Funny that this is a complaint I just heard from a co-worker blaming a certain generation for being late, staring at their cellphone instead of working, etc. I generally lol at this studf because plenty of my co workers are cell addicts themselves. I guess the biggest difference is that most are more judicious about it.
No generation is monolithic, just to be clear, despite some trends they might display.
But yeah, we’ve had a few people fired because they unapologetically couldn’t get their shit together. My career isn’t one where showing up late is even remotely acceptable. There’s been a massive upheaval in my industry from shitty pay for decades and a grind to climb the ladder that very quickly got rid of people that weren’t committed to the job, to today where the industry has been throwing money at people, huge pay hikes for the former grinders, and rapid climbs up the ladder with job offers everywhere.
So they’re spoiled in a way. No need to conform when people are handing you everything on a platter at some level. While I really appreciate the fact that these new people have it good, this job never should have needed the sacrifices it did, at the same time they really aren’t professional. On time is everything in this job.
I am fresh off a rather interesting conversation with my boomer boss. I’m a new manager and I’m working on policy and process. I was basically shut down, told to not bother documenting, that we have a way of doing things and he would spend every day with me for weeks to get it right if he had to.
I asked again, wouldn’t it be easier and more efficient to have these processes documented and accepted rather than force muscle memory? I even offered to document the process during our training sessions but was told that were a small company and no one will look at documentation if we create it (we’re a 2000 employee manufacturing company).
Oh well, I know how to work around obstinance and he’s pretty old.
That’s crazy. Anyone who is against documentation should not have a job that requires literacy.
Think there’s a balance.
I work at a company where they have a documented process for everything. The thing is once some thing is in a document, it’s like some written in stone mandate that becomes unchangeable and inflexible. The stuff in the “oral tradition” remains flexible.
Every so often new blood comes along, sees how dysfunctional the documented processes are, and proposes to fix the processes. Now in principle, they are right, but those of us who have been through a few iterations dread the outcome. Invariably the changes they propose to replace stupid existing processes are instead just added to existing processes, because some folks recognize the improvement but no one wants the blame for a mistake caused by leaving the old process behind. So each time we end up with more redundant stupid work.
So while in principle, documented processes are right, sometimes the political reality is stupid.
The. Your company is doing lean six sigma wrong…if at all. Processes are supposed to improve and change all the time.
What’s a sigma?
Both of you are right.
You meed to document processes. The minute you put them to paper they will be out of date. No one will read them. It has always been so.
But it does allow you to go, “Ah here’s where the process went wrong, step 6 in the SOP. Why don’t you use it as a guide for the next one?” It then isn’t me vs them, it’s me helping them understand the documented process collaboratively.
Yup. Documentation is a necessary, but imperfect medium.
That’s precisely what I’m after, and what I’m proposing. I don’t care about the outputs, I care about the process that gets them to us.
Also why they need to be living documents, but if we have to reinvent the wheel every time we need a new one, it slows things down. I should mention, I’m on the IT side.
There are Process people and there are Get It Done people. Both are necessary. In their extremes, both are bad. When they work together they can do great things.
I just started at a new company that really invests time in documenting their processes, but the are poorly made by people that don’t understand the process itself and, in some cases, the process itself is poorly planned and has to be changed over and over again, to the point where the DTP looks nothing like what’s actually done…
I was instructed to review the documentation you twin myself, but advised the process did not actually describe the process itself…
Depending on industry certs, documenting things will make life easier.
Used to be a phone salesman. Got there at least 15 minutes late every day. It got so bad that one time I got there 15 minutes early and when my boss saw me get there he shouted “Steve?! What time is it?!”. Nobody cared because I outsold everyone else by so much that I was making double what they were, until the boss of my boss’ boss decided to start micromanaging the branch and basically told me I would be fired unless I started showing up on time. Boomers have weird priorities.
Their weird priorities is because they were raised with the dumbass idea that showing up early somehow increased production and is rewarding. Hell I showed up 15 minutes early everyday and the boomer was still pissed because he didn’t want to pay the overtime. Can’t even make up their minds!
yeah we have this whole thing about being logged on by 8.30 to start stand up at 8.37, so everyone logs on between 8 and 8.30 and then has breakfast or doomscrolls until the stand up starts. Which nobody listens to, because it’s poorly run, and then immediately after goes an makes another cup of coffee, bathroom run, and probably starts actual work around 9.30.
Meh. It’s all about power. Same reason tucking in your shirt and being clean shaven is a big thing for some boomer execs, it’s just some bullshit they can’t use to force people to conform
This seems more likely. The same guy also wanted me to buy a suit because jeans and military boots give clients a bad image of the company. We did all of our business through the phone.
