Let's bitch about our stupid, annoying co-workers

My employer is currently in the middle of a merger with another company, and their equivalent of our department is in "meltdown" to quote one of their HR people. Like I thought our roll-out of *INSERT NAME OF NEW-ISH TECH* was way behind schedule, but they haven't even started. Despite them having a team dedicated to figuring out how to do the deployment. Oh and they have two hours of scheduled time on their group calenders every day to discuss 'merger issues' which basically boils down to a large proportion of them getting laid off because they don't actually seem to be doing anything.

Ha that reminds me of when we merged companies ohhh...2 years back now? And at the time someone said they aimed to have our billing and IP dbases merged with theirs within 3 quarters. I did laugh. 2 years later its still not happened.

"This new e-mail system" = Gmail, a free service that's been provided since 2004.

it is 77°F in my office

the window is already open

translate pls

too effing hot

right down to the vernacular, impressive service

Newish colleague (neither stupid nor annoying tbh but y'know coworker so seemed the thread) was running a big annual black tie dinner for the first time tonight. He came back from tm lewin in the afternoon with a new dress shirt and realised he didn't have any cufflinks. I keep spares in the office because I've had the same thing happen in the past, so I offered them up.

Two hours later I went by the staff toilet on my way out

http://cl.ly/image/3S062J462h0u/File%2010-03-2015%2022%2037%2027.jpeg

gah!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh lord it takes like two things to unwind (no tools required or water main turned off). Might be gross in there but I'd do that any day to avoid losing someone else's stuff.

One of my colleagues wanted to bring in an external AV contractor to change a bulb in a video projector that could be reached by standing on the table underneath it.

coworker is on calls all day selling movies to customers, constantly mangling actor names

in the last 10 minutes alone
ChristophER Waltz
JuliannA Moore
Kayley CuCOW (lol though)
oh and talked about Jennifer Aniston for a long time before he realized he meant Jennifer Lopez

u_u

i got into a huge fight with a coworker yesterday, and she repeatedly called me a liar*. then last night she called and left me a message apologizing for her 'losing her temper' but not for the accusations. she wants me to call her back so i'm not gonna, bc i'm mean and like holding grudges.

*this is boring, but to justify why her lying accusations are so stupid:
i'm the garment-dyer. i have to come up with new formulas to try and match the samples that coworker (65yr old french lady) gives me. i also manage the inventory, which means that i decide what goes out (sizes, colors etc) to each store. so she's telling me that we have to discontinue the cranberry and continue the moss bc the latter sells well and the former doesn't. how does she know this? bc she works about 15 hours a week, split between two stores. i tell her it's actually the other way round, bc i see the inventory sheets so i know the actual numbers. she starts telling me she doesn't believe me, that i just say a color is selling well if it's a color i like, and that it's not selling well if i don't like it. this is... nuts. like, why would i give a shit?? i don't work in the stores, i don't buy these clothes, i couldn't care less. it's in my best interests to correctly predict what is selling well and keep it stocked, bc i take the blame when we're left with tons of a bad color at the end of the season. but she wouldn't let up on this ridiculous idea, so yeah, fuck her.

it shouldn't amaze me, but I am constantly amazed at how few people know how to apologize properly and handsomely. the non-apology or halfway apology or just the misapplied apology for the wrong thing seems to rule the world, not just the god damned playground. it takes patience and forgiveness to cope with all the rotten apologies one gets in the course of life.

otm

^^^

It can be so freeing to sometimes just own a mistake and say "i got it wrong, what can I do to repair this?" and not make any excuses.

^ this is actually one of the best ways to gain a reputation for competence and reliability, ironically

Good apologies and good acceptance (focused on solutions, dispassionate) are beautiful and the inspire so much respect. Three of my co -workers/bosses are really great at both and that makes up for a ton of quirks.

OTOH, my direct boss is terrible at both - on my the rare occasions she apologizes, it's hyperbolic and irritated ("That was my stupidity"). Usually she doesn't own up to mistakes, but says, "This didn't get done right. It needs to get done."

Anyway, that sucks, J. What a bizarre accusation. Like you're a shill for cranberry.

Yeah this is true, I remember I got massive respect from the QA manager at one of my previous jobs because I owned up immediately to breaking something and fixed it straight away, from then on he trusted me over most of the other devs, who he said would've just denied all knowledge of it.

The co-workers on my immediate team range from fair to good at this. But the department as a whole is about as bad as it can get while still staying on the pass-agg side of aggressive. We're not all in one big open plan office, but cutbacks mean that soon we might be. I wonder if the pass-agg blamers will learn to do that less, or will the 'good' colleagues learn to blame?

