How do you maintain your dignity in a Corporate World?

[Tsiyu]

Do you make voodoo dolls of your boss, out of paper clips and the last photo from the Corporate Annual Report?

Do you secretly spit in the coffee pot?

Do you mentally document the hours and hours upper management spend NOT working?

How do you make it?

I'm close to meltdown myself.

:nuke:

[DrDan]

1. 25 years in big corporation servitude

always, always, always keep your personal and work life separate

merging the two can only cause grief that is difficult to repair

[Callalily]

2. Excellent advice!

Something that I adhere to religiously.

[NewJeffCT]

4. agreed

I have worked for 2 big corporations (both in the Fortune 100) and I've been good about not taking my work home from me. Of course, when you're there 70-80 hours a week sometimes, it's not always easy.

[salin]

3. Maybe remember that life in the nonprofit sector

isn't free from the same office politics and craziness?

[TheCentepedeShoes]

5. I inhabit an all-female cubeville now

whereas for the previous 25 or so years I worked in a mixed gender open style office, which was more to my taste. I bugs me how much The Gaggle (as I secretly call my cube-mates) tries to live in each others pockets. They're a little miffed at me right now cause I don't feel like participating in The Gaggle's latest plans. Hey, I got stuff to do, like keeping my work up to date, chasing the dustbunnies from under the bed, and re-reading Crossing the Rubicon.

[dean_dem]

6. Gut a fish on your boss's desk at least once a week.

[Guy Fawkes]

7. I don't have a job.

Works well enough for me.

[Tsiyu]

8. That's what I'm beginning to see as the solution

it's a "Plantation Mentality" out there in the working world.

Be a freaking doormat or starve. Isn't America wonderful?

[smirkymonkey]

9. I have a friend who says "The office is the new plantation"

There are the masters, but most of us are slaves. We feel trapped, overworked, dehumanized and live in fear of retribution.

I find it almost impossibly to be healthy and happy while working ata corporate job. The heaviness stays with you until you leave for good.

[Wapsie B]

10. You have to detach yourself at times

in order to retain your sanity. I know in my heart that I'm good at what I do. If you think of all the times when management screwed things up only to make the underlings pay for it we'd all have permanent residence in a rubber room.

Management requires blind obedience. That's a given. If you want to be asst. toilet scrubber don't ask any hard questions of the head toilet scrubber. I've seen senior managers fired simply because they didn't unquestionly accepting what the ceo was doing.

Why? is the most unwelcome question there is in the corporate world.

[Tsiyu]

21. You are so correct

Our little piece of the big corporate pie is being run so ineffectively, it drives me crazy.

I know how to make this company $$$$ and how to help it keep its contract but I don't dare suggest anything. I am in "management" now, and it's killing me to bite my tongue and watch this place do so many things wrong.

Oh, it's certainly not the first time I've seen a company shoot itself in the foot out of pride and arrogance and just lack of experience, but I'm at the stage in life where I want to see progress and I want to see things done well and done right.

It's really a statement about our society as a whole when being a slacker is considered "good management."

Thanks to all of you who responded. I love you all for enduring the same crazy world and helping me make sense of it
:hi:

[NMMNG]

22. In one of my jobs I have been given the message

in several different ways, that my job is to "STFU and take orders". So that's basically what I do now--I do the basic work and follow any direct orders that are given to me. I no longer seek out new or better ways of doing things, offer suggestions or otherwise try to interact with the administration. Why should I when the direct care people are treated like so much offal?

[radwriter0555]

26. Well there is also a part of you that has to stop CARING about the issues

you're dealing with, do as your told and just not put so much of your heart into your work.

Exactly, stop asking why. Sometimes you have to do the Stepford Smile and do the best job you can.

You just have to stop caring about THE job and just care only that you do your job the way they want you to.

It's horrific.

