"Hump" Day...
Jan. 14th, 2004 08:06 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
klsiegel320Sigh...did not want to get out of bed this morning, simply did not. Did not want to get dressed and venture out into the world. Just wanted to sit on my couch and watch TV and knit.
Long day yesterday - getting a document ready to put in front of the client is always exciting, and having to write new scripts to do it at the 11th hour...well, anyway, we got the information into the model, got the scripts into the template, and we have something for the users to look at this afternoon. This is good.
What's not good is the amount of "hurry up and wait" time involved, on my end. When the template is ready to go, and I'm sitting here waiting for them to finish adding content to the model...it's excruciating. And ordinarily, I would use that time for personal stuff, on the theory that as soon as the work was ready, I'd drop whatever I was doing and go back to it.
That's much less possible here. Can't read my mail; can't shop; can't even play because we're not allowed to load anything at all on the machines. I was reading the "internet use" guidelines the other day, and there's a FAQ page, and one question plaintively asks, "Can we use the Internet for personal business before or after work hours, or during lunch." Answer: No.
I suppose, realistically, it's hard to say "yes, if you keep it reasonable," because that's such a subjective measurement. Is allowing access to sites like Amazon and eBay reasonable? Well, that depends. If once in a while I go hunt down a book at Amazon while waiting for a print run to finish or something, probably it is. If I spend seven hours out of an eight-hour work day bidding on eBay while my work sits languishing in my "in" basket - probably not.
But how do you say, "Okay, you can use it for these things as long as you're reasonable." The person spending seven hours bidding may feel that his or her work is still getting done, and that having that ability to blow off steam is reasonable. Any definition or prescription for reasonable is necessarily going to seem too liberal to some people and too draconian to others. Sigh...wish there were an easier answer, but there really isn't.
One is moved to wonder if there were abuses early on, that led to this policy, or if it's been like this from the beginning.
Long day yesterday - getting a document ready to put in front of the client is always exciting, and having to write new scripts to do it at the 11th hour...well, anyway, we got the information into the model, got the scripts into the template, and we have something for the users to look at this afternoon. This is good.
What's not good is the amount of "hurry up and wait" time involved, on my end. When the template is ready to go, and I'm sitting here waiting for them to finish adding content to the model...it's excruciating. And ordinarily, I would use that time for personal stuff, on the theory that as soon as the work was ready, I'd drop whatever I was doing and go back to it.
That's much less possible here. Can't read my mail; can't shop; can't even play because we're not allowed to load anything at all on the machines. I was reading the "internet use" guidelines the other day, and there's a FAQ page, and one question plaintively asks, "Can we use the Internet for personal business before or after work hours, or during lunch." Answer: No.
I suppose, realistically, it's hard to say "yes, if you keep it reasonable," because that's such a subjective measurement. Is allowing access to sites like Amazon and eBay reasonable? Well, that depends. If once in a while I go hunt down a book at Amazon while waiting for a print run to finish or something, probably it is. If I spend seven hours out of an eight-hour work day bidding on eBay while my work sits languishing in my "in" basket - probably not.
But how do you say, "Okay, you can use it for these things as long as you're reasonable." The person spending seven hours bidding may feel that his or her work is still getting done, and that having that ability to blow off steam is reasonable. Any definition or prescription for reasonable is necessarily going to seem too liberal to some people and too draconian to others. Sigh...wish there were an easier answer, but there really isn't.
One is moved to wonder if there were abuses early on, that led to this policy, or if it's been like this from the beginning.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
I concurred with your first paragraph this morning . . . .
Date: 2004-01-14 10:11 pm (UTC)Your long day yesterday probably contributed to feeling like you could've used a break today.
The "hurry up and wait" model sounds, in function not complexity, like most of the temp jobs I've worked in my life. If you're efficient at the tasks they've assigned and run out of things to do, it can get excruciatingly boring.
I confess -- I've gotten way addicted to being able to do some recreational things on my work computer. I track nutritional information, post to TypePad, rearrange movies in my Netflix queue, order books from my public library, check the status of an Amazon order. But my work always gets done and my "clients" always get my full attention when they need it. The 'net keeps me sane in a workplace with only two immediate co-workers, both of whom are often a floor away from me.
Re: I concurred with your first paragraph this morning . . . .
Date: 2004-01-15 01:50 pm (UTC)Except it turns out that this place actually closes and has an official holiday for Martin Luther King's birthday, which is officially Monday - which of course none of us knew when we booked our travel. So I immediately called up to reschedule my flight, and now I get two whole days home, plus most of Monday (although Monday I'm going to have to work, even though we're officially "off"). Cost $143.20, and I don't know if they'll accept the expense; I was accustomed to taking those out of my per diem at CCE to spare the project the extra cost, but I'm not necessarily so minded here.
So I get extra home time - always a plus, and if it costs me $143.20 out of pocket, so be it. It's worth it to me, right now.
And yeah, the work stuff is pretty grim, sometimes. I noticed on the first project I was on that this was essentially a second shift job - the analysts do their work, while I sit on my hands; and then when they're done, I do my thing. Unfortunately there's no adequate way to explain that to the client.
I'm not sure there's an adequate way to explain anything to this client. The PM in particular seems very set in his ways, very unwilling to see things from other people's point of view. Not auspicious.
Anyway, that's my two cents for the morning...type to you later.
Re: I concurred with your first paragraph this morning . . . .
Date: 2004-01-16 06:34 pm (UTC)