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On loyalty to your employer (2018)

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Re: On loyalty to your employer (2018)

#201

Post by seneca »

rckt wrote: post #103

I got it pretty early in my career that loyalty for a company is concept to make you work harder without asking anything in return. And the moment the company shifts focus and you are out of it, then suddenly you understand that this loyalty wasn't kind of a credits account which you've been saving all this time. It's simply nothing. You are on your own and can fuck off. So there's simply no place for loyalty in empl…

This isn't always true. I've been in engineering leadership a long time, and I've absolutely gone out of my way to cover for, or help out, engineers that I know put in the extra work, and I've seen other leaders do it too.

It's not unlimited, but it exists.

Re: On loyalty to your employer (2018)

#202

Post by moffkalast »

simpaticoder wrote: post #182
horsawlarway wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things don't deserve loyalty. Your company is a "thing". People - people can absolutely deserve loyalty, and those people can be managers, coworkers, spouses, family, etc. But don't mix the two up in your mind.

>Things don't deserve loyalty. Your company is a "thing". A country is a thing and loyalty to it is called "patriotism". A sports-team or TV show or band is a thing, loyalty to it is called "fandom". Loyalty to an idea or philosophy is called "being principled" or "idealism". Do you believe that things don't deserve loyalty, such that all of these are errors? Or do these examples not capture the sense of your stateme…

Patriotism is mostly just propaganda to make people willing to kill and die for some old cynical geezers' delusions of grandeur. The guy said it right, countries don't deserve loyalty either. Lots of Russians are figuring this out firsthand these days.

Re: On loyalty to your employer (2018)

#203

Post by lenerdenator »

It's not 1950 anymore. Workers are no longer employed by people with a sense of community, duty, patriotism/nationalism, or anything else involving loyalty. The only loyalty is to the bottom line.

As such the employers will receive the same in return.

Re: On loyalty to your employer (2018)

#204

Post by ashoeafoot »

simpaticoder wrote: post #182
horsawlarway wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things don't deserve loyalty. Your company is a "thing". People - people can absolutely deserve loyalty, and those people can be managers, coworkers, spouses, family, etc. But don't mix the two up in your mind.

>Things don't deserve loyalty. Your company is a "thing". A country is a thing and loyalty to it is called "patriotism". A sports-team or TV show or band is a thing, loyalty to it is called "fandom". Loyalty to an idea or philosophy is called "being principled" or "idealism". Do you believe that things don't deserve loyalty, such that all of these are errors? Or do these examples not capture the sense of your stateme…

Yes, all of these things do not deserve loyalty. There are values i hold dear, if a philosophy or state holds on to the same values, i support them. If they turn away from them, no reason to be loyal.

Re: On loyalty to your employer (2018)

#205

Post by closewith »

peepee1982 wrote: post #131
closewith wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, work is effort expended to achieve a result. Whether it's paid or not is irrelevant, and many people work harder for free than they ever do in employment, because the incentives are right.

This is a useless definition, especially in this context. Washing my dishes is not work, because it's ultimately irrelevant whether I do it or not, although I'm doing it still because I have a result in mind. It also comes across as very out of touch and privileged, because unless you have a relatively cushy job, you would definitely not see the difference between being paid or not as irrelevant. There are plenty of…

> This is a useless definition, especially in this context.

No, it's a very apt and useful definition. It's just not one you appreciate.

> It also comes across as very out of touch and privileged, because unless you have a relatively cushy job, you would definitely not see the difference between being paid or not as irrelevant.

This comment is a straw man, because I didn't say pay was irrelevant. I said work is work whether you're paid or not.

It also ironically shows that you are out of touch and privileged, as your comment completely ignores two of the heaviest workloads in the world, housework and child-rearing. Neither are generally paid and both are most definitely work.

Only a completely out-of-touch and privileged person could think otherwise.

Re: On loyalty to your employer (2018)

#206

Post by dspillett »

simpaticoder wrote: post #182
horsawlarway wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things don't deserve loyalty. Your company is a "thing". People - people can absolutely deserve loyalty, and those people can be managers, coworkers, spouses, family, etc. But don't mix the two up in your mind.

