__________ is/are overrated.

[elsmere241]

Then again, I have been staying late over the last whole bunch of months more often than I'd like (half-hour or less on most of the days I have).  And I'm salaried, so no comp time/overtime for me.  Bad time management on my part, perhaps.

I was supposed to start a vacation last Thursday September 3rd.

Wednesday, I was working from home and lost my Internet connection and couldn't put in my last two hours that day.  I had to make up those two hours and had left a few things hanging, I went in to the office Thursday for what I thought would be a few hours.

I came in at 8:15 and didn't wrap everything up until about 2:00, without taking a lunch.  At least I got credit for the time I did put in.

And I just heard from my supervisor that the police dispatch layers I thought I'd fixed had a bunch of mistakes.  Grrr.

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

New Year's Day

[TheHighwayMan3561]

New Year's Day

I'll step in for Max and say while that's fine, again you just kind of throw things out hoping other people bite without explaining your thought.

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

New Year's Day

I'll step in for Max and say while that's fine, again you just kind of throw things out hoping other people bite without explaining your thought.

It's overrated because it's an observed holiday.

[hotdogPi]

I agree that "observed" holidays are overrated. Nobody celebrates New Years' on the 2nd.

That said, New Years' Day itself (i.e. the 1st) is not "observed" in that sense.

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

Target

It's just a cleaner, brighter Walmart. Change my mind.

Target wasn't overrated until about 2018.

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

I agree that "observed" holidays are overrated. Nobody celebrates New Years' on the 2nd.

That said, New Years' Day itself (i.e. the 1st) is not "observed" in that sense.

I'm talking about how it's a day off, but I do agree with you on observed holidays.

[Scott5114]

But I still think it's a thing that companies need to have "alternatives" in place in case of PTO. I used to run payroll for my staff when I was working at the hotel, but if I was out of town, my AGM knew how to do it. In the tech world, this is always the joke:

Yes, and the illustration is quite apt to describe my position.  The problem is manifold:

1.  It's a small company, so there's very little staffing overlap to begin with.

2.  I created my own procedures for everything I do, which means they're all custom-built for my strengths.

3.  My tasks are very complex and detail-oriented, with a zillion steps that are all second-nature to me because I do them every day.

4.  A lot of what I do is based on years of experience in other roles, and there's only one other person in the company who has had similar experience in those roles.

5.  If I were to make SOPs for what I do, not only would they each have a zillion steps, but little things change every so often, so they'd always be out of date.

The way that Jake manages this is to lean on me to write computer scripts (Perl mostly) to do as much of my job as possible (to the point that he's mailed me programming books on his own dime that he thinks will help). This has three  benefits—one, it causes me to think of my job as a series of procedures, which makes them more consistently replicable. Two, it means that I have less work to do since the computer is doing as much of it as possible, and if I wrote the code correctly less error-prone. Three, if I ever get run over by a bus, Jake has a copy of all the code and figure out from that what exactly it was I was doing with it—in a way, it's self-documenting.

Not a solution that works for most companies, but it's one that works for us.

News flash: Unless you live alone, when you're at home, you're still under the expectations of a boss.

My house runs more like Congress. There are no bosses. Sometimes there aren't enough votes for something to pass, so either it doesn't happen or there's a negotiation to try to gain support for a measure without enough popular support to pass on its own. There is a lot of pork barrel spending, influenced by wealthy corporations, and everyone involved is deeply unpopular with the American public.

[PColumbus73]

Target

It's just a cleaner, brighter Walmart. Change my mind.

Target wasn't overrated until about 2018.

Target isn't the same without the snack bar

[kphoger]

New Year's Day

New Year's Day is not overrated.  Having the day off from work after staying up till midnight with alcohol is a good thing—especially because it's still within the 12 days of Christmas.

Target wasn't overrated until about 2018.

I remember Target being overrated in the late 1990s.  People were already calling it Tar-zhay at that point.

[Max Rockatansky]

Once you learn about all the weird internal Target employee slang it is hard to take them seriously.  Even still, I prefer Target over Walmart more often than not. 

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

New Year's Day

New Year's Day is not overrated.  Having the day off from work after staying up till midnight with alcohol is a good thing—especially because it's still within the 12 days of Christmas.

Target wasn't overrated until about 2018.

I remember Target being overrated in the late 1990s.  People were already calling it Tar-zhay at that point.

Why NYD is a federal holiday never made sense to me.
Target had the best CD selection in town until streaming killed that, best trading card selection in town til scalping killed that best board game selection in town til a Meijer opened down the street, all happened around 2018, need I continue?

[hotdogPi]

best trading card selection in town til scalping killed that best board game selection in town til a Meijer opened down the street

Have you considered going to a board game store?

[kphoger]

Once you learn about all the weird internal Target employee slang it is hard to take them seriously.  Even still, I prefer Target over Walmart more often than not. 

FWIW, my first real job was at Target, back in 2000.

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

best trading card selection in town til scalping killed that best board game selection in town til a Meijer opened down the street

Have you considered going to a board game store?