Good apologies and good acceptance (focused on solutions, dispassionate

I've done this on several occasions even when I wasn't to blame, simply because it brought things out into the open and stopped a potentially long series of recriminations and counter-recriminations. It's interesting the effect doing that has on pass-agg people, particularly the 'office politics' type. It's like they're gradually winding up to the point where they're saying "I'm going to tell your boss", but their whole gameplan gets short circuited when I take responsibility.

ive a few coworkers that rode good apologies all the way up the promotion ladder, despite the apologies being numerous and warranted.

Like one time my boss emailed me while out of town, "Email this FOIA request to the X city department and copy the client," so I emailed it and CC'd the client.

She called me in a state a minute after I sent it b/c she hadn't wanted the city dept to have the client's email address. I said I was sorry but "that was not apparent from your email." (There was no apparent confidentiality issue (the client's name was on the request) and it would be normal to CC the client, especially since she said "and copy the client.") She responded, "I meant 'send a copy to the client'! You should ask for clarification of yiu don't understand my directions."

Like ayou're a shill for cranberry.

Lololol

my God, having "a team" at work, how do u ppl stand it?

it's just laundry

they do all the work its great

So it's that time of year again when we think about vacations. I have to take mine at a time convenient to everyone else, even ignorant, lazy people who don't leave town for theirs, even though economics are not a factor.

WTF is going on with people who have the means and opportunity to travel and don't? Travel educates you and makes you a more worthwhile person. One would think employers encouraged such a thing.

*SOBS*

travelling is definitely awesome but being a dick about it is not

imo

ya - if people don't want to travel, it's their loss – but really doesn't affect anyone else. maybe they just really like their beds and their cooking. even worse than a non-traveler, is a shitty/grouchy traveler.

I'm basically a shut in except for work and i HATE when people say, ooh, taking a staycation? yes i am, co-worker, mind your own beeswax

for me, travel for travel's sake is pointless and a waste of money, and anyone who has a problem with that can fuck themselves in every way possible

Depends on what country you live in. And if you want to work in a creative field like publishing, but won't leave your city, it's a narrow-minded and provincial thing to do. It smacks of entitlement if you expect a job in academia or publishing, but won't travel.

Might not be so bad if you don't work in publishing or academia.

You think that's entitled? Wait until they start telling you how to spend your time and money!

Lolol just1n3 that is so weird and petty!! Like "YOU just want YOUR favorite colors and MOM SAID IT WAS MY TURN WITH THE REMOTR AND STOP HOGGING ALL THE COOKIES! MOOMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!l"

I work in publishing and haven't left the state in over five years.

(Except for this past winter/summer when I went to Australia for three weeks.)

ah our friends with wealthy parents are always telling us about how traveling makes one a better person. How does anyone know about anyone else's means for travel?

And even if you're sure they have the disposable income they may have other unavoidable demands on their free time, anxiety issues, etc

(or in my case chronic disorganisation)

Like, I could probably afford to go away (though it is goddamned expensive to spend a week in hotels and eating in restaurants or w/e, I took my first holiday abroad in years last autumn and was p. shocked by the dent it left in my bank balance) but I'd need to hatch a plan and ask for time off and think about transport and research hotels and make bookings, all preferably months in advance, and it just never happens

better to take a vacation from I M Losted

I go abroad at least once a year and its a fuckload of work to plan and budget for even without kids and with two incomes between us, and if it was my preference alone a few out of those times I'd havd preferred to sit at home in the house I pay for and dont get to enjoy and maybe at 2pm every day I'd go out for lunch in the town I pay to live in and never get to enjoy and as I say I travel abroad as much as Ryanair allows but srsly wtf at the attitude espoused above.

otm. 4 days is my max for travelling, bored after that.

And if you want to work in a creative field like publishing, but won't leave your city, it's a narrow-minded and provincial thing to do. It smacks of entitlement if you expect a job in academia or publishing, but won't travel.

What is this assholish reasoning? Everyone I know in creative fields has exactly two tenths of fuck all money, for starters.

the bigger question is what r u running from with all this endless travel

hmmmmm?

pretty jealous of anyone who has all the PTO to do all this overseas travelling

guilty as charged there tbh yr eyes would pop I'm on about half if what sic gets in terms of leave.

i have plenty of leave because i don't take it but how do people with jobs have the energy to travel? feels like a cruel joke. i'd choose stay home and get some sleep and be dull.

I heard u were afraid of international outrage