Maybe I'm just a grumpy misanthrope

The new maternity/paternity policy has come into force, with details of how work are planning to support parents, particularly new parents. And, of course, that’s all good. But there is a small part of my brain thinking ‘what about those of us who aren’t having children?’

There’s a Dilbert strip somewhere that satirises ‘family friendly’ policies for effectively discriminating against single people (or childless married people). I can’t remember the actual joke, but the gist of it is that childless people end up doing the work of their burdened co-workers, while said co-workers get extra time off for an event they chose to happen.

It would be like me having an extra week off ‘decorating time’ if I move house, or ‘driving time’ to enjoy my new car. Basically if you want some extra vacation, make a new sprog every year. Don’t worry about your work – other people can do that while you take some much-needed time with your family. Although perhaps spending too much time with your spouse is what caused this whole thing in the first place. (Hmm?)

What about some kind of bonus for those of is who don’t take paternity leave? After all we don’t cost the company anything with extra leave, we don’t add to the workload of our colleagues, and we will have fewer unplanned days out of the office in the next fifteen years because our kids are suddenly ill. We are less inconvenient all round, and on top of that we don’t show anyone pictures of wrinkled babies and demand to be told how cute they look.

I think we should be rewarded as team players, not punished for other people’s proclivity for procreation.

Seriously, do you have nothing better to do?

The background: recently a mobile phone was stolen from my work office. It had been left lying on a desk in the IT room. As it was an 'unassigned phone', it was only a month or so later, when the bill arrived with a couple of hundred quid rung up on it, that anyone noticed...

The response is a planned "clean desk policy". I don't have anything against cleanliness. But I can't help but feeling this is a kneejerk reaction to one person's carelessness. I feel like writing a sarcastic email to our HR guy who sent round the memo which talked about the policy. If I was going to send an email, it would read something like this...

Hi N---

I read about the clean desk policy in the tidy up day memo. I realise the new policy is a reaction to the theft of a mobile phone from a desk in Garth House, but I'm not sure it's the best way to respond to that situation.

For one thing, clean desk policies mainly apply to paperwork. Now, I'm no expert on these matters, but I am fairly confident in asserting that most would-be thieves are not really going to bother with a sheaf of papers.

Also, I'm interested to know how the clean desk policy is going to be enforced, or even if it's going to be. Are people going to patrol the building after 5pm putting everything off desks into a bin? Will this be a management role? Are our managers so desperate for something to do, they need to check whether my desk is tidy? If so, I will happily occupy their time by passing them some of the work I don't have time to do. On the plus side, if they are going to bin paperwork off untidy desks, I think I've found a fantastic new way of getting rid of work I don't want to do...

Will we get black marks if we don't tidy our desks? Will there be a grading system and prizes for the tidiest desk? Realistically, will this policy achieve anything other than making managers look petty-minded and fussy?

Just out of interest, if you haven't had anything valuable stolen from your desk, ever, do you still have to conform to the clean desk policy?

Don't you think this policy is a severe over-reaction? Why penalise everyone for one person's mistake?

As you can probably tell, I think this new policy is silly. I don't know about you, but I prefer to be treated as a grown up at work. If I wanted to be treated like a five year old, I'd go back to school.

Thanks for reading my annoyed rant. I'm sure it won't achieve anything, but I'm hopeful it might.

Lots of love and hugs and stuff

Jon

I doubt I'm going to send this email, but as a number of work peeps look at my blog, who knows where my remarks may end up...

(And if they agree with me, maybe those peeps will comment, instead of referencing my blog over lunch)