Re: [Futurework] The world of work

[Ray Evans Harrell]

This is an interesting study,   Such statistics are often given to explain why I shouldn't be paid.    After all if I'm happy in my work and they are in pain then they should be paid and my pay is my happiness even though I don't have the money to do the work and eat.     The problem as I see it is that the society needs for everyone to work.    What would it do with all of those people meddling around as a result of too much leisure time?   That is, after all, the sole reason for the existence of public schools as well.   You guys worry about public education but education for what?    To take your place in this workforce that does little of significance!    And knows that that is the case!    I should ask my ex-Sister-in-Law who is happy in her work.   She works for Towers Perrin.   She gets to be an explorer and get paid for bringing the news to the Rubes.       The purpose of work in this society is two-fold:   1. to keep people busy and out of trouble and 2. to redistribute income based upon who gets the prize for being the busiest.      Remember the Reagan Revolution that put all those "druggies",  finding themselves in the 1960s,  to work doing drab jobs?    You guys need work for control.   You don't need it to make money but to redistribute money that is truly in excess as a result of Lean Manufacturing i.e. automated slave machines.    That is like that Black Stone that the Moslems love to touch and then run away from unchanged.       In fact people on this list recently referred to people not as resources but as slow, overweight computers.   That's because computers and slave machines are better equipped for Mr. Ford's meditation than human beings.   But once you do that, what do you do with all of this excess protoplasm?       As if human subtlity didn't exist and human talent was of no purpose or use to the future of the species.   Once upon a time they said that it was in order to be able to make Art.    But today you've lost the way.    You don't even know what the impulse behind the Art is so why do it?     And if there is no reason then go back to work and fight the machine except you are only second rate next to all of that tortured stone out there working in the darkness of the black factory.    So we find the next scientific Mess-iah.   Eu$gen-hicks.    Eugenics is the biggest cop-out of all.   Instead of working and growing those old decrepit brain cells you want to build a bigger and better human not through mastery but through chemistry and DNA manipulation.      Where is the science as exploration?    Buried in Utility!      But the Utilitarian "usefulness" of science is a bastard child.    Sort of like using Velcro as an excuse or rational for going into Space.        Unlike the abused child J.S. Mill (by a demented father),  I got my abuse from the results of J.S. Mill's abuse.   But we both share the same sadness and rage from that abuse.    They said Utility was for happiness but if that were true then only one half of one percent of the Nation would be successfully happy with their immense wealth.   But they are not!    I've met them and even know a few and they ain't happy but they sure as hell feel vulnerable.    I "share" the feeling.       Happiness through economic value and "usefulness"  (manipulation of the money supply for redistribution through work)   is a bust.    They are always living in the future!    Now we even have FUTURISTS!    I remember them wheeling my Father into the operating as he said that he would be back because he hadn't finished his work and that would guarantee his return.    I loved my Dad but he didn't come back and it doesn't matter that he hadn't finished or found the future.   It found him.    I hope he had what he needed.   In fact, on this list,  we are talking about the FUTURE of more of the same.   Is this not a waste of the one truly valuable dimishing asset that we possess?   Time?        The future is for growth.    For Knowing, NOT for Standing Under.    Knowing is an instantaneous holistic response to a problem that raises learned habit to the level of "Natural Intuitive Mastery."    That it is so Natural that the Rubes believe you are born with it.   That its genetic, chemical or some other excuse for their not trying.       Happiness comes from success and meaningful growth that brings fulfillment.      If it doesn't do that you get a C-.     Industry could never do that, it posited all happiness in the family and in working for the future generations.    They called it "Profit" but to what end?   For the family, for the child, for the nation because it sure as hell was not worth the effort but it might be "Un bel dě".      So it was OK for poor Butterfly to be miserable as she waited so delicately for her "American Future" .    "Your life wasn't a waste Butterfly!"   "You WILL be appreciated some day!"   (That is the Art Composer's Creed that creates and sustains hope in misery!)    When the LSD told them this was the dream and life was elsewhere, Reagan said "forget the pursuit of psycho-physical values,  ground yourself instead in WORK!    Work for the Future generations!    If this is a Dream then let us Dream On!"    But that dream was found in all of those old celluloid tapes filled with banal cliche's that made it impossible to imagine anything else.    There are those on LSD who spoke of their chest breaking open and seeing the sacred heart at the center beating, while all the way down were layers and layers of old Hollywood movies.          The Soviets made the same mistake but they were not as good at promises and novelty as the Capitalists and so eventually people ceased believing in their Dream, their Future.   Reagan called them the Evil Empire but what would you expect?   Reagan was an idiot, a lousy actor whose main worth was PR for mediocrities who liked to claim the mantle of the scholar but who wouldn't know one when they met her.    And if they did realize it they would try to kill her because of their own fear of mirrors.   So we have this mediocrity in the White House now and thank God we got rid of the genius who was there before.   Did anyone truly understand the cynicism of William Jefferson Clinton?     What kind of person would see as much as he saw and understand as much as he did and turn the meaning of life into "keeping the old dog on the porch?"     Clinton on the Sax and Blair on the Guitar knowing that everyone was happy being manipulated and "working" to no purpose whatsoever.   Now its Blair and the Baseball Owner.    Same game.   May as well play Rock and Roll.   Or have stars on the brain.   Star Singer aka Ray Evans Harrell         ----- Original Message ----- From: Bruce Leier To: 'Ed Weick' ; 'futurework' Sent: Tuesday, January 28, 2003 2:25 PM Subject: RE: [Futurework] The world of work Ed,   Reminds me of a study that Lee Iacocca (sp?) once commissioned and buried.  