Job rantings: I HATE it!!!

okay, so some background. I am a campus tour guide. I actually enjoy giving the tours, I just walk around a campus I'm very familiar with, point out stuff, talk about my experiences and uni services, etc. I love that part, except for the heat of course, it's fun meeting new people every day from all over the country with different interests. I've also lost about 10 lbs without even trying .

So here is what I cannot stand! The majority of the people I work with. Some of them are nice, but the problem there is these people are all, with the exception of me, friends outside of the job. They all belong to a campus religious group, and are almost entirely from right near here, went to high school together, etc. So the ones I am sort of work-friends with are better friends with the people I hate than they are with me. So there's that problem already, which I can deal with.

But this is getting ridiculous. This is one of the easiest jobs I have had in my life, and I have NEVER heard so much whining about anything! I swear I'm at my wits end! We have a morning tour and an afternoon tour, and you are supposed to clock out between them if you're working both. Which none of them do, already makes me mad but I kept my mouth shut because it doesn't really affect me, aside from that they're all stealing hours by just sitting there gossiping between tours. I don't do that.

But the really really irritating part of this is that somehow if you gave a morning tour, and signed up and are on the schedule, you don't have to give the second one unless there are too many people on it. Like, if you come in just for the 2nd tour you have to give one, but if you are supposed to do both you don't have to unless there are too many people.

I think that is absurd. If you don't want to give two tours a day, then DON'T SIGN UP FOR TWO!!!! How hard is that? And then of course they just keep sitting there, on the clock, getting paid for nothing.

In effect, these people (two in particular) are getting paid twice as much as me for giving one tour a day because they just sit there and I don't. And when I say that that is unfair, somehow I'm the bad guy and nobody will even speak to me. One of the other ones agrees with me, so he started having everyone there pick cards and the lowest two or three or however many have to go. I think that is fair. But of course these two who sit around on the clock don't, because, gasp! they might actually have to do the work they are supposed to do! I seriously cannot stand it.

And then they all started making fun of "creepy vegetarians" of course, and I am a vegetarian, although obviously I'm not obnoxious about it if none of them know that!!!

I have never in my life seen a group of people whine about work so much! And be soooo lazy about it too! I mean, yea, sometimes I show up a few minutes early and clock-in, but these people sit there for hours, doing nothing!

Would anybody else be mad? Should I just shut my mouth about it? I haven't said anything much, or very angrily yet, just that I don't think it's fair, and that if you don't want two tours a day don't sign up for them, in a pretty though not totally calm way.

I'm only working there a few more weeks, so I can just shut up about it, but I really hate it and I don't like my job anymore because of these people.

Any advice? I know this was really long.

Don't worry about it being long, everyone needs to vent sometimes, and frankly I think I'd be on the brink of murdering them. Whining is one of my pet hates, but these two are just unbelievable.

Do you have a supportive supervisor that you can report them to? I think you probably already suspect this, but there is nothing that you can say to people like this.

I would have the urge to, at the end of my last few weeks there, let the supervisor know that they might want to review everyone's hours clocked in against the hours that they were actually working and giving tours. Let them know that you didn't want to say anything, but that you know school funding monies are precious and you hate to see them waste away to people slacking off and not working.

It has always angered me too in past jobs to watch people slack off when I'm working my butt off.

It sounds like they're all just stuck up and have been babied. Too many people never have jobs until college or even after, and don't know the value of hard work. I'm sending good vibes your way.

I would talk to your supervisor, where are they when everyone is sitting around on their booties? and don't they notice the extra hours the others are getting paid? sounds poorly managed IMO, but there is nothing you can really do about that grit your teeth, smile, and tough out the next couple weeks, pretty soon you'll be a hundred miles away

It always amazes me that when jobs are so valued people don't want to work. They see how much they can get away with. Ot "that's not my job!! That's one thing I don't miss. Many of my ex-co-workers would whine about their job not realizing how lucky they were (until last sept!) to be working for such a good company.

I've worked places like that, you have to face it in the end you are at a university with a virtual cornicopia of "know it alls" who don't figure they should have to work a remedial job, they want management. They need money but don't want others to believe that they like their job and will wine and complain until eventually they start trying to get fired or decide to turn their attentions onto getting someone else fired. I've worked with a few at every job I have had in my 28 year life time. If they are all like that you will want to be on the defencive and go about your business, don't give them amunition in case they get bored and want to try to get you fired. Good luck and I hope you losse them at the next job you have. I'm glad you hear i'm not the only one who has come across the type. Remember we are all in this together.

Thank you guys all! I was worried it sounded like they weren't doing anything wrong...