>Things don't deserve loyalty. Your company is a "thing". A country is a thing and loyalty to it is called "patriotism". A sports-team or TV show or band is a thing, loyalty to it is called "fandom". Loyalty to an idea or philosophy is called "being principled" or "idealism". Do you believe that things don't deserve loyalty, such that all of these are errors? Or do these examples not capture the sense of your stateme…

> A country is a thing and loyalty to it is called "patriotism".

That sort of loyalty is not quite the same: protecting your own to indirectly protect yourself. People often see their “external tribes” as an extension of their self much likely they do family/friends, rather than them being part of it like a company. I am a Spillett. I am a Yorkshireman, I am English, I am UKian, I am European, I work for TL. Notice the difference in language in that last one.

This is part of why some get so offended when you poke fun at their town/county/country: if they see it as an extension of their identity more than just somewhere they live then your disrespect is a personal attack. They would not likely defend their employer nearly as passionately.

Re: On loyalty to your employer (2018)

#207

Post by lo_zamoyski »

HEmanZ wrote: post #144
rckt wrote: post #103

I got it pretty early in my career that loyalty for a company is concept to make you work harder without asking anything in return. And the moment the company shifts focus and you are out of it, then suddenly you understand that this loyalty wasn't kind of a credits account which you've been saving all this time. It's simply nothing. You are on your own and can fuck off. So there's simply no place for loyalty in empl…

All loyalty is a risk. Even loyalty to your spouse is a risk. Just like how all love and human trust is a risk. To feel human you have to take these emotional risks. You shouldn’t bet your life that a mega-corp has absolute and utter loyalty to you. You shouldn’t bet your entire life that your spouse has absolute loyalty to you (we have divorce, pre-nups, and post-nups for a reason). But it strikes me as a pretty sou…

It's not about feelings. It's about making human life possible, as we are social animals. We develop through relationships.

Loyalty is a commitment to the objective good of the other, of skin in the game. Loyalty is hierarchical and the particular variety and its entailed commitments depends on the particular nature of the relationship.

In a hyperindividualist liberal society, the presumption is basically Hobbesian; life is taken to be intrinsically and thoroughly adversarial and exploitative, and relationships are taken to be basically instrumental and transactional. (This even informs scientific interpretation, as science is downstream of culture.) Society is taken to be intrinsically a matter of "contract" or a kind of Mexican standoff. Loyalty is a quaint and anachronistic notion, a passing emotion that expires the moment the landscape of opportunities shifts. Provisional and temporary.

Re: On loyalty to your employer (2018)

#208

Post by tomrod »

rckt wrote: post #103

I got it pretty early in my career that loyalty for a company is concept to make you work harder without asking anything in return. And the moment the company shifts focus and you are out of it, then suddenly you understand that this loyalty wasn't kind of a credits account which you've been saving all this time. It's simply nothing. You are on your own and can fuck off. So there's simply no place for loyalty in empl…

Loyalty to a company is broken because companies are typically too big.

Loyalty to people still has significant returns, _especially_ when you are specific with what you want and take control of how your interactions should work.

When I started my own business, a few-times-former employer became a client. The way they interacted with me changed dramatically overnight -- the CxOs treated me as a peer versus an employee. Was very strange to experience and a very welcome change.

Re: On loyalty to your employer (2018)

#209

Post by waiquoo »

jbs789 wrote: post #200

I always scratch my head when someone refers to the “company”. A company is a bunch of people, and that’s the level at which I build relationships and make decisions about loyalty.

There's a level where institutions are separate from the people that make them move. If your boss can get replaced without destroying your department, then that institutional layer exists.

Re: On loyalty to your employer (2018)

#210

Post by FredPret »

On the one hand, you are a single-person service provider and should act accordingly.

On the other hand, the individuals you work with will remember how much you helped them and how you made them feel, which will go a long way towards future engagements.

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