He probably wanted you to buy a suit, but wouldn’t give you a stipend for it if you asked
Maybe if the fucking workplace wasn’t so fucking far from home, or if public transportation was decent, people would be much less likely to arrive late at work.
The other thing is, as soon as you realize that your job could be remote, which is true for a lot of office stuff, being “on time” matters fuck all.
Force employers to pay hourly wages for at home prep and commuting and they will suddenly start caring about hiring people in their area
I’ve always thought not compensating for commutes was ridiculous. Ive demanded 15k raises for jobs because they wanted me to drive.
All of the neighborhoods within walking or cycling distance of my workplace are literal crack dens where I’d be mugged and/or robbed within a week.
Baby Boomers, if were going to generalize, often feel the boss has ass-grabbing privileges with the attractive employees, so their opinion may not amount for much in the 21st century.
Except among the ruling class, of course, where we leave demented and senile representatives in power until it is wrested from their cold dead hands.
until it is wrested from their cold dead hands.
Does the wresting happen often or do most folks just wait for Father Time to do all the work? :( lol
Let me tell you the story of a man named Luigi…
Hang on Gen X once the boomer population dies out you’re next in the ongoing war to keep generations hating each other. You may get lucky and the future articles will skip over you and go directly to the “uptight, low tolerance Millennials”
These articles are such overgeneralized bullshit just to get people mad at each other. I bet there are older workers that are always late to work and I bet there are young workers that are on time and do amazing work. Yet nuance like that doesn’t drive angry clicks and comments.
I’m looking forward to it. GenX here, fuck all of you and fuck all of this. I just want to spend time with my family and friends.
I don’t think anyone outside of GenX understands how fucked GenX is. We are jaded AF You’re free to come for us but fuck around and find out.
Lol as if fuck around and find out is exclusive to one generation.
No previous generation has ever wanted to spend time with family and friends before! This is unprecedented!! Every single old person has only ever wanted to go to work and help create value for shareholders by fucking over the disadvantaged!!!
I mean…yeah?
Millennials aren’t doing hot either. As best as I can tell Gen Z has the best chance because they’ve adjusted to the new economic reality.
Nah man, we don’t want to fuck with you except as friends. After the boomers, we all cool.
If you say so, but I’m a millennial who heard a lot of “we’ll never belittle the next generation like the Boomers did to us” from my peers back in the day. And yet here we are calling the next generation “iPad kiddies” and taking the piss of teenagers who are doing the exact same shit we should have done if we had TikTok in the 90s.
Who’s we? I’m not interested in dumping on anyone, neither are my millennial friends.
Sure, there’s stuff I don’t like, I don’t agree with trashing school bathrooms bc of online trends, but I’d have said the same as a young kid as well. Otherwise, kids are doing their thing, and we don’t need to understand it.
I bet there are older workers that are always late to work
I’ve employed several, and in my experience they’re usually the ones who spend most of their time at the bottom of a bottle.
Low tolerance millennials?
If anything millennials are just becoming more and more radicalized against the elites and the unhealthy work “ethics” they had to endure.
Good on the next generations if they dare standing up for themselves.
Some of us. A lot of us are just like the stereotype of our boomer parents.
Millennials are reversing the trend and getting more progressive as they age contrary to all other studied generations
https://www.ft.com/content/c361e372-769e-45cd-a063-f5c0a7767cf4
Gen X exists in name only. It went from boomers to millenials and nobody blinked.
A lot of these differences are regional and industry specific. I worked on the east coast in more traditional industries and 9am on the dot was expected. Moved west and switched to tech and I was the only one in the office at 9am. I had coworkers showing up at 11 and noon. Despite the late arrival, people would still leave at 3 and 4pm. Were they working any less hard? No, in tech people are online til midnight and 2 am regularly. Tech attracts a lot of folks with night owl chronotypes. Their brains are literally not functioning optimally until 7pm rolls around. Boomer work ethic doesn’t have a lot of understanding of this fact.
I personally don’t want to hear anything about coming in late when I usually am the last one to leave the office in the evening.
I’m the other way around. I’ve agreed to work for these hours, so I’m showing up on time and leaving on time. They seem to value this higher than more total time spent.
Zero sympathy.
Be at work when you’re supposed to be at work. That’s why they told you what time to be there, not around what time to be there.
but public transportation!..
Account for it. You took the job. If you aren’t the right fit, just say so.
The mouth pieces for the ruling class really love pumping out articles to drive division between us…
Thanks for pointing that out. Its like we have multiple levels of control mechanisms ensuring our eternal enslavement.
