Just recently a dear friend of mine quit her job at a reputed IT firm.After a year of mental torture,she had lots of kind things to say about the IT industry and life as a whole.A very interesting read on lessons from the corporate world.
What follow are a few random observations, no offence meant except in some cases J , though the pot shots are very much intended.
My first project turned out to be a hugely mismanaged, utterly chaotic, frenzied effort of hundreds of people- some barely competent enough to handle board game tactics, forget board room planning, others soullessly slogging hours to earn that “exceeds expectations” and the “first bucket” in the yearly appraisals. ( I wonder if kicking the bucket isn’t better than being kicked around by some incompetent, martyr expressioned, sweet talking, spineless manager who cannot take the pressure on herself and prefers slave driving the team to save her ass. )
P.S- Now excuse me for assuming that projects are generally better managed-cynical though I am its hard to be completely bereft of hope and ideals when you are fresh out of college.
If you are a cynic this place would leave you with an unwipeable smirk on your face and a “see didn’t I tell you” look that makes you strut around as if understanding the world has never been easier.
Never, I repeat, never completely bare yourself. They will feed on your talents, leverage your fears, and wallow in your decency.Nothing can save your ass better than corporate speak.
Planning apparently entails making idiotic lists on papers, assigning impossible deadlines to people and screaming your lungs out at anyone who points out your idiocy. This is followed by seat by seat visits to coax, beg, threaten, intimidate (depending on the “resource”) the respective resources and updating the “status” to ensure that your panic levels are as high as your dumbness quotient.
When the higher management realizes that one manager is incapable of getting the job done, they rope in another one, preferably as incompetent but louder and bitchier. As if that doesn’t take the cake, they ensure that there is an ego clash between the two so as to make the communication gap as huge as a gaping chasm.
Never ask for a planned leave, never tell them you haven’t been home for a year, never say its your brother’s marriage that you cannot possibly miss, “project dependencies” would never let you have your own sweet will. Instead call in sick with acute diarrhoea or malaria, typhoid, small pox-damn invent a disease if you have to.
There will be times when your PM will be taken over by an irresistible urge to be democratic and popular. What will follow is a team meeting where they let you decide
a) Either something that’s already been decided
b) or something of little consequence
And to top it off they will inevitably give you two options. Option 1-being option 1 and option 2 being choose option 1. So much for free will.
Passing the buck is national sports here. Bitching and sweet talking come a close, tied second.
Pressure does not trickle down the hierarchy it gushes down like water from a broken dam.
The more you commit the deeper you are sucked into the quicksand.
Honesty is a non entity. You end up feeling like the biggest sucker every time you utter the truth.
The project is always in a critical stage especially when weekends are approaching and when you have to ask for leaves. In my humble opinion, they should consider corporate euthanasia for such cases.
Coffee breaks are rationed here, apparently everyone from the PM down makes it there personal concern to keep a count of the number of breaks each team member takes per day.
Corporate gossip is any day spicier than college gossip. Especially if the project has its share of married women. I have seen blatant violation and utter disrespect of personal space that I’d have assumed is not tolerated in any civilized place.
There will be days when you do not want to talk- utter a single syllable more than required or make eye contact with anyone for that matter- practice and perfect the art of staring viciously at the computer with that tense expression of “I have a deliverable today” writ large over your face. If that does not keep people from hurling niceties and asking are you alright, nothing will.
There, inevitably, will be an assault on your sense of humour. You better be prepared to exercise your facial muscles to what would barely pass as sad attempts at jokes and learn to rein in your jokes so that you don’t look like an alien blabbering in whatever aliens blabber in. Also it will be initially hard to figure what the punch line of the “joke” is and where exactly to fake laugh. The trick here is to be alert and guffaw along the minute everyone else around starts doing the same.
There are five steps to Nirvana(thanks X, for this lesson)-
a) The first step is to be yelled at for any random crap-taking fag breaks, coming in late, having long hair, listening to music etc etc etc. The list goes on.
b) Follow it up by making it very clear that you do not care about their “deadlines” and will/can not finish the work on time.
c) Take leave on “critical” days; make them beg/threaten you to come.
d) They will play good cop, bad cop with you-your TL will be the good guy, your own personal Jesus, taking the consequences of your sin, shielding you from the evil PM. And you are supposed to repay and prove your loyalty to your well wisher by slogging till midnight possibly on weekends too.
e) Finally your PM will deign to come down from her high and mighty seat and act like your mum. What follows is a “one on one” –their idea of counselling; the process is quite painful and ideally includes- how they know what you are going through and the regular “been there, done that”- interspersed with pretty sordid personal tales of distress and redemption that are supposed to be inspiring and that you would rather not know.
If you can make it through these five steps without flinching and still get yelled at for the random crap you had been yelled at for at the beginning of the cycle, congratulations-you have just won yourself your release. Nevermind the not-so-veiled threats about your confirmation and appraisal, the regular stream of childish bitching stories doing the rounds and the very mature advice of “do not hang out with the @#$@$@” doled out to the rest of your project mates.
**Latest update- Well at the end of it all they will call you for another one on one, this time with the account manager, to say sorry to burst your bubble but there’s no such thing as Nirvana, read, release. But they will definitely address your “concerns” and make you feel treasured in the days to come. This is the point where you are supposed to have tears of regret in your eyes and make a resolution saying this project is my baby and I’m not going to let it down.
Sweet dreams are made of this for sure! J
Cheers!