I haven't seen either of the particular two really obnoxious ones again since what happened in the post. In my experience, it's always people who have never had a job before who are the absolute worst! (One at another job called me obscenities while I was trying to train him all the time, and then when I told the manager about it he said I was lying and I got fired! They later found out I wasn't lying and apologized profusely because everyone else had heard him do it--it was his first job too).

My supervisor wants to be "cool" or something, so she never says anything to anybody. It is kind of poorly managed, I guess, because she's more worried about what they think of her than with how well it's running. Which is also annoying, but I can't really be mad at her for long about it. When I have complained about little things, usually she addresses them, but by e-mailing everyone with updated rules, never by actually confronting anyone about anything.

Maybe I should post a "NO WHINING" sign up! Hehehe!

I have no idea how nobody has noticed all these extra hours people are getting, at times when they shouldn't be working at all. I guess that's what happens in huge places where the timecards are shipped off to payroll dept and they have no idea if the people even really exist, of course.

Hopefully when they become managers or whatever all their employees do nothing but whine at them, and they can see what it's like.

I just don't get it. My work ethic is very good, when I am on the clock I am uncomfortable not doing something even if there's nothing to be done. What kind of person just sits on their butt and whines and expects to get paid for it, and feels okay about doing so? I guess I really don't care what they think of me, but at the same timeit's not worth it to say anything to them. I never complain about what someone else is doing unless it directly affects me, like I have to do more work or cover for them.

Technically, they're stealing my tuition money. That's annoying. Pllhhh!

Thank you all again for the support! Chin up.

Don't work so much, then.

If there are no chances of you getting an advancement than why work so much for so little. People in entry positions with no chance of advancement are always lazy. They are always whiners. They can get away with it because they cannot be fired and they cannot be advanced. They are stuck.

Either you find a job with more chances of advancement, or you join them and relax while getting paid. There is nothing wrong with that. This is a capitalist society and employers pay for the maximum work and employees do the mininum work required by the contract. Sooner or later they will strike a balance.

So many people steal tuition at my university, the student workers are the least of their concerns.

Originally Posted by shengmei

Don't work so much, then.

If there are no chances of you getting an advancement than why work so much for so little. People in entry positions with no chance of advancement are always lazy. They are always whiners. They can get away with it because they cannot be fired and they cannot be advanced. They are stuck.

Either you find a job with more chances of advancement, or you join them and relax while getting paid. There is nothing wrong with that. This is a capitalist society and employers pay for the maximum work and employees do the mininum work required by the contract. Sooner or later they will strike a balance.

So many people steal tuition at my university, the student workers are the least of their concerns.

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It's a point of view, certainly.

Nonetheless, seeing other people do wrong is not usually my cue to join them.

I believe that something does not become right, by the sheer number of people who do it, any more than something becomes wrong because no-one is willing to take a stand for it.

Or to [mis?]quote Albert Einstien: "Small is the number of them who see with their own eyes and feel with their own hearts."

I can't do what they do because I believe it is wrong. And I have had many hourly wage jobs, and actually people who do that for a living are way less lazy than the people who actually make enough money to live on. (eta: to a point. most people have noticed that they do more work than their bosses, i don't mean to say if you work in an office or something you're lazy)

There is a lot wrong with being lazy, and to many people laziness is disdainful, and I'm one of them. The American economy is so good precisely because we aren't lazy. People who sit around and whine don't deserve their paycheck. I don't want to be one of those people.

I guess it's a matter of personal dignity and pride. But I don't steal, and I don't cheat.

Originally Posted by Zissou'sMom

I guess it's a matter of personal dignity and pride. But I don't steal, and I don't cheat.

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I guess it is too

Too bad it's not contagious.

That is very honorable.

You are a tour guide, though.....a tour guide is basically a teacher.

A teacher teaches much more effectively when he/she is more relaxed.

I used to do so much things for my teaching, but I cut off some workload one semester....my students actually liked me better, they learned faster, and I was much happier.

This may be a personality defect, but I have the ability to totally cut off any stress from whatever else when I'm at work. You know, leave it at the door, and pick it up on the way home. I managed to do several tutoring sessions the day after my ex and I broke up, when we had been up until 4 am fighting, and nobody had any idea anything was wrong. I can go straight from crying, all-out-fighting to "Hello, how can I help you?" smiling in no time flat.

I do agree with you though, shengmei, that I should try to quit being so stressed out about it. In the long term, it really matters naught. I'll just continue to be friendly with everyone and just ignore the people who are being so difficult. I did well with that today. Tommorow when I have to see the particular people I just won't bring it up, and if they start being nasty I will go to the bathroom or something. It's just all so juvenile.