A board game store didn't successfully stay open in my area until recently.

[Max Rockatansky]

Once you learn about all the weird internal Target employee slang it is hard to take them seriously.  Even still, I prefer Target over Walmart more often than not. 

FWIW, my first real job was at Target, back in 2000.

Mine also back in 2001.  I don't know how I lasted there for three years aside from being out of sight catching shoplifters. 

[kphoger]

FWIW, my first real job was at Target, back in 2000.

Mine also back in 2001.  I don't know how I lasted there for three years aside from being out of sight catching shoplifters.

I was hired full-time to push shopping carts for $5.15/hour, Monday to Friday from 10am to 4:30pm.  That also included taking re-shop and returns and hangers back to the storeroom a couple of times per day, plus helping with carry-outs if needed.  On Black Friday, I helped with re-stock till 11pm;  my section was cosmetics, which I know absolutely nothing about, and everything looks the same to me, and I hated it.  A few times I had to help out on a register, which wasn't terrible.

Anyway, we weren't allowed to take time off in December.  But I was planning to go visit my parents over Christmas, so I put in my two week's notice.  My boss said he'd let me take off, and he also offered me a ten- or twenty-cent raise.  I still said no.  After returning from Christmas, I found a different (and better) job.

[Max Rockatansky]

FWIW, my first real job was at Target, back in 2000.

Mine also back in 2001.  I don't know how I lasted there for three years aside from being out of sight catching shoplifters.

I was hired full-time to push shopping carts for $5.15/hour, Monday to Friday from 10am to 4:30pm.  That also included taking re-shop and returns and hangers back to the storeroom a couple of times per day, plus helping with carry-outs if needed.  On Black Friday, I helped with re-stock till 11pm;  my section was cosmetics, which I know absolutely nothing about, and everything looks the same to me, and I hated it.  A few times I had to help out on a register, which wasn't terrible.

Anyway, we weren't allowed to take time off in December.  But I was planning to go visit my parents over Christmas, so I put in my two week's notice.  My boss said he'd let me take off, and he also offered me a ten- or twenty-cent raise.  I still said no.  After returning from Christmas, I found a different (and better) job.

I was making $8.75 catching shoplifters for their Loss Prevention (they call it Asset Protection) department.  I got into an argument one day with the District LP Manager and quit on the spot.  I put an application for LP at Dillard's a week later.  They called me for an interview and offered $14 an hour on the spot.  I started the day of the interview and actually caught a shoplifter. 

FWIW Dillard's was a lot more fun and a great job to have in college.  Completely chill environment and laid back versus the high strung atmosphere at Target. 

[kphoger]

the high strung atmosphere at Target

Working outside in the parking lot all day, I avoided whatever atmosphere Target had, for the most part.

[hbelkins]

If no one is telling you what to do and not holding you accountable, then there's no reason for you to pile on the work to "catch up" after you return from taking PTO.

Eh, I can kind of sympathize. Jake doesn't necessarily tell me what to do or hold me immediately accountable for not doing it, but if I were to slack on certain things, something would break badly enough he'd figure out real quick what it is I'm not doing. I'm guessing Kyle has more of a buffer since he's part of a bigger company, but it's probably the same sort of deal.

Right...you still have a boss...

Kyle mentioned he has one several times. It's just that they don't know exactly what he does all day. Presumably, if he fell behind, they'd know whatever consequences ensued were his fault, though.

Well, yes.  That was my point:  He'd rather be at work under the expectations of a boss than at home.

News flash: Unless you live alone, when you're at home, you're still under the expectations of a boss.

So...you prefer your work boss over your home boss...?

My work boss generally leaves me alone and lets me do my thing without interruption.

[Max Rockatansky]

the high strung atmosphere at Target

Working outside in the parking lot all day, I avoided whatever atmosphere Target had, for the most part.

I mostly did also with our first District LP Manager.  He was a regular guy who just liked catching people and didn't partake in the Target corporate lingo.  He was ultimately replaced with the district person I got into the argument with. 


Ironically seven years after I had quit Target I ran into that same District LP Manager at Sears.  I was an LP Manager at a large Sears store and needed video of an employee theft that took place at Kmart.  Turns out the Kmart District LP Manager was the same guy who I had got into that argument with.  We ended up briefly speaking and he actually helped facilitate getting my video request through a local Kmart LP Manager.  We never spoke about the argument or the manner that I had quit at Target.

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

Since it seems to be a hot topic tonight, mileage-based numbers

[Max Rockatansky]

Since it seems to be a hot topic tonight, mileage-based numbers

Thank god, I thought you were going to talk about "mileage based exit numbers." 

[vdeane]

Since it seems to be a hot topic tonight, mileage-based numbers

Thank god, I thought you were going to talk about "mileage based exit numbers." 

Yeah, mileage-based route numbers are definitely overrated.  Mileage-based exit numbers, on the other hand, are about properly rated (as are mileage-based u turn numbers).  And don't get me started on mileage-based mile numbers.

[kphoger]

Mileage-based kilometer marker numbers are way overrated.