He was the Chrysler CEO who got the Feds to bail Chrysler out.  After he got them earning money again he was thinking about running for president.  He commissioned a study (at least $1,000,000) of the US workforce to get attitudes of workers, etc.  The results were so disturbing, that those who did the work  were sworn to never write about any of the results.   At that time dissatisfaction levels were so high that a high % were ready to commit sabotage at the work place.   Bruce Leier -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] On Behalf Of Ed Weick Sent: Tuesday, January 28, 2003 9:08 AM To: futurework Subject: [Futurework] The world of work   For a lot of people, the sad, grey world of work!   Ed Ed Weick 577 Melbourne Ave. Ottawa, ON, K2A 1W7 Canada Phone (613) 728 4630 Fax     (613)  728 9382 One-third of employees loathe their jobs, consultants find By VIRGINIA GALT, WORKPLACE REPORTER, Globe and Mail  Tuesday, January 28, 2003 – Print Edition, Page B1 TORONTO -- Hate your job? You're not alone. New research to be published today by Towers Perrin management consultants shows that one-third of employees are profoundly unhappy in their work. "It's the saddest feeling you can ever have, when you wake up in the morning and dread the thought of going to work," says graphic designer Anthony Pimenta, who felt stifled and unchallenged -- but fairly treated -- in his previous position with one of Canada's major banks. It was the monotony that drove Melissa Alvares to flee her previous job at a market research firm, where she spent most of her time closeted in a room going through stacks of forms, checking for missing postal codes. Employees were under constant pressure to process the forms faster and faster. "It was like a weird boot camp," said Ms. Alvares, who has a combined business and science degree from the University of Waterloo and who now works, happily, as a marketing co-ordinator with Toronto-based Softchoice Corp. For communications specialist Stacie Smith, it was the total lack of control over her own time that led her to quit a Toronto public relations agency and set up her own shop. The pay was good, the work was interesting, "but I couldn't even have lunch, unless I had it at my desk," Ms. Smith said in an interview yesterday. "I couldn't leave at six o'clock to watch my nephew play hockey." The Towers Perrin study found that most people have strong feelings about their jobs -- "employees are not apathetic or indifferent, as many suppose" -- and these emotions are predominantly negative. More than half of 1,100 employees polled in Canada and the United States reported negative feelings about their jobs, and one-third of employees in that sample group described their feelings as "intensely negative." Towers Perrin suggests that the mood of employees has worsened as a result of a decade of downsizings. They "have never worked as hard or as fast," said one of the firm's representatives in Toronto yesterday. Towers Perrin said in its report that "people are burned out -- doing as much or more work with fewer resources and less support." The researchers found that senior managers have an accurate sense of the current mood of the work force, "but they misjudge some of the root causes," Bruce Near, managing director of Towers Perrin in Canada, said in an interview yesterday. Employees cited boredom, overwork, concern about their future, and a lack of support and recognition from their bosses as key reasons for their unhappiness. "Where pay was an issue, it was largely about perceived unfairness, specifically insufficient pay for the level of effort or results provided, rather than absolute pay levels," Towers Perrin reported in its study, Working Today: Exploring Employees' Emotional Connections to Their Jobs. "Among our discontented group, 28 per cent are actively looking for a new job or planning to leave their company," the report said. "Equally disturbing, fully a quarter of these individuals plan to remain with their current employer -- suggesting a company could have a segment of disaffected workers just 'hanging on' to their jobs and, potentially, adversely affecting others with their negative attitudes." Mr. Near said many employees are sticking with their jobs in the current economic environment. But as the climate improves, many of the disaffected will move on. For every 1,000 employees in any large organization, he said, roughly 600 are either actively or passively looking for other work. He said the survey, conducted in partnership with a U.S. firm, Gang & Gang, found no difference in attitudes between Canadian and U.S. employees. And, after a spate of corporate scandals, the researchers were surprised to discover that the question of whether employees trusted their senior executives had less impact on their level of job satisfaction than other factors, Mr. Near said. The researchers also found "a statistically significant relationship" between employee satisfaction and strong financial results, said Mr. Near, who added that employees who feel connected to, and competent in, their work perform better. Ms. Alvares said she is thriving in her new job, where she helps develop marketing programs for computer product vendors. She said she doesn't mind hard work and long hours, if the work is challenging. Ms. Smith, who has hung out her shingle as Smith Communications, still puts in long days -- but she gets to choose her own clients and set her own hours. She can now take a break for lunch, walk the dog or watch her nephew's hockey games. She is expecting her first child in April. Mr. Pimenta was given the option of moving into a branch-banking role or taking a buyout when his position as a graphic designer was eliminated. He opted for the buyout, took career counselling, and now operates his own business, Hibryd Productions, which specializes in Web design, animation, graphics, and film and video production. It was not the bank's fault that he felt bored and out of place, Mr. Pimenta said in an interview. But he felt that his creativity was undervalued -- "They'd get more excited about someone developing a new form, a new withdrawal slip." Now, working for himself after 15 years in banking, Mr. Pimenta says he cannot wait to get out of bed in the morning to develop his new business. "It's beyond fun, it's so cool." The Towers Perrin report said employers have a lot to gain by harnessing this passion in their current work forces. "Gaining this discretionary effort from employees may be the last remaining source of increased productivity, now that so many companies have already captured the efficiencies of technology and streamlined work processes," the report said.