Veep Drinking Game

5 Signs Your Job Sucks

I pulled this off a now defunct website called bripblap from a few years ago, yet it seems relevant to life in another large corporation I know of today. I like number 2 & 5 on the list as it is very much what I do. 

  1. You can’t get out of bed in the morning. If you wake up in the morning and groan, it’s not a good sign. During the one year in the last eight years of my working career I was excited about my work, I leapt out of bed every morning. If the prospect of going to work creates enough dread in your mind that you don’t want to leave bed in the morning, your job sucks. 
  2. You spend more time on the internet than you do working. I know everyone spends a certain amount of time browsing the internet at work – we’re all human. At the same time, if you spend more time at gothamist than you do working, it means your job sucks for one of two reasons: either you have stuff to do and it’s so awful you’re avoiding it, or your job sucks because you have nothing to do. 
  3. You’re the first person out the door in the evening. I’m a big work-life balance guy, but I know that when I lead the 5:00 charge out of the door I’m not engaged in my work. If you’re enjoying your work you’re going to stick around at least past the first exodus every evening – if for no other reason than to see if you can pick up on after-hours gossip. 
  4. You don’t think about work after hours. When I was engaged in my work, I thought about it after I left work. I would go for drinks with co-workers and talk about work. I got passionate about it, because it was interesting and I was involved. As I sit here writing this post in the evening, I can barely tell you what I worked on today. That means I don’t find the work interesting or even worthy of contemplation. 
  5. You mock people who enjoy their work. I think this demonstrates that your job sucks worse than anything. Everyone should enjoy their work. Even if your work sucks, YOU should be able to find some sense of satisfaction in the paycheck, or the fact that you’re creating something of value or beauty. If you TELL people your work is awful and mock people who enjoy their own work, your job probably sucks.

Comments

Eccentri City said…
check, check, check... check aaaaand check.
Steve said…
It's incredibly sad to me that these points are universally, timelessly applicable. Jobs do suck sometimes, don't they? But thanks for continuing to spread my depressing post across the web :)
MGD said…
EC - having worked where you do, I figured you would relate.

And Steve - good commentary is timeless. thanks.