My Rant on Corporate America

OK, maybe not corporate as much... but the principle is the same.

A couple weeks ago, one of the higher ups at work sent out an email saying that personal email, messaging and web surfing is prohibited and is "grounds for termination". I wasn't doing it that much, but I knew it was probly more than I needed to be. So I cut back. Its hard to go all day without checking your Yahoo account, or shooting off a quick messenger note. So this week, I seriously was really careful to not let it get in the way of my work. Once a day, sometimes twice, but not often, I would send off an email, to either Adam or Andrew.. just chatting type stuff. And I'd look at all the sites that I participate in, and everything. I'm telling you. ONCE a day.

And its not like I'm a slacker at all, in fact, every week I get faster and faster at getting the ads out. After I'm done with that every week, I've got tons of other things to work on. Last Friday I was scanning stuff (ie random junk) ALL day. So while the scanner was "heating up" and taking its dear sweet time to scan, I'd pop over to Animefringe or AnimeOasis. No harm done.

I got called into the "boss's" office today. She said that she wanted to talk to me about my performance. The HR lady came in as well. They were all like, we've been tracking all the emailing and messaging you've been doing, and we're concerned. Your work on the readers is really good, but there are other things to do after that each week (duh). So ALL the time you spend here at work has to involve working.

Well, what about the REQUIRED two 15 minute breaks you get every day? Oh, those should be used to get up and walk around, and to talk to other people who are on their breaks too. Don't bother anyone that's not on break. Obviously. But isn't it MY break, and if I want to sit on my butt and check on a couple websites, what business is that of theirs?

The HR lady said that they're not here to babysit, and that this is the real world. Well, crap. I guess I'm just a little kid then huh? They made me feel like I was disrupting the whole company. "A company is only as strong as the weakest link." Direct quote. I'm a weak link because I freaking check my email? These ladies have a seriously skewed view of what technology is for.

I found out that they seriously can track EVERYTHING you do. Everything that goes through the server. So they're sitting here with a stack of printed out emails and MSN convo's... ack.

One lady said that they had proof of me saying to my coworker that by using Yahoo messenger, you can bypass the company's security measures. I was like, um, OK. I'm a serious hacker and I know things like that. What I DID say to him was that I wish MSN had a "stealth" mode like Yahoo, so that while I was at work I could easily BLOCK OUT the people I didn't need to talk to, so I'd only have the two people I work with that I need to talk to on the list. If they could have understood that, I think that would have helped.

Yesterday they turned off my MSN access. And I can't get on yahoo.com at ALL. The other thing that just makes me SO irate is the fact that the IT guy knew, he was the one who can track these things, my coworker knew, he was informed about it, the boss ladies knew, obviously, AND during a meeting, I was BROUGHT UP to the ACTUAL boss. My coworker did tell me that he was for telling me about it, and the boss agreed. But they seem to have chosen the sneaky way. Does that make more of an impression? Maybe it would if I were STUPID but I think I could have handled having my coworker, who I consider a friend, tell me that what I was still doing wasn't acceptable. So I had no indication for probably about a WEEK that this was going on. Is that right?? I really don't think so. I think they could have had the decency to tell me that they had noticed what I was doing, and just take the damn time to explain it to me. As opposed to waiting so long and just slamming me with it. Since I had been doing such great work, apparently, and not being a hinderance to the company at all, I think that it would have been the best thing to do to just talk to me about it as soon as it came up. My coworker said that this WAS a not-too-bad type meeting that I had... it could have been worse.

OK. So they said it was forbidden, yeah yeah. But, this is my first time at a big company like this, my first experience with the rights they have to see everything. How was I supposed to know that even checking things on a break or while I was doing something else was out of the question? I guess I was supposed to know that I should be looking through magazines for inspiration and walking around.

I just can't believe, as well, that no one is allowed to say anything about it. But what KILLS me, is that I asked the IT guy multiple times right after they sent out that email, whether or not they were serious, or SERIOUS. Had I know they were SERIOUS, this could have all been avoided. That would have been a great time for him to say, yeah, they can track stuff (ie, I can track stuff and just not mention that I use MSN constantly) and they are serious about it. I would have gotten the clue! And I asked my coworker too, but he just kinda spaced it, and I didn't ask him again.

Another thing they said was that I should be so happy that I have a job that I can learn at while I'm getting paid. Whoever said I wasn't? And they wonder if I'm not getting enough of a challenge. So, 15 minutes a day of being on the internet, non-work related, indicates that I'm not learning anything, or not concentrating on learning all I can, as well as implying that I'm not challenged by what I do. I love my job, most of the time... and its very challenging.

So one of the ladies said I should practice designing stuff in my "spare time".. since my coworker does all of my ads and logos for me. Ack! Seriously? He helps me figure out what the heck I'm going to do, but he does NOT do it for me in any shape or form. Unbelievable. They think they know everything because they can read your email and stuff. But they don't take the time to see how much I'm really learning. And doing.

My coworker (I'm sorry to keep saying that, I just don't want to name names... I feel bad enough ranting, but its gotta happen) helped me a lot by telling me about his experiences with this sort of thing. I did fine during the meeting, but at that point, when I was talking to him, I just couldn't not start bawling. I have always hated getting in trouble in any way, and this was just the worst ever. I work so hard, harder than I ever have. He told me that he has really appreciated all I had done and was impressed by how I've improved (cue more bawling), but I feel like the boss ladies could have emphasized that a little more instead of just treating me like a child.

Speaking of feeling like a child... an analogy that popped into my head about all this is, this is the equivalent of having a kid talk a lot in class, like in kindegarten when they're not used to the way school works, and without warning, the teacher slaps tape over the kid's mouth. Or, even, in like junior high, there's a kid writing notes in class, and so the teacher has been keeping a record of them, somehow (just go with it) and then one day takes all the paper out of all of the kid's notebooks!

OK, I know that was weird, but whatev.

So they said that we can "start over, and have a clean slate"... but did they give me back Yahoo? No. I mean, I use it for other things than email. Did they give me back MSN? No. I feel like I'm probation even though they said its fine. Plus, I've been worried, because of one of the boss's sudden lack of friendliness to me, about the fact that in a month, I'm going to not be on the staffing agency's payroll anymore, and they'll chose whether or not to hire me at this company.

Whatever. I'll get over it. I worked hard today, just like freaking always, and I hope they will notice that and make me feel better about the situation. Seriously. I feel like it is so wrong to treat someone like this, even if they are a big special company. And yeah, its not like they fired me or did anything more than slap me on the wrist, but it still sucks to know you're being spied on and everyone knows but you.

Sigh. What a day. All I can do is move on. So here goes.

Thanks for reading. Sorry to rant.