I am wearing jeans!
Kudos to my employer, and I really mean it. I believe they have found the one way to boost morale, that doesn’t cost a thing! We have “Casual Everyday” from now until Labor Day and we are allowed to wear jeans.
I never really understood the US dress code for employees. It was a bummer from day one - I can’t wear jeans to work? Impossible!
I understand that for some customer contact and for certain types of jobs, people have to wear attire that is a little more formal, but in all honesty - those people know, they don’t need a dress code. And if they don’t, there are bigger issues. For the majority of employees at my company there is no need to wear anything else.
Now, since corporate morale everywhere in the US is down, my company has sent out a company wide update with the new dress code that is in effect until Labor Day in September when it will be reviewed again. I am so happy!
On the other hand, that brings up a new question - why does it make me so happy that I can wear jeans. I am not a formal dresser, I actually wear mostly pants that are cut like jeans anyway but made out of a different fabric. But somehow, jeans is just a whole different world.
Survivor’s remorse - lay-off aftermath
So, yet another round of lay-offs has passed. Last week, I lost several of my nice benefits - tuition reimbursement being the one that would hurt the most and we got a pay cut. This was actually the aftermath of the “restructuring” earlier this year. Back then, they said that they may have to “do more” if business or the economy doesn’t pick up. Well, we all know, economy is still in bad shape, so yesterday we went through round 2.
I was in early because I wanted to leave early and my boss basically greeted me with the news. Believe me, this is not a good way to start you day. So, for the next few hours, you just keep your head down. You don’t move, you don’t look up. You work as hard as possible so everyone sees how busy you are - not that it matters because the decisions have been made already, but it is just my instinct. If the phone rings, your heart stops for a moment - until I saw on the caller ID that it was my husband. I told him not to call for the rest of the day or I’d need digitalis for my heart.
Either way, I survived, and today is just another day. Unfortunately, my chipper self is really down today, and when I told my husband (who is by the way allowed to call me again), he said that it sounds like “survivor’s remorse”. I looked it up and yeah, that’s pretty much it. Why were those people let go - some of them were here for 20+ years? And even more curious - why am I still here? If they were no good - why weren’t they canned before? Does performance even matter? What is the criterion?
But there is something else that bugs me today. Wherever I go, people are basically whispering and bad-mouthing the company. Hey, I still work here - AND SO DO YOU! I for one am happy to have a job right now. It is not like there is a job market out there with. Show my a similar company out there that is doing much better right now. And if you find a better company - well, maybe you should apply for a job. It’s not like I feel everything is hunky dory but right now I don’t feel like hearing all the trash-talk. I feel like curling up on the recliner with a bag of chocolate - or a bottle of something, I haven’t made up my mind.
Anyway, I guess I am still in-house…
Links:
X-Rite’s Kentwood headquarters feels brunt of about 30 job cuts
Photography Companies Provide Snapshot Of A Lousy Year
Survivor’s Remorse
Email Delays (Yahoogroups et al.)
If you are a member of a Yahoogroup, you are probably aware of the incredible delays that can happen between the time the email was sent and the time it was received. We are all so spoiled and anything less than instantaneously is almost unacceptable. With Yahoogroups, it sometimes is really bad. I have seen messages delayed for hours, even days and sometimes you see answers to questions that have been long answered sufficiently. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of people who are just slow and late and like to reply to messages just to say something and basically repeating what has already been said.
But delays are not just happening with Yahoogroups, regular emails can also be delayed but in all honesty, it rarely happens. If you are curious and like to see if someone’s redundant reply was just sloppy or if there was a real email delay, you can check up on that.
In Outlook, this is pretty easy. Generally, the column that most people associate with the time of the email is called “Received”. This column shows date and time when you received the email. This information is nice and good, but wouldn’t it be nice to know when the email has actually been SENT? No problem!
Rightclick any of the column heads (for example said “Received” column) and select “Field Chooser” (DE: Feldauswahl, FR: Sélecteur de champs, ES: Selector de campos). A little list pops up, scroll down to S and drag and drop the item “Sent” onto the column heads. In Outlook 2007, two little arrows indicate the insert position - I usually position it next to the Received column.
Now, I am sure you can extract that information from the email header, but there you have to deal with all the different time zones and convert from UTC to GMT or whatever else your email passed through.
Unfortunately, I cannot find a similar function in Thunderbird, which I use at home. I am not sure why because I believe this information is really valuable - but maybe I am just a snoop! So, the next time your client tells you he/she sent the file a long time ago, and it arrives in your inbox a minute later, you know if it is true or not.
Monday, Monday
Happy week start! I have no idea what is going on but today is one of those days where you simply cannot wake up. I got up, rode my exercise bike for 30 minutes half asleep, got ready half asleep, drove to work half asleep and am now sitting here since almost 8 hours and am still not able to wake up. I had coffee and Vault and instant espresso, but nothing helps. The fact that my day is still a little slow doesn’t help much.
I had such a nice weekend, the first weekend that was so nice and warm that we even had breakfast on the patio watching our cats who put on a nice circus act. If you think people are happy about spring, you should see a bunch of cats who have been cooped up in the house all winter long - it’s not like we make them, but during winter the little pussies just stare out the door expecting the snow to melt in front of their eyes. I also got to sleep at a reasonable time and still, I feel like I have been partying all night.
I mentioned it before, I have two classes this session, Global Project Management and Applied Mathematics and so far I have been able to coast, but that ends now. For GPMT we are using a tool called SimProject, where we are working on a simulated construction project. We have to hire resources, we have a budget and apparently the instructor can throw roadblocks into our way like a budget cut or a strike - very interesting. Unfortunately, we are having problems getting our group of 4 together. We tried yesterday at 6pm but only two people were “there” (in the project chat area) so I sent out an email telling them all to be there tonight at 7pm - not sure what to do if they aren’t because we have to make our first group decisions.
Unfortunately, I cannot even be too mad. If I look back at my own time at university, I am pretty sure a returning adult student would have been just as impatient. Well, we’ll see what happens tonight.
The Linguists - Tonight (Feb. 26) on PBS
I just saw this in a magazine - tonight on PBS (10pm EST on my PBS station):
The Linguists is a hilarious and poignant chronicle of two scientists—David Harrison and Gregory Anderson—racing to document languages on the verge of extinction. In Siberia, India, and Bolivia, the linguists confront head-on the very forces silencing languages: racism, humiliation, and violent economic unrest. David and Greg’s journey takes them deep into the heart of the cultures, knowledge, and communities at risk when a language dies.
Before airing on PBS, The Linguists world premiered at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival and screened at more than 40 festivals worldwide. The Linguists is produced and directed by Seth Kramer, Daniel A. Miller, and Jeremy Newberger of Ironbound Films, and based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grants No. 0452417 and 0438121 and by the Nonprofit Media Group.