[Nikia]

11. Although our company isn't a major corporation

It is a private rather than public corporation. It makes it worse in some ways because the dictators are permanent dictators unless they, themselves decide otherwise. One of the owners reminds me of Darth Vader for some reason. Everytime I see him, I have the theme music going through my head.
Other than that, I want to scream sometimes. What makes it worse is that I don't have direct collegues. Most people there are production workers so I don't have anyone to sympathize with some of my issues.
I've been told that you have to throw away the middle class value of valuing what you do for a living to not get depressed.

[Betty88]

12. try this

Take the name of your boss, write it on a bit of paper, then freeze it in a container of very strong coffee. Minor magic, just gets them to leave you alone.

I did this to my boss when I first met her, then told the others about it. Now every once in a while, when she is ranting, someone will get up and say "I'm making coffee..."

[u4ic]

13. Welcome to DU, Betty88!

:hi:

[Tsiyu]

30. Hmmmm.....

I may try this, and welcome to DU!

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

14. In my cubeville, we re-enact scenes from "Office Space" and laugh

our asses off. And then we amuse ourselves with this web site: http://www.despair.com -- despite its name, it's one of the funniest things I've ever seen.

[Redstone]

15. Quit. Say "fuck it" and walk away.

find a smaller company to work for, or go out on your own.

Life is WAY too short to waste any of it in Dilbertville.

Redstone

[ikojo]

16. Although I work for an HMO, my direct boss

was promoted from our unit (I am hoping it does not go to her head and at the moment it does not appear it is) and her boss both know I am not like others. They like me for being me and seem to accept it.

I have a Jedi poster at my desk as well as a Darth Tater and some other Star Wars toys.

On Halloween I came dressed as Obi Wan Kenobi.

I have worked places where I was treated as less than human. I survived by doing the best I could but always looking for another job.

Until I found another job, my iPod helped get me through. Before I had an iPod it was my portable DVD player. I would listen to movies all day and try to block out the world.

[LostInAnomie]

17. What's dignity?

eom

[DanCa]

18. leave tacks on chairs :D

And seriously realize that you have no control over other people.
You can only control your actions around them :hug: Peace I know its crappy advice but its truisim nonethless. :peace:

[Lady President]

19. My workplace "meditation"

I work for a huge company where thinking is frowned upon and the person with the highest salary is always right. It's miserable. Every moment is miserable. However, I'm single and living in a horrible job market, so until I find something new I have to stay.

Periodically through day I take a deep breath and exhale saying things like:
"Housing is good"
"Ohio is cold"
"You like food"

[Tsiyu]

20. LOL!

You cracked me up. If we just didn't need those everloving $$$$$$

I am in a position where today's attitudes and behaviors of the haves toward the have-nots is very much in evidence.


It is dehumanizing.

[Starbucks Anarchist]

23. You can't.

It's like maintaining your virginity in a whorehouse.

[Orsino]

24. Keeping my customers happy.

Caring about their problems, listening to them, and giving them good feedback on how a fix (I work trouble tickets for an international ISP) is progressing. I make 'em glad *I* happened to pick up their ticket, or glad they got *me* when they called. When I can hear it in their voices, that's job satisfaction.

I try to make my boss look good, too. That's not hard, though.

[radwriter0555]

25. I learned the art of the Stepford Constipated Smile.

It's a smile that is on your mouth only, with a nice slight tilt of the head.

Teeth showing, gentle, and it looks like you're paying attention. It keeps you from grabbing a pen and gouging everyone's eyes out.

[usedtobesick]

27. I have a home office and my boss lives in Scotland

when he tells me I don't see the big picture I use my camera phone to take a picture of my ass and send it to him with the caption... "here's your big picture..."
Two things about this approach.
1. Your boss must have a sence of humor.
2. You have to have a very loose definition of the word "Dignity"

[gizmo1979]

28. Have a baseline

of things you won't do,and standup for what's right.

[mitchum]

29. Sabotage