[Yesterday: 3.4 miles; none today]
I checked out a book at the library: Shop Class as Soulcraft by Matthew B. Crawford.
I have been enjoying it. The subtitle is a good summary: “An inquiry into the value of work”
Mr Crawford sees some serious problems in the erosion of personal agency in corporate culture.
Up until recently I’ve been able to avoid most of those problems by being a “one man band” at my job. I could talk to my user community, make decisions, take action, and maybe see improvement or not. But here about a year ago I got a new boss who has taken over some of the decision making. Then I got a co-worker, and another new boss between me and my old-new-boss. I’m starting to feel less and less connected to whatever good may be coming out of my work.
So this book has me wondering how I can capture that feeling of accomplishment again.
One overlooked part is the need for income, although the author does mention it in a place or two. If I didn’t need the money it would definitely be easier to become a teacher or a welder. I’ve gone too far down this road I’m on, and I don’t know if there is any actual way off until such time as retirement, or near retirement should arrive. And I’ve been too lazy to be proactive about it; I could be saving up money to take a leap, but haven’t done that.
Oh well, I have it easy. I eat too much food too, and my wife is too pretty. So we all have our problems.
2 replies on “Book”
I read about that book somewhere else but can’t for the life of me recall where.
I’ve not read it, but what you describe is happening where I work. I am in a staff function and there is a company-wide restructuring to centralize staff functions in “centers of excellence” and remove the structure that grew organically with time. Lots of talk now and the reorg itself happens next year. Everything I do came to my plate organically over time. Organically. Bad word. It means I do some finance, some accounting, some data, some projects. Not only accounting or only finance… (Same with a lot of co-workers.) I envision COE being bureaucracy. You can’t just call “Janet” who has being doing XYZ for years and can shortcut to a solution. Also, who owns the problem and who owns the solution (I mean specific individuals, not amorphous group). It’s suppose to be better so I may be proved incorrect in my concerns.
For you I offer advice my friend Andy has. Andy is from Harban Manchuria and got his degree in Michigan then landed a job with Chevron after rejecting an offer from a startup ten or so years ago as he thought it too risky (Google). Andy says they pay you to do something and then pay you again to do it again when they change their minds. So don’t be attached to your work in a manner that redoing it is offensive or dismaying. More changes, more work, more pay.
It’s been very hard for the people in our office & shop to adjust to the new owners. They are very nice people and are paying us all very well, but things haven’t really gone smoothly from the beginning. (Our bank was failing, so they were calling notes and closing businesses all over town to try and stay afloat. They couldn’t satisfy the feds and we couldn’t satisfy the bank…so now the bank is closed, too.)
Anyway, the new bosses have a small bureaucracy that they feel runs okay. Getting sucked into that hasn’t been very fun. Particularly, when we could individually make a decision and see it’s efficacy before. Now, we ask permission to make a decision. Where a one or two-word answer would suffice, we get a paragraph or three of “thoughts” or procedures, which may or may not actually give us an answer.
Then there are the non-answers that mean they don’t want to make the decision, so we’re to act like it doesn’t need to be made. Very disheartening.
Take bidding for instance, it used to be fairly simple. Procure the plans, decide how the job should be done, figure costs, mark up and – voila! – a bid ready to be sent to the contractor.
Now we procure the plans, decide how the job should be done, figure costs, mark up and…crickets. The bid must be discussed with the owner – which makes sense. However, it can’t be discussed until approximately ten minutes prior to the actual bid time. After the discussion, changes have to be made and the bid submitted in a haphazard manner greatly decreasing the possibility of our getting the work.
Then there are the mixed messages: “We want you to be profitable” “Raise your price above what the market will bear and see what happens” (the second one isn’t a quote…just what is actually happening) “Hire more people” “Why did you hire that guy?” Etc.
Most of the processes I did for Miller The Driller have gone to the other office, and up until lately I just fed information to them so they could do the work. We recently hired a woman to do that, and now I’m in the estimating part of the work. Our estimator went elsewhere this summer due to frustration. Any given day it’s still a fun job…and can still be rewarding. But the change in structure has made it much less so.
I’m staying until they decide to quit paying me. Then will find something else to take me another ten years or so.