“it’s like”? Yes suspiciously like that. Almost exactly. Hmm.
I mean, this is from Fortune magazine. It’s owned by a billionaire. So it’s hardly surprising.
I’m gen x. I’m always anxious about being on time because of how I was raised (thanks Mom). My partner is older than me and she’s ok with being late. This isn’t an age thing. It’s a personality thing.
They’re trying to divide us by sowing division amongst generations. The most wealthy are the enemy. They own everything and we must join together to take it back.
My mother raised me on the saying that (with occasional exceptions, such as dinner and parties) “if you’re not ten minutes early, you’re late.”
I don’t entirely agree with it, but it did result in me taking other people’s time very seriously and me being a very punctual person. It also caused anxiety about being punctual.
It also caused anxiety about being punctual.
Exactly. If I’m running late I get pretty stressed. It’s physically uncomfortable.
taking other people’s time very seriously
This is a kind thing to do, but I also put it squarely in the “respect is earned” category.
I wouldn’t give someone hell for being 10 mins late because traffic or whatever, but if their standard is expecting me to be there half an hour early, just staring at the clock, won’t let me clock in early and just get to it, burning time I’ll never get back, anxiously awaiting to clock in on the dot and not a minute more or else…
…They clearly don’t think much of my time and therefore the relationship is going to be adversarial in nature.
As a millennial I’m on team, “Work starts at 9, show up at 9”… but if you’re a little late here and there, whatever. So long as the work gets done.
I’m paid to solve problems, not warm a chair and let my manager look over my shoulder constantly.
I would be this way but I started my career in Boston and the T and the busses and the tunnels there make anything close to this impossible. If you actually wanted to be on time you’d be showing up 20 minutes early just as often as 15 minutes late. To truly always be on time would mean planning to get there an hour early every day.
Companies downtown here know just not to put meetings between 9 and 10 because it’s just impossible that every single member of a team will make it to work without issues even once a week. I’d guess even hourly jobs give more flexibility than you’d expect from a standard employer here because it’s just such a clusterfuck to transit in Boston
The further into the burbs you get, the more hardcore companies are about enforcing a 9-5.
I show up 30 minutes early because everyone at my job is incompetent so I have to see how things are going so I can plan my day. Im mid 20’s
10 minutes is on time. Unless you work with shifts, where other people need to wait for you.
Yeah, 10 minutes where I work can snowball if just the right ingredients are in play. But at least the pay isn’t total shit. Just a bit shit. ($25/hour should be the national minimum, dammit!)
Just common sense should be enough.
If your job doesn’t require you to be there on the dot, who care?
If you keep being late for meetings and you’re wasting your colleagues time, get your ass out of bed earlier.
It’s not hard. But it’s super annoying to be waiting for people who just don’t care to be on time.
It’s also super annoying to be hounded about being on time when it makes no fucking difference.
Yep. The number of pointless meetings is far too many.
Some people like scheduling meetings just for the sake of a meeting, while others keep meetings booked only to say once the meeting starts they there is nothing to be discussed. Then cancel it before everyone wastes time attending! I’ve got 12 tasks to do that makes Hercules tasks look like kindergarten events, and pointless meetings really don’t help anyone.
/end rant
You know what super fucking annoying? Meeting at 9am. WTF?
People get stuck in traffic, or public transport failed, or little Johny forgot his school bag so the parent had to turn around when dropping them at school.
Number of times I’ve been in meeting at 9am that don’t end up happening is absurd. Plus the majority of attendees have most of the day clear in their schedule. So why book the meeting for 9 goddamn am in the morning?
I would love. 9am meeting over a 7am meeting. JFC, let my cold personality a chance to thaw. IDC about time zones.
I think 10am is reasonable for first meetings.
I would also say no meetings to close to the end of lunch or ending at 5pm.
I would also say no meetings
I agree with this part.
10 is the best time for morning meetings, just like 2 in the afternoon. After you’ve had a chance to get going, before people are hungry. And 2pm is after the lunch snooze but early enough to fix stuff before close of business.
Putting meetings super early or late is an attempt to prevent interruption in workflow but meetings should be rare enough that it’s not an issue and it is the productive thing for that morning/afternoon.
So the rest of the day can be used for work. If you start at 930 everyone on time fucks off for half an hour
As if people don’t already fuck off for at least a half hour every day anyway
Ten minutes late to a meeting? Go somewhere else and make someone else’s life harder. Ten minutes late to holding a chair down? I don’t care if you’re on the moon, just get your shit done.
