Unhappy Families

Wasn't it Chekhov who said all happy families are alike, but every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way? Words to that effect, anyway.

Well, it applies to the workplace too, doesn't it? My evil, anal-impacted, micromanaging boss may be nothing like *your* evil, anal-impacted, micromanaging boss, right? I speak purely hypothetically, with the assumption that our IT department is reading what I write as I write it. Of course *my* boss isn't evil. Or anal-impacted (that's the next step up from anal-retentive, btw). Or even micromanaging. *My*boss is a paragon of virtue, a delightful gent, a hail-fellow-well-met type, a gentleman and a scholar. In fact, my boss is a god. I burn incense at his feet. I sacrifice goats to him. If I were, or knew, a virgin, well -- oh, let's not go there, I'm starting to turn my own stomach.

Generally speaking, however, it is awfully difficult to get any work done when your boss feels the need to A) receive a written proposal for a particular project (even though this is an ongoing or repeating project that you've done in the past, many times), B) sit and think over the proposal (assuming he bothers to open his email and read it) for a few weeks, C) hold a full-department meeting to discuss this proposal, a meeting that ends with him deciding unilaterally that the issue requires more thought on his part, D) finally make a decision and then send emails to everybody in the world who might be affected by your project -- and neglect to copy you, E) complain bitterly when the work doesn't get done and there are negative consequences, and finally F) blame you entirely for everything falling apart. And then we start all over again.

Hakuna matata -- it's the circle of life . . .

But as I mentioned earlier, this doesn't apply in any way to *my* boss. No no no no no.

Here's something else that doesn't apply to him, cough cough: it's absolutely amazing to me how it just so happened that as soon as he got hired, 5 out of 7 department members suddenly got stupider. He hired a new position, so now 3 out of 8 of us are intelligent, innovative, responsible employees, while the rest of us are, well -- older, fatter, older, not younger, not prettier, older, and, well, older, and therefore stupid and not to be trusted with any kind of actual work. And gods forbid we take it upon ourselves to actually think ahead and try to determine the result of an action before we take the action -- how dare we be that defiant of his authority!

Gee, I'm glad my boss isn't like that.

I'm also glad he doesn't: obsess over triviality, ignore massive problems, neglect to support his own department when representing us and our interests to outsiders, or treat any of us disrespectfully.

I'm so damn lucky!

I could go on and on (and on) and probably will later, but I'm late for another fabulous meeting! Gosh I love meetings, I could go to them all day! Oh, wait, it just feels like they last all day, what with a boss (nothing like mine) droning on about his personal concerns instead of work for the better part of each hour. Lectures are fun, right? Especially when they're about the difficulties of buying a new microwave, or about how things were done at his *last* place of employment, or about how he'd like to get a cat but really feels like it's just too much responsibility right now (or ever), or --

Gotta go. Quick.