Now it is fair to say that the relationship between employer and employee, between boss and staff, between emperor and slave has always been … tense to say the least. Well now that society has deemed me to have “come of age” I’m starting to realise what this whole nonsense is about and I don’t like it. In all honesty it’s a total nightmare where everyone is moaning and complaining about everyone and nothing gets done as a result. Welcome to the working world. You get thrown in, chewed up and spat out as either a top dog or a mediocre pup. Then you’re stuck in one of these roles and you’re destined to hate it no matter what you do to try to change it. People who try to make things better only end up worse off. Anyway, every cloud and all that.
Now I have the “privilege” of being both a boss and having a boss so I see myself as something of a middle ground. Although that probably makes me sound more pretentious than anything else. I’m not going to say who I work for but anyone who has access to Google could probably find out. Any who, my experiences are no different from that of someone else in the working world so I’ll try to make it as simple as possible.
If you’re a boss:
– You try to do the best you possibly can whilst trying to please the appropriate people (usually stockholders for most people).
– You are belittled by your staff behind your back because they think you do a poor job or don’t do enough.
– Secretly though, you just want to be friends with your staff but they have no desire to because you’re a pencil pushing snob who treats them like dirt on your shoe.
If you’re an employee:
– You do the best work you can, and the bulk of the work (remember that), so that you can keep your job.
– You get no recognition for all your efforts and if you do, it’s often shared with someone who did nothing.
– Secretly though, you’re jealous of your boss because of either the lucrative pay they receive or the respect they gain or anything else that will make you a decent member of society.
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I’m stuck in both these categories and you’d think that would make me a humble employee and a respectful boss. NO! It makes me even worse in fact. I hate my boss even more than I hate Frankie Cocozza and I will forever be my boss’s most annoying and whining critic. On the other side, I crave to be friends with my employees so much that I’m starting to run out of money buying them drinks all the time and they, in turn, hate me even more for “trying to be cool”. It certainly seems that I’m now at a cross-road, or T-junction depending on which way you look at it.
Am I either the stern boss who knows that his employees are going to criticise him no matter what and move higher up the food chain because of it? Or do I become friends with the people lower down the line and risk not moving anywhere in my career.
It certainly seems as though it comes down to, not employer vs employee, but social life vs professional life.
Let me know your thoughts.
thesplodge 