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Wow, the way you come across I thought you were gonna say $8-$9/hr.
So in 5 years do you see yourself making $56k a year with excellent benefits? Or do you want more?
At $54k you have what most consider a career-type job. If you don't consider it interesting enough to go "above and beyond" then you will never be successful in this job. Consider changing careers now, before you're cornered with a wife, kids, and a mortgage.
Because it builds certifications that give you leverage. It depends on what the "above and beyond" is, if it is special work that gives you a greater breadth of experience that leads to additional certifications recognized by the state that are respected and result in significant income increases or allow you walk into a new field thus opening new job opportunities then its totally worth it. If its just moving more boxes and wearing your body out then I agree there is not much use.
It depends on what you are doing. Anything that is not building leverage in an employment type setting is probably a waste of energy and time. As employees/workers we have so little legal protections/leverage that you have to be actively working on it every day.
Then use the skills to moonlight, moonlighting is where you gain your greatest leverage because its side income that you don't need to survive so the negotiations become more honest.
I actually like that there are people who share the mindset of the OP.... you know the ones that think all companies only promote brown nosers or friends, who try to use you up, who only want to skate by, etc...
Those folks are just people that I can mark off my list as my competition for a promotion and allow me to focus on becoming better than the few left who have a good work ethic. My current opportunity would be to be the manager in the group I work in now. It's riddled with people who share the mindset of doing the least and just getting by. I warned the hiring manager that there would need to be changes made as I don't share those values (or lack thereof) and his response was sometimes you have to rock the boat to create change and part of the reason that they want me for the position is because of my work ethic and my desire to see the department succeed. It will succeed, but whether or not these folks are still here when it does is left up to them.
Thats the reality of MOST Workplaces today.. Meritocracy is a thing of the past. Work is a social club. Its essentially high school for adults. If it wasn't you wouldn't see so many clueless buffoons in power who have no business being in those positions.
Sure there may be a FEW good companies out there who promote strictly by merit/value/knowledge etc. But for every one good company there are 50-100 crapola ones.
Long term nepotism/cronyism does major damage to companies that endorsed this type of behavior. The last 2 companies Ive worked for, this is the type of environment that was endorsed. One multiple facilities close down due to poor management, the current one the same thing is happening but at a slower pace. It seems like every promotion Ive seen the person chosen already hooked them up with the job. Whether they deserved to get the job or not. (Most didn't) Thats not even to mention the turnover issues this type of environment causes. companies are losing TONS OF great employees because of this.
Its why Ive always said, instead of putting in ALL year effort going Above and Beyond being this "standout employee". DO just enough and direct the remaining effort to networking, schmoozing, brown nosing etc. It will get you further quicker.
The best you can do doing above and beyond is probably just avoiding layoffs. (Sometimes that won't even happen).
Theres no point of killing yourself because the truth is NO ONE cares anyways.
I was told you had to work hard in college and choose a difficult relevant major and it would pay off. So I worked my @ss off for a chemistry major instead of having the "Animal House Experience." I even got a graduate degree. I graduated and got offered Sh*t $15 an hour no benefits temp jobs.
So I took a temp job and was told you have to work hard and you would be rewarded with a perm position. Well that never happened.
See the pattern. That reward for hard work is a carrot at the end of a stick that you will never taste so why keep chasing it.
Also for all those work hard out of pride people the last I checked this wasn't a communist utopia. People work hard for money and promotions not just because they want to. Nice how companies love capitalism when it provides them cheap labor but hate it when it means they have to pay to motivate workers.
I did finally find a good company to work for and I do work hard for them to reward them. But almost anywhere else why bother?
Sometimes you have to wade through a couple of dead ends to find a good one. That does NOT mean that you should change your work ethic because you had a couple of bad experiences. Most of your posts insinuate that all companies are just out for themselves and that hard workers get the short end of the stick. That has only happened to me twice in my lifetime. The rest of the times I have been successful and been able to move up. That had nothing to do with water cooler talk (I don't participate in that as I am too busy with real work) and everything to do with motivation and my work ethic.
