Work Culture Spoilers

      I was going through an editorial, apparently written by Mr. N. R. Narayana Murthy, co-founder of Infosys. He mentioned that a gigantic figure of software professionals are working for late hours these days which he termed as “Sitting late” and not “working late”. That’s in fact true. It’s a very familiar picture we see every single day where people sit beyond day's end. And when I looked closely I could filter each person out in following 3-4 categories.

I don’t have anything to do at home – I have mentioned this breed of  community before in one of my earlier blog Boost is the secret of my  energy, they exist to work and sleep. The intention behind this is still blurred to me because for them place of work starts at 11 pm (Instead of customary 8:30 am for everyone else) and to complete 8-9 hrs they hang around way beyond working hours. They are apple of manager’s eye for the sole reason that they are good in showing that they work a lot.  They have no hobbies, no interests. They generally slumber out the entire weekend. These are the same people belong to the group who say “Life is SO unexciting”.

I should be working always – This is one more variety of software engineers, Chicken hearted soldiers, as far as in my thoughts.

# They are frightened of Company’s business policies, they think each company policy is intended to throw them out,

# They are SHIT scared of their managers,

# They are terrified of their coworkers,

# They are petrified of every potential object around them.

According to them the solitary way to survive is to carry on working. It does not matter if it’s late or its weekend. Managers like this category of resources because they work a lot and managers need not give them back anything because they do not ask or demand for it. They are scared to demand for award or reward against the work they have given to the organization and yet are rated “Average Performer” ALWAYS. They are the No. 1 reason behind company’s revenue. Wake up guys, everyone in this industry molests you and yet you give them chance to molest you again and again.

Work for Pleasure – This is not a very familiar race of people but not uncommon also. They always do more then what is assigned to them just because they like working. It does not matter what rating they get, small salaries does not bother them and it does not matter if they will be given an opportunity to take a trip onsite or not. They just like to work work work. Day, night, Saturday and Sunday everything is same for them.

Now the point what I want to make here is if you unite these 3 categories, it will give you around 60-70% of the total software engineers but what about rest 30%. I belong to that 30%,

1. I don’t work/Sit outside organization defined working hours if not necessary because I have hobbies and interests which I have to follow every single day.
2. I say no to work on weekends because I work for money, the money for which I need time to spend. I get only weekends to spend and take pleasure in that money. If I start working on weekends then when will I enjoy and where will I spend??
3. I sketch my effort in such a way that I conclude everything by company set “end of day” which is highly UNACCEPTABLE to my supervisors, Reason ? No idea.
4. I do not take surplus work un-necessarily just because everyone else in my team belongs to one of those 3 categories.

I am not and I was never in my managers good books just because of those 3 categories. In past 5 years I have seen managers and companies like people who work beyond working hours even if there is no work and just because of this the fraction of those 3 categories is mounting radically. My new manager asked me once why people do not stay back in this project. What sort of issue is that?? When everyone finishes everything by 6 then why do you desire them to stay back??

I suppose I will not transform because I am proud the way I work.

I work to live and not live to work

Beware !!

Hi people, this is after a very long time I felt like writing. This time I chose to make you alert of unusual white coat fraudsters, please share if you have bumped into rather similar so that we do not plunge into their traps.

1. Supermarkets – Yes they are one of the leading cheaters, particularly when they sell out food items. Brands like food world, Benson’s, Big Bazaar. All of us shop in one of those every single week and yet we fail to detect something very very significant.

Have you ever noticed the expiry date of the item you have just pulled out from the rack, I guess not. We don’t do that because we have an impression that whatever is sold in the supermarkets is fresh and of a high-quality, is it??

I observed this sometime back when I purchased a bottle of tomato ketchup which was black upon opening!!! Yes, and I could not return it because I had misplaced the receipt but when I noticed the expiry date, it was already expired 3 months before!!! Same thing happened yesterday yet again, we failed to note just 1 item (habitually we verify the expiry date for every article ahead of paying for it) and bang it was all flooded with fungus from inside when we opened it, so be careful from next time.

2. Hindi Movies – They are the 2^nd leading frauds, just Hindi movie makers. These days they make such crapiest movies that you feel like butchering someone after you have watched it. All the newest movies guarantee A LOT in their promos but when you actually purchase a ticket of more then 200 bucks; the film does not care about you, every single movie these days cares for you till you buy the tickets and then it chuckles on you. I suppose in last 2 years I have seen just 2 high-quality movies “3 Idiots” and “A Wednesday”.

You will find actors, directors appealing everyone to prevent piracy; they request us to watch it in the theatre rather then downloading it. How can they expect that after movies like Drona, Ghajini, Prince, Tashan and latest piece Houseful? I am glad to download and watch. I even have discovered that some movies were not even worth watching at home and then I felt dreadful that I wasted my internet bandwidth for it. I am proud to say that I don’t throw away my money on Hindi movies, beware of Hindi Movies.

3. Electronic Stores – This is one more place where they mystify and manipulate you to buy something which you did not come to purchase at the first place. One such episode took place with me. I went to buy a LCD TV and I did all my research, I wanted LG LCD HD 42”. When I reached the e-zone store I found 2 walls covered with LCD TVs, One with all promising brands and one with Only Sony.

Now on Sony wall each screen was connected with Blu-ray disc (High-density optical disc) player and the other wall with all brands was connected with regular cable (Not even to any DTH). So as soon as you enter you will observe an incredible image quality on Sony but a dreadful picture quality on every other brand. When I asked the salesman to attach Blu-ray disc player to LG, he declined, he said it’s not doable; it can be connected to Sony only!! After sometime he recommended why don’t you buy Sony? It has miraculous picture quality!!

So before buying anything like this please do your groundwork and be firm on what you crave for because they might want to maneuver you like this, beware of such tactics.