Wednesday, June 20, 2012

I don't feel like it

This or variations of it have now been said twice this week in front of me. The first time this girl got told to make new folders, labeled. It was probably like a hundred folders.

Her: Pssst, Sam!
Me: Yeah?
Her: I'll give you $20 to do the folder project for me.
Me: But I already have a project for today.
Her: Come on. I hate this shit.
Me: Sorry

She was supposed to do it Monday. Like, start and finish it Monday. How long does it take to type out a hundred labels, print them out, slap them on folders, and put the right papers (already sorted) in the folders? Like maybe two hours? I left at 6:15 tonight and it still wasn't done. This morning I heard someone ask if she'd finished it and she said she was finishing up.

Also, when Josh's mom took me fancy-suit shopping she told me not to curse at work, even if someone else did. The girl? She said fuck really loudly today. I was like in someone's office getting told what they needed me to do this morning and she was way down the hall and I heard it. There's this nice German lady who always wears bracelets that jingle who I overheard telling someone that girl took a huge stack of papers and just dumped them in a drawer instead of sorting and filing them. They take their filing REALLY seriously around here.

Today, I saw this administrative assistant look up, look around at everyone nearby, and say to one intern, "Hey, come help me?" and you know what his response was? "Nah, I don't feel like it." I cringed hearing it. Yes, I know - we're competing with each other in a way, and I should be happy when my competition throws themselves out of the running. But I am getting soft in my old age or something, because I just feel bad. Of course we don't feel like it. You think I want to walk around fetching people's lunch orders? You think I want to get deep paper cuts filing crap nobody will probably ever look at?

The point isn't to have fun at work. If it were, instead of walking down hallways we'd slip-n-slide down them. I want to ask these people. How do you have the balls to do that? When I worked at the diner there were so many times that either someone asked me to do something that was blatantly someone else's job or I saw that a table needed to be set or whatever so I'd do it. The two people who are so lax? They never do anything other than exactly what they're asked.

It makes me kind of angry. They took spots from other people. People who might have really needed this. Maybe they need it, but they're not appreciating it. Other people would. Other people do.

5 comments:

Monica said...

This doesn't just occur at internships, some people act this way at work too and then are all surprised and hurt when they get fired.

I used to wonder how they got away with it and get frustrated when they seemed to but now I just take deep breaths and remind myself that their time will come. The odd part is that it's not related to need. I've worked with some people who truly desperately need their jobs and yet treat them like an afterthought. It's odd.

RC said...

You are going to do well at this internship and beyond. You get that even though you don't want to do something, it needs to be done. Work is called WORK for a reason. ;-)

Suzanne said...

You've got something that 98% of your peers do not have. A work ethic.
Get a couple of references from this job that can state that you've got a great work ethic and you've got it made!

Anonymous said...

Good for you. These people are dopes. You do have a work ethic, and it will serve you well.

OTRgirl said...

When I was interviewing freelancers, I kept trying to ask questions that would give me a sense if the person had self-initiative. I can train someone to do lots of things, but if they aren't self-driven, then I can't make that happen.

Keep your head down and keep working at your normal level (which is excellent) and you'll come out way ahead.

You have one of the hardest work ethics I know. The sad truth is, I think it's only the top 5-10 percent that have such drive.