It’s just the same, without the uniform
So we replace mum’s home-packed lunches, homework and teachers for more home-packed lunches (only we are responsible for the soggy sandwiches), homework and bosses.
Think you can escape the pitfalls of the schoolyard now you’re grown up. Think again.
The minefield of en vogue open-planned offices only encourages a more advanced version of popularity games and social cliques.
Who are you friends with? Whose mailing list are you on? It is school all over again. Only this time we are a little bit older and wiser.
Are you the bully or the bullied? Are you popular or still looking on from the outside?
Whether you think you’re above all of this is irrelevant. The jockeying for position exists regardless of your input. Your refusal to partake probably even drives the engine more so.
Office politics is a more grown-up replication of the school-yard popularity contest without the hormones. Friendship alliances are even more critical and wield stronger results. Whether it be a promotion or demotion, who you hang out with affects your grade just as much as it did in the class room. Let’s do the algebra a boss is unlikely to hand a sweet bonus to a minion they don’t like.
The rules don’t change either. You’ve got lots of friends – chances are people in the office are going to be nice to you. Why piss off Miss Popularity when she’s only going to talk to half the company about you at the pub?
And if you like watching it all from the edge, then observe and enjoy my friends, the persuasive techniques administered by those who value popularity as much as a job well done. It is more than butt-licking the boss, it is taking notes from the bible of How to Win Friends and Influence People. It’s doing the coffee run, it’s dictating the after-work curriculm, it’s a well-worked finger on the pulse.
You see nothing changes after graduation – cool is still the currency that opens doors and sees a full inbox.
In essence, it is playing the game of perception. It is not enough in this competitive sphere to just be good at your job. You have to make others think that you are good at it too. And how do you do that? By determining and managing people’s perception of you.
What kind of person in the office do you want people to think you are? We all have an office persona – so what’s yours? And how do you make it work for you?
Are you the school-yard bully that scares others into doing a good job? Or do you go for the sycophantic approach and convince others you are from the wrong side of the tracks aiming for a better life? Or maybe you’re consistent and stick to the allure of the enigmatic loner you were when Clearasil was still your best kept weapon.
I am not saying its right; all I am saying is that it is foolish to deny its existence. Don’t think we’ve risen above all of that simply on the basis of our age/maturity. Just do the things you never had the balls to do at school because now you can.
Think you can escape the pitfalls of the schoolyard now you’re grown up. Think again.
The minefield of en vogue open-planned offices only encourages a more advanced version of popularity games and social cliques.
Who are you friends with? Whose mailing list are you on? It is school all over again. Only this time we are a little bit older and wiser.
Are you the bully or the bullied? Are you popular or still looking on from the outside?
Whether you think you’re above all of this is irrelevant. The jockeying for position exists regardless of your input. Your refusal to partake probably even drives the engine more so.
Office politics is a more grown-up replication of the school-yard popularity contest without the hormones. Friendship alliances are even more critical and wield stronger results. Whether it be a promotion or demotion, who you hang out with affects your grade just as much as it did in the class room. Let’s do the algebra a boss is unlikely to hand a sweet bonus to a minion they don’t like.
The rules don’t change either. You’ve got lots of friends – chances are people in the office are going to be nice to you. Why piss off Miss Popularity when she’s only going to talk to half the company about you at the pub?
And if you like watching it all from the edge, then observe and enjoy my friends, the persuasive techniques administered by those who value popularity as much as a job well done. It is more than butt-licking the boss, it is taking notes from the bible of How to Win Friends and Influence People. It’s doing the coffee run, it’s dictating the after-work curriculm, it’s a well-worked finger on the pulse.
You see nothing changes after graduation – cool is still the currency that opens doors and sees a full inbox.
In essence, it is playing the game of perception. It is not enough in this competitive sphere to just be good at your job. You have to make others think that you are good at it too. And how do you do that? By determining and managing people’s perception of you.
What kind of person in the office do you want people to think you are? We all have an office persona – so what’s yours? And how do you make it work for you?
Are you the school-yard bully that scares others into doing a good job? Or do you go for the sycophantic approach and convince others you are from the wrong side of the tracks aiming for a better life? Or maybe you’re consistent and stick to the allure of the enigmatic loner you were when Clearasil was still your best kept weapon.
I am not saying its right; all I am saying is that it is foolish to deny its existence. Don’t think we’ve risen above all of that simply on the basis of our age/maturity. Just do the things you never had the balls to do at school because now you can.
posted by Zap at
4:06 pm
2 Comments:
This comment has been removed by the author.
I can't spell.. oh well.. bugger it I haven't slept in ages...
Well written and much in agreement.
So, Who is the real Zap? asks the Professor(?)
I fear many do not see through even the thinest of onion skins that collectively form the various facets of our personalties. And most don't even try.
Well... leave them for dead I say, if they're not making an effort for you then why should you make an effort them?
All too often it is these same onion skins that we end up hiding behind, which prevent us from seeing those around us as they really are... or could be.
Be they loved or loathed, feared yet fearful, the truth hurts in many cases as it is these persona's [from cock licking arse fucking anally retentive playful school girl, through to boisterous frustrated teen meets 1000-mile-an-hour no holes barred eccentric freak out] who we create in fact to hide from ourselves just as much as from each other.
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