QOD

Filed in National by on May 29, 2008

When did doing your job not become good enough?  At what point did having to do more than your job requires become the standard and just doing your job become not enough? 

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  1. jason330 says:
    May 29, 2008 at 9:20 am

    DV,

    I call bullshit on this one.

    The idea that anybody gives 110% is a myth. Most people give around 40% and people who give a miserly 55% look like superstars.

    (Now back to work!)

  2. anon says:
    May 29, 2008 at 9:29 am

    Jason – then 40% is the baseline that humans are capable of for long-term job performance, and 55% represents the 110% demand that DV is talking about.

    At what point

    Well, depending on your profession… it may have happened when we let employers hire 12 million workers who sneak to and from work with the fear of deportation every day.

    For white collar workers, it happens once or twice per decade when there is an environment of job insecurity and bosses feel free to indulge their natural instincts to treat employees like shit, without fear they will quit and they will have to go through the inconvenience of hiring and training a new recruit.

  3. Dana says:
    May 29, 2008 at 9:56 am

    It becomes standard during any economic downturn.

    During 1991 and 1992, I was a quality control technician for a midsized ready-mied concrete producer in southeastern Virginia. There was a major building recession at the time, and companies were laying off people. A lot of my friends who did one job got laid off, while I kept my job, because I was able to do a bunch of other jobs as well: batcher, loader operator, dispatcher, yard buzzard and occasionally even plant mechanic. Because I was always willing and able to do anything — and I seemed to attract more than my share of the “unusual” assignments — I was retained while people senior to me wound up on the street.

    “That’s not my job” is the most deadly career statement that anyone can make.

  4. Dominique says:
    May 29, 2008 at 10:17 am

    Excellent point, Dana, however, I think sometimes 110% is just in a person’s nature. I consider myself to be a hard worker who goes above and beyond, but not to the point where I’m allowing an employer to take advantage of me. My husband, on the other hand, can’t help but work like a hamster on a wheel – sometimes up to 70 hours a week (he’s on salary, so he doesn’t get paid for the extra hours). He doesn’t do it because he fears losing his job. He does it because it’s in his nature. Either that or he’s completely disorganized…or he just doesn’t want to come home. 🙂

  5. Dana says:
    May 29, 2008 at 12:02 pm

    Dominique: I absolutely agree that people work the way they want to work. In my experience, paying more money doesn’t make someone work harder, and paying less money doesn’t make him slack off — though it may mean that he’s more likely to seek another job. People simply work the way that they work.

    That goes against every economic argument in the book, but it’s the way I’ve seen life.

  6. Nancy Willing says:
    May 29, 2008 at 6:10 pm

    I agree with Dana that is about the recession.

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