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The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

gallup.com

241–250 of 264 posts

Re: The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

#241

I wonder how much it has to do with vacations. Rationally I know I need a vacation, but I don't know what I'd do - and so I've taken long weekends here and there but never two weeks disconnected.

Book a hotel and flight to a different country. Stay in a hotel. Walk around that place, engage with the people. Try the food. Visit a Museum.

Re: The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

#242
post #22

I resigned during the pandemic. The lockdown stripped my job to the essentials: No colleagues, no coffee corner, no nice fancy office, no treats (lunches, dinners, drinks), brainstorms, etc. I was left with something that was boring me to death. I felt perfectly happy in that job for 5 years before covid.

I think some folks are use to the noise and filler time at the office. In absence of that kind of chatter, work becomes a bit more soul sucking than expected so it's no surprise to me that anyone would want to move to another job just for some kind of change that requires interfacing with co-workers (training, on-boarding, etc).

Re: The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

#243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My employer administered questions regarding how many days per week the employees wanted to spend in-office versus WFH. Zero days per week in the office was not presented as an option.

AKA "we spent way too much on the lease for you to just work from home pleb"

I bet they wish they had leased! This employer owns many large campuses...

Re: The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

#244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Should you be given free shit simply because you exist? Yes? > Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person. > No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. > Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organizati…

None of these things indicate that I should be forced to pay for someone who doesn't want to work.

Fresh example of what you've been already forced to pay: https://www.propublica.org/article/secret-irs-files-reveal-h...

Re: The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

#245
post #192
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I stayed home and unplugged all work devices. I would just focus on your hobbies and improving your living situation or see your friends (Depending on where you live I know this can be hard for covid reasons). I took two weeks and I feel a lot better. Sometimes you just need to step away from the grind.

> Sometimes you just need to step away from the grind. Was your work routed to someone else during your time off? I would truly like to step away and relax. But the last time I tried to step away, I couldn't stop ruminating over all the unfinished work in my queue. My hunch is that it's not possible to truly relax unless someone else can temporarily step-in for the vacationer. Otherwise, on return, we're just greeted…

I'm at a constant balance of 2 months of vacation because it's actually stressful to take more time off. Typically I stay up way too late before/after vacation trying to get everything done.

I've also noticed unnecessary urgency/escalation when someone is not in the office to deal with things. Say it's a Friday and I am in the office, but I am in back to back meetings and then have time blocked off to meet a deadline. Someone asks me to help on something semi-urgent, but they see I am booked, and they are generally OK with waiting, even if it delays until Monday. However,if they see a Friday OOO/vacation message in e-mail/slack, urgency is automatically ratcheted up and they want it done now.

I think there must be some psychological factors involved. It's OK if someone is technically "available" but does not have time. However if someone is takes a day off and is "unavailable" and there is wait..that is less acceptable.

Re: The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

#246
post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"they’re only still here because the entire company would crumble if they stopped." Honestly thats a terrible reason to stay - unless you work at a charity.

I don’t know their situation, but it might be an illusion. Some people are great at making it seem like they’re doing a lot, when they actually just look very busy.

It’s more of a petard hoisting situation. Some people carved out an subject matter that could have been much smaller and now that some business conditions have changed, they have as much work to do as the next three groups combined. Those other groups, including mine, only have so much work because they’ve taken the message to delegate incorrectly, and instead of an orderly handoff starting three years ago, it’s now rushed because it’s load shedding.

Add to the middle of this that we have deals or licenses running out and have decided that on top of everything else we should save some money too. The opportunity costs are probably killing us. But to keep them from completely killing us, other people are still cranking out major features including architectural changes, so we have those disruptions hitting too. It’s chaos.

Re: The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

#247
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You must understand that this attitude is the minority. Most people like their workplace because they like the people there. My dad worked in pharma sales for 30 years. Do you think he cared to sell the drugs? I mean... in that the drugs were helping people, he was happy. But his reason for going to work everyday was talking to his colleagues. To this day, he and his old colleagues still visit each other, still party…

I don't believe you are right. Literally everyone I've talked to the past year and a half has said how much they enjoy working remotely and that they never want to go back to an office. Both of our experiences are anecdotal, but from my perspective, those wanting to go back to the office are in the tiny minority, so much so that you are the first one I've heard express that view.

I've worked at home for a few years now, and don't ever want to go back to the office unless:

- Commute is sub 10 minutes

- I get an office with a closing door

In 20 years, I've had that combo for maybe 18 months. I lost it when my team had to move to accommodate a management-heavy org that required the personal offices.

Re: The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

#248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The problem: everything looks 'critical' to folks with a greedy and selfish streak who rise high in management and have their pay tied to the quarterly stock price. That's how we ended up with 24/7 support and "five nines" availability. I think it was because customers preferred to patronize banks and stores that were open longer hours, and so they won business by selling something customers wanted. Similarly, I tho…

> customers preferred to patronize banks and stores that were open longer hours https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-tyranny-of-ch...

How is that related to what we are talking about?

That article is about choosing between 10 different comparable items. It is not about giving money to a store that happens to be open when you want to give it money, versus a store that is closed.

Re: The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

#249

Pay me well, provide good benefits, allow a flexible work schedule where I can work when I want to and still get day to day life stuff done and hire enough people so I can consistently work only the 40 hours you are actually paying me for. My current job does that and I love it. When something critical comes up I'm happy to work over a weekend to hit a deadline because I know my manager will comp me back time when I…

> When something critical comes up The problem: everything looks 'critical' to folks with a greedy and selfish streak who rise high in management and have their pay tied to the quarterly stock price. That's how we ended up with 24/7 support and "five nines" availability. I'm old enough to remember that banks opened late and closed early, didn't operate on weekends or holidays, and if you didn't get your paycheck cash…

It's true this is a problem. It's actually a problem I ran into at another job and one of the reasons I left that job. It goes hand in hand with letting a bunch of a team attrit and then ignoring that fact. I find it often happens when a direct manager doesn't know how to handle their manager or their managers manager. I have also found that in most cases the person requesting the 'critical' item never actually wanted it immediately but after it filtered down from two managers who are desperately trying to look good it became a 'critical' item.

It's definitely a problem and while there are some ways to just work around your boss it's often just easier to find another job.

Re: The 'Great Resignation' is really the 'Great Discontent'

#250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Increasing wages across the board should lead to increased inflation either way unless people start saving at higher rates. Edit: my reasoning is that increased wages leads to increased spending, which increases prices unless goods/services can be supplied cheaper, which is unlikely since productivity growth is low.

Given M amount of money, if that money goes to shareholders or the company coffers or managers or workers, it can be spent or saved. Why is it more likely to be spent by workers? I gotta say, the notion that it's somehow a negative that workers get a larger share is a bit convenient for the shareholders, managers, and companies.

The money going to shareholders isn't really coming from the workers though, it's coming from stock price appreciation. They could cut their dividends and give that to employees instead, but they don't have large dividends to begin with.

I'm not making a value judgement, I'm just saying that increasing wages across the entire economy will cause increased prices unless something offsets it (e.g. increased productivity that keeps pace with wage increases... which doesn't seem likely).

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