*sigh*

Unfortunately, there are a lot of bosses who don't know how to be bosses. Sounds like you have one of them. But at the same time, having a good work ethic and taking pride in your work, no matter what the job may be, WILL pay off for you in the end! It may not be in this job as a tour guide with someone who cannot manage people, but it will.

Case in point...in my current job, they LOVE me. Why? Because I work, I take constructive criticism, and I try to go above and beyond to make the company look better. The women who were in my position before me...what a crew. One didn't do anything. Seriously - she messed up typing jobs so badly, so regularly that the engineers ended up just doing it themselves. The one before her was a crack-head who surfed porn all day at the front desk. (Honestly - no exaggeration!) So when someone came in who WANTED to work, and who WANTED to do a good job, they have rewarded me for my efforts. It's been a mutually beneficial relationship.

Unfortunately when you start at the bottom, there are bottom feeders too. These people you speak off probably will graduate and not amount to anything in life, unless they marry rich somehow.

I've worked with many many people that are like that though...they whine about anything. One example would be it was the 4th of July weekend and we had to work the day before (or after can't remember). Anyhoo, since there was only a handful of people there, I went out and bought ice cream, chocolate syrup, and all the works for making Ice Cream Sundaes.
A friend from work told me that some of our co-workers had the nerve to COMPLAIN that it was ice cream and not real food, like sandwiches and stuff. They were saying that if the company is going to feed them, they should get real food and not ice cream.
My friend at the time basically spoke right back to her and said "Jenney thought of this, Jenney did this and Jenney paid for anything out of her own pocket". I thanked her and no one had the balls to complain to my face the rest of the day!

If I were you, I would just make fun of them. "So...how are those tours coming along?"...or if they're so 'religious' then bring in their diety. "Didn't God work 7 days straight just so that you could have a chair for your fat butt to sit on????"
Well...maybe leave that one for when you resign.

Originally Posted by lunasmom

If I were you, I would just make fun of them. "So...how are those tours coming along?"...or if they're so 'religious' then bring in their diety. "Didn't God work 7 days straight just so that you could have a chair for your fat butt to sit on????"
Well...maybe leave that one for when you resign.

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I had wondered about that part to - but, to be fair, God didn't work seven days straight.

Just six. Still, that's a pretty high work to break ratio.

And I seem to remember some injunctions against lying and stealing, too, from my Catholic days...

Lunasmom, that is hilarious!!!! I don't want to offend the ones who are my friends though, so I'll have to keep it in my head. My mom said something like that too, when I was just talking to her. She's very religious, but very private about it--I know this only from observing her, she's never even said anything about it. But she said to ask them if Jesus gave them special permission to steal and be slothful! (if anyone works hard, it's my mom. she was a juvenile probation officer, and now she works full-time in food service even though she is really too sick to work. she didn't tell them she has a college degree, because she didn't want to be a manager!) Whenever someone complains about food given as a gift, I just look at them and say "Well I'm sorry you don't like your free ____" It happened all the time when I'd bring candy in for my class I taught (also an unpaid position).

Heidi, thank you so much. I hope someday it will pay off... so far the best paying job I've had was 6.75$ an hour even though it was worth much more than that. And I've had many. So far it's only paid off in compliments from customers, which does make me feel really good! Your job is lucky to have you after those last two rejects.

Today I got a tip even. We are not allowed to take them, and I told the person so, but she was the student's grandmother and it seemed soooo rude to refuse it. They said, oh it's not a tip, we found it on the floor. I know I shouldn'tve but 5$ actually means a lot to me right now, so I did.

Satai, you just rock. Really. Does more need said?

Originally Posted by shengmei

People in entry positions with no chance of advancement are always lazy. They are always whiners. They can get away with it because they cannot be fired and they cannot be advanced. They are stuck..

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Even those that are in much higher slots are lazy. and are whiners. I have to fight with the client to fix there issues that they did not give me the rights to fix.. Once they left a whole location down for 2 days cause they did not want to fix a computer issue,
and they wanted to blame for it.

I am sure you boss knows they are working extra hours that are not needed, but being lazy they dont want to deal with it. How ever if it really upsets you, pass along the information.

heeh 5 dollars is 5 dollars.

Originally Posted by Satai

I
And I seem to remember some injunctions against lying and stealing, too, from my Catholic days...

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oh gee, your taking all the fun out of life

heeh just kidding, and someone forgot to tell my cat that, she just stuck her face in my glass of milk as i was typing this.

Originally Posted by theimp98

oh gee, your taking all the fun out of life

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I usually do