospect of moving up. Corporate America is not about a job well done. I will rephrase that: one cannot be a workhouse, and expect any good to come of it, unless you have dedicated suck-up sycophantic cheerleaders telling everyone how fantastic you are at the job, whether it is the truth or not.

That’s why I say, if that is all a reference is good for: Why not hire a bunch of good actors, get the kind of background created like in that entertaining show, Leverage, go forth, and move up the Corporate America ladder? One of the things I’ve always noticed about head honchos, in most organizations starting from mid-level directors on up, is how good they are at stealing the ideas of others, taking credit for their work, claiming how hard they work and always, always networking (chatting up their cheerleaders) as to how they are the greatest thing since slice bread.

And it bloody well works. All the damn time.

I don’t hate them. I am envious. I wish I was a successful psychopath* on the job too.

The sociopath is that truly self-absorbed individual with no conscience or feeling for others and for whom social rules have no meaning.

CHARISMATIC PSYCHOPATHS are charming, attractive liars. They are usually gifted at some talent or another, and they use it to their advantage in manipulating others. They are usually fast-talkers, and possess an almost demonic ability to persuade others out of everything they own, even their lives. Leaders of religious sects or cults, for example, might be psychopaths if they lead their followers to their deaths. This subtype often comes to believe in their own fictions. They are irresistible.

Definition lifted from: cassiopaea.com

 
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Posted in corporate America, featured, job hunting, jobs, politics, references, work

 

Society Today

21 Apr

The American moto: “We are your good buddy, only when we want your money.”

I cannot stand phony fake-friendly salespeople. I don’t need you to be my best friend. Respect and honesty about your product or service is all I require.

 
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Posted in corporate America

 

Pessimistic Outlook: US Government Is Broke(n), It Will Never Be Fixed

22 Mar

I remember when Katrina hit the south back in 2005. I followed the hurricane tangentially. It didn’t  hit me until the news media started calling American citizens “refugees” that I realized how bad it was.

I had a conversation with friends afterward, and they were surprised by the gross incompetence of the local, state and federal government. I looked at them, wanting to know: Where have they been the last 5-to-30 plus years? Haven’t they noticed that the US has been in a slow and steady decline since the inflationary, decrepit, corrupt and stagnate 1970′s?

Despite the celebratory big-talk of the Reagan years, I would say that when he helped usher in the we’re-going-for-broke-sorta-war against the country formerly known as the USSR, it would likewise take us down. When the government decided to have a mano-a-mano battle with the USSR, it drained a number of internal well-thought-out strategies for keeping our country whole, solid, and well functioning with it.

A rising stock market doesn’t contrast well against jobs that evaporate from the industrial US to overseas. A rising top 1% making more money than ever doesn’t contrast well against white collar jobs that evaporate from the service economy to overseas. A society cannot survive on consumption alone, it must make durable goods as well.

Every job lost is a tax payment lost. Every job lost is a Social Security payment lost. Every job lost is a Medicaid/Medicare payment lost. “Economists” love to say that the loss of a US job to someone overseas due to slave wage labor is something we benefit from, because we can purchase “cheap” goods. I wonder why they never mention that lower paying jobs here mean people could only afford cheap goods, buy less higher-end products, and contribute less to the taxes that are necessary to keep the US afloat. It is no accident that to finance its grand entitlement schemes the US is borrowing nearly every dime.

In the future, when good and excellent historians look at this country, they will draw a line from whatever took place in this country in its attempts to keep its supremacy, and what it lost in the balance. The founders had it right: let’s mind our business, and stop trying to micromanage the rest of the world.

A man fighting fires in other people’s houses will not notice that his own home is burning down to the ground.

9/11 didn’t happen due to any conspiracies within the government. It happened because of gross indifference, incompetence, and negligence. Bureaucracy exists only for the bureaucracy. It took over 40 years for that to happen. It will take another 30 plus years for the country to entirely collapse.

In nearly every facet of our lives, if it’s not Corporate America, then it’s an officer, agent, or bureaucrat of the government(s) watching, spying, monitoring, and cataloging everyone. Everyone is “guilty” of everything. Everything is illegal. Everything is restricted. Every time a “crime” occurs the sheeple request more interference, monitoring, and watching. I bet no one feels “safer” either.

Nothing improves, and nothing will improve.

9/11 put the icing on the cake for the totalitarianism this government has always wanted to embrace and deploy. A permanent war with no ending. The never ending battlefield encapsulates the entire country. The US Constitution can be ignored, suspended, and deemed irrelevant. Travel has the same atmospherics as being in a prison. Yet somehow, millions of illegal aliens can easily enter the country.

We are a prison(er) society. We will be in a state of martial law, until foreign governments stop purchasing USA debt, the country collapses under the weight of illegitimacy and stupidity, or deliberate ignorance of basic governance, fairness, due process, and economics. Take your pick.

We are told that things are getting better, but they’re not, and they wont. We’ve reached the turning point, and since the country is already flying over the cliff, there is no going back. We’re waiting for the impact once we hit bottom.

The difference for me is that I used to care. Starting today, I don’t.

Prediction

They will come and confiscate your savings and all other assets, and they wont need a reason. You can count on it. There’s nothing restraining the jackals in DC.

 
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Posted in Barack Obama, IRS, US, US Congress, airlines, bully, consumers, consumption, consumptive, corporate America, globalism, politics, safety, savings, thief, usa

 

From Ted Talks -> Gary Vaynerchuk: Do what you love (no excuses!)

13 Mar

I like the inspirational aspect, outside of the profanity.

 
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Posted in Think, corporate America, jobs, motivational speakers, motivational writers, work

 

America: The Consumptive Society

31 Dec


Definitions of consumptive according to an online dictionary:

ADJECTIVE:
  1. Consuming or tending to consume.
  2. Of, relating to, or afflicted with consumption.

NOUN:

A person afflicted with consumption. An infectious disease producing lesions especially of the lungs.

Consumption is no longer used to describe a disease. However, I want to apply it to this topic.

America is a consumptive society; we are sick. We are consumers of the worst sort. What happened to saving for a rainy day? Where did this constant need to purchase what we want, and what we don’t need become the sole focus of this society?

Everywhere one turns there is a billboard, a radio ad, a television ad, magazine and newspaper ads, pre-movie commercials, Internet pop-ups, and everywhere else they can stick this intrusive medium, urging us to consume. We are not even referred to as Americans, but as consumers. It’s an ugly word. I can’t stand hearing it.

I see this constant cycle of digging into the earth to pull up precious metals and natural resources. This process leaves devastation, destruction, and unlivable conditions and habitats in its wake. These resources get molded and shaped into “stuff” also known as consumer goods, and at the end this “stuff”, aka pollution, gets shoved back into the earth as non-recyclable, non-reusable, non-treatable, toxic, and non-biodegradable garbage.

There are people in developing countries living atop of this refuse who, due to their poverty, accept our garbage. It is piling up around the world with nowhere to go.

If we didn’t consume so much, we would not produce so much pollution. I feel guilty every time I toss something out.

I appreciate and respect our capitalistic society. I appreciate and welcome new developments in technology, but somehow, somewhere, something has gone horribly wrong. I am hoping that we Americans get back to saving, that we get back to moderating our tastes and excesses. I hope that we learn to purchase what we need (with cash).

It doesn’t hurt to learn how to wait before we purchase what we want (without credit cards). I ask myself all the time: Do I need this item now? Why do I want it now? Do I already own something that would take care of my needs? If this new and improved item fails to make any kind of necessary difference, then I decide to pass. It’s just a passing phase.

I don’t like the way the media, our national brainwashing, propagandizing arm of consumptive industries, constantly re-enforces this delirium that we must buy, buy, buy, and shop, shop, shop. I cannot stand the words disposable income. It is your money to keep, save, invest, and enjoy, it is not disposable. We’ve worked too hard to treat it as something we need to immediately get rid of.

The economy will recover, because we are the economy. We will recover, but I wish for the sake of national (mental) health people will be encouraged to save, to moderate, and measure the impact of their lifestyles.

 
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Posted in consumers, consumption, consumptive, corporate America, disposable income, environment

 

The Bully at Work

26 Mar

The New York Times, March 25, 2008, has a rather fascinating article on the bully at work. I find that article to be rather timely. I was talking to my mother about how Corporate America is actually an extension of junior high or high school. The same asshats that you disliked or were bullied by at school, end up being coworkers and supervisors.

So the hell of working with a belligerent jerk never ends. In this case, because one needs work to eat and survive this makes the situation worse. With all the debts people have, the difficultly of job jumping, the commute, our personal obligations, health benefits, and so on, sometimes hell is the only place we can work.

I’m not surprised companies are losing billions of dollars in lawsuits, people are taking extensive sick time, or just walking off the job. I’ve walked away from a number of people I wanted to knock the stuffing out of. It’s not even just about rudeness, they know you don’t want to be labeled a troublemaker.

This is about power. Nothing else.

This quote from the article, is pretty much standard at every job I’ve worked at. It’s happened to me and I’ve seen it happen to others. Oftentimes, I wonder why there aren’t more shoot-outs at job sites. According to the NY Times:

The work bully sets out on a course of constant but subtle harassment. It may start with a belittling comment at a staff meeting. Later it becomes gossip to co-workers and forgetting to invite someone to an important work event. If the bully is a supervisor, victims may be stripped of critical duties, then accused of not doing their job, says Gary Namie.

I’m a vendetta minded type of person. Not only do I thoroughly document disgusting and rude behavior, I also retaliate. I don’t let people mess with my money. I see that as life threatening, and I respond in kind.

People have and will lose jobs after I’m done with them, because I’m willing to lose my job just to get my revenge.

 
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Posted in bully, corporate America, work

 

Third Party Vendor Needed: Job References

15 Jan

I do not trust business people, especially supervisors or managers.

They speak. Their lips move: I see a liar.

Why do I feel this way? Personal experience.

It doesn’t matter how many good reviews received while on-the-job, once you are gone from the organization, do not expect these individuals to keep their word. Yes, of course, they’ll be a reference, but they are saying anything to get rid of you.

It’s gotten so bad these days, a man won a lawsuit to keep his ex-employer from bad mouthing him.

Has anyone ever bad-mouthed me? Once, many many years ago.

Today, a third party has to be utilized to make sure all these references aren’t calling one an embezzler or incompetent boob. Because you know how corporate America is today – it’s nothing personal, it’s just the business rules of the vindictive, bigoted, stupid and spiteful.

Yeah, I’m bitter.

I haven’t started the search yet, but is there a business that provides vetted references? What do I mean? There’s a company that provides, excuses – ah, alibis – as a cover for people who are supposed to be at a specific location, yet are not.

I want to find a company – legit - that works like an official reference trust or a credit scoring service. This company carries out the task of making sure references are vetted, checked, and asked a series of questions.

After 12 months, the reference information expires. This leaves the managerial liars at the former company free of legal entanglements. They are released from being asked the same questions multiple times and providing multiple fraudulent and inflammatory answers.

In addition, people forget. Why have them answer the same questions over and over again over a period of (gawd forbid) years?

Through this plan, all sides win.

If a company can use testimonies of their “customers” – whom I suspect are really actors – as proof of their level of quality. Why not have a company that keeps references for working people?

 
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Posted in corporate America, job hunting, references

 

I Hate Corporate America

03 Jan

I love to work, especially when I get to use my brain power. I love figuring out puzzles, following clues and solving problems. I’m all for intellectual inquiry and resolving obscure issues.

What I don’t like is working for corporate America. I’ve hated working for that soul draining monster, since I left college. I wasn’t overly fond of college either, but at least I saw the results of my work: decent, unbiased grades.

I’ve stayed jobs over the years, misconstruing that the problem was with the individual company. Well, after the enthusiasm wears off, be it the third week, month or year one thing becomes apparent: it’s the same all over.

I’ve run out of interest in it all.

There is no difference between a career and a job. People show up to a job because they work to live. People who have a career live to work. No matter which way it’s played out, people are trading in their time – a precious commodity – for dollars.

I’m angry at myself, because I feel I’ve been conned, yoked and suckered after so many years. I had hoped that of the years I’ve worked at a company, any company, there would be some satisfaction for a job well done.

Hah!

I enjoy being busy, at a good, interesting, well thought out, and methodical task. Yet, there were times when work was slow or non-existent. Yeah, try and find your manager for something to do. Would you believe most of the work I ever did, I gave to myself? I mostly created all of my own projects.

Those dead work times were the most stressful for me. It’s limbo time. I’ve been told that the project will start, or continue, as soon as so and so signs off on the budget. Or head honcho Chief Doubletalker is over in Europe and we must wait for his return. Or it could be the case that the manager is in over her / his head and is frozen into inaction. Name the scenario, I’ve been there.

It happens everywhere, and it happens all the time.

Now, I’m someone who doesn’t care for much of the niceties of socializing at the job. I’m not a water cooler plant. It’s like mingling with the cattle as we’re about to be slaughtered.

I feel that after spending 12 LONG hours a day with these people, I don’t want to see you after I leave the building. No offense. Nothing personal. I just want to keep separation between corporate church and state, which is my life.

Ever really read any of those career advice columns?

I used to, until I realized that it was never about competence. It could never be. These articles have been and always will pertain to how to be the best brown nosing ass-kissing suck-up at the office.

The fact is if you are attractive, which almost anyone can achieve these days, you will get ahead. If you are a phoney, unpleasant, non-compliant, take-credit-for-other-people’s-work cretin, and a two-faced backstabbing liar at the job, that’s the way up the corporate ladder.

But what if you aren’t a sociopath?

If one can find a way to make a living, and not head off to the jail-cubicles of corporate America, make a run for it and don’t look back. You’ll be happier person for it.

As for me, these people can keep their damn jobs. I’ve had enough.

 
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Posted in college, corporate America, jobs, work