Dear Ruby,
I know this is a bad time to think about leaving my job, but I hate it and I don’t think I can stand it much longer. I have a micromanaging boss and some bad coworkers, but mostly I’m just tired of what I do. It’s office work and not very creative. I’ve been trying to stick it out, but I find myself surfing around online all day and I’m afraid that I’m going to get caught and fired before I find something better. Should I stay or should I go?

Ken

Dear Ken,
You didn’t tell me whether or not you are supporting a family, but I’m going to try to answer in a way that would address both situations — stay.

Put down the letter opener, I don’t mean forever. What I do mean is, end it like a man. End it honorably, like an agreement, like a marriage, like any obligation. You need a plan and a timetable, so I am providing you, free of charge, Ruby’s patented 3 Weeks to 2 Weeks’ Notice program:

Week 1: Get some real work done.
On Monday morning for two hours, figure out what you need to accomplish in the coming week to get caught up on your work, or at least close to it. Close your office door or tape off your cubicle opening, turn off your phone. You could even send out a “please do not disturb me from 8-10″ email to those likely to disturb you. If your boss gives you crap about it, tell him or her that it’s something you read about in 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and you hope it will help you be more organized. It is likely that your screwing off has already been noted and this explanation will give your boss hope that you are getting back on track and that he or she will not have to fire you. It is false hope, but you don’t have to explain that.

I know what you’re thinking — if you could get yourself to work more you wouldn’t be in this position. The problem was that you weren’t incentivized. Here’s your incentive. After every 2 hours of work you complete, you get to spend 20 minutes on your resume and you get to pick one personal item to take home. Maybe it’s 20 minutes reading an online article about interviewing or maybe it’s 20 minutes of writing out a really flattering description of your current position. By the end of a week, you should have a spiffing resume in progress and a desk drawer or two cleaned out.

At night, it goes without saying, you’re Facebooking, LinkedInning, and hitting the job boards. Hard. But, only at home, where you have time to write carefully compelling cover letters and catch the errors before you hit “Submit.”

Week 2: Hanging curtains in the escape tunnel [Read more →]

Tags: advice for the rest of us by Ruby Mac, all work
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What kind of work environment could possibly lead to this situation?

A Buffalo man told police two men, including his manager, forced him from his home Friday evening and drove him to the restaurant where he works and told him to clean grease off a Dumpster.

The man… said the pair forced their way into his bedroom by kicking open the door.

He also told police when he was done the manager gave him his paycheck and instructed him not to go to the police or “he would end up dead somewhere.”

I’ve heard people joke about this sort of thing as a solution to truancy in the public schools, but it just doesn’t work in restaurants. The reality is that this is a terrible way to motivate people. Even in tough economic times, when forcing your employees back to work may seem charitable — after all, who couldn’t use the overtime? — it’s just not effective.  And Friday evening was awfully darn cold in Buffalo. While I am sure there is a bit more to this news story, whatever’s missing can’t possibly justify this managerial response. He was probably going way against company procedure.

Still, as wrong as the manager’s actions may seem, I’d like to thank him and his accomplice for what they’ve done. It’s stories like these that help the rest of America to keep a positive view of our own jobs. Even on the worst day, I will always be able to say that my boss just isn’t the breaking-and-entering-and-stealing-my-phone-and-dragging-me-to-work-and-threatening-my-life-and-then-paying-me type of guy.  He really, really isn’t.  That’s probably worth a “thank you.”

Tags: all work, on the law
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The best typo I have ever seen in my line of work was “[a] coyote’s plaintiff whaling.” But the book I’m cleaning up now — without naming any names or titles or major publishers — has some pretty good ones.

[After tipping a cauldron of boiling tar over the enemy,] “he turned away from the sight of the massive pile of writing flaming demons…”

[The Dwarf King] “patted the legendary harmer at his side.”

“With the death of the Queen’s closets advisor since the time of her father…”

On the scale of one to plaintiff whaling, I’d give these 7, 8, and 9, respectively.

Tags: all work, sticks & stones
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Dear Ruby,
I have a job people often envy.  I am a writer in advertising.  My friends think I’m cool.  However, my boss re-writes everything I turn in.  Today, after weeks of research on a new client, I turned in a great bunch of headlines for a magazine ad.  She re-wrote them, but obviously had not done the research.  Do I give her notes on why her version sucks?  The guy next to me says to face the fact that I’m an art whore.  I never was a very good whore, so I’m not super comfy with that.  What to do?

Thanks,
Peach

Peach, honey,
I think maybe someone doesn’t want to be a very good whore.

Bosses, teachers, editors, pimps — they’re always telling you to do stuff you don’t want to do and then sometimes they’re not even very nice about it. And sometimes they’re dumbasses. If your boss is really a dumbass who’s rewriting your great stuff and turning in her own crappy stuff (and hopefully not passing it off as yours), the market/management/clients will eventually correct her.

My advice: keep lovely laser copies of all your own great stuff, build yourself a bitchin’ portfolio and get ready to move up when she gets canned or maybe start dreaming about your own piece of street corner.  But, remember this, even if you’re really good, even if you have the greatest stage name ever — even if the john is Richard Gere — Peach, you are a filthy whore, like everyone else. We all sell stuff to buy other stuff and we all have to deal with the difficult people on top from time to time.

Be a better whore. Work on your technique. Take it with a smile. Keep good records. And let old Ruby know how it works out.

Does Ruby know what’s best for you? Just ask.

Tags: advice for the rest of us by Ruby Mac, all work
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We all have our horror stories about lousy customer service. My most recent was when my husband and I were standing in line at an office supply store. The clerk was yapping into her cell phone while scanning our purchases. Without so much as a word or a glance in our direction, she managed to bag our items, take our money, and hand us our receipt. Her name tag identified her as the assistant manager. [Read more →]

Tags: all work, easy go
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