The reward for hard work is promotion, advancement, and more money. It doesn't often happen over night and most often you may go months or years without any real benefit noticed. But when it happens it all feels worth it.
This has been the case for myself and my wife. She has it even better than me. She started at the bottom with her accounting degree and in ten years has more than tripled her salary through promotions. She is now in management and accepted another job offer from a different group in her company that will gain her another $18k per year with less responsibility. She is now well over the six figure mark. In my area, it's not common for a 35 year old to make over 6 figures. I am working my way towards the same goal.
We work extremely hard and don't have the outlook that the company is out to get us.
Work is definitely a social club. Hard workers who don't spend time shoot the cr@p with boss don't get promoted. Why should they? And those who already are working at a high level don't get any of the special awards that go to people that they want to work harder. Why should they?
If you want working hard and above the top to work for you, then you have to be working for yourself. You can be the best there is if you don't work for anyone but people who employ you, and pay for the best.
Working harder than everyone else violates serious rules of working in a bureaucracy. Everyone else, including your bosses, will do their best to bring you down to the common level of mediocrity in the company. Having you out there doing that means that upper bosses may require them to do that too. And they ways they find to bring you down can be from mildly disagreeable to career destroying---or even things that could get you jail time.
Thats the reality of MOST Workplaces today.. Meritocracy is a thing of the past. Work is a social club. Its essentially high school for adults. If it wasn't you wouldn't see so many clueless buffoons in power who have no business being in those positions.
Sure there may be a FEW good companies out there who promote strictly by merit/value/knowledge etc. But for every one good company there are 50-100 crapola ones.
Long term nepotism/cronyism does major damage to companies that endorsed this type of behavior. The last 2 companies Ive worked for, this is the type of environment that was endorsed. One multiple facilities close down due to poor management, the current one the same thing is happening but at a slower pace. It seems like every promotion Ive seen the person chosen already hooked them up with the job. Whether they deserved to get the job or not. (Most didn't) Thats not even to mention the turnover issues this type of environment causes. companies are losing TONS OF great employees because of this.
There are definitely companies like this out there. But you should research the company before hiring on to find out their ethical values and if they do not align with your own either don't take the job or take the job temporarily and work to find a company who has a lot better values later on. Deciding to remain with a company that does not have your interests in mind is a choice. Granted, if you have never had a good work ethic or excelled in your position then your resume and network may be short and your opportunities will be as well.
If you have worked your way up into an impressive resume and have built a strong enough network you will have many more opportunities than those who just skate by.
Lots of people on here have gone above and beyond but are still stuck at the same position. While many people on here does average work, moves up and get promotions.
Work is definitely a social club. Hard workers who don't spend time shoot the cr@p with boss don't get promoted. Why should they? And those who already are working at a high level don't get any of the special awards that go to people that they want to work harder. Why should they?
Bologna. I don't come to work to socialize. I get along with most all my co-workers and I am friendly to them but they are not my friends. We are here to do a job. I have never been promoted because I am friends with the right people. I'm promoted on my merit, my job performance, and my work ethic. Most people I know will say the same. This type of attitude stems from people who don't go above and beyond and expect that their years of showing up to a job will grant them the right to success and promotion. The market is competitive, so you either compete or get left behind. We get to decide that for ourselves.
Quote:
Originally Posted by slyfox2
Working harder than everyone else violates serious rules of working in a bureaucracy. Everyone else, including your bosses, will do their best to bring you down to the common level of mediocrity in the company. Having you out there doing that means that upper bosses may require them to do that too. And they ways they find to bring you down can be from mildly disagreeable to career destroying.
Learned from hard experience.
I now fully embrace my comment above. No one can bring down a person who is looked upon by managers throughout all of the departments as a stellar performer. If you have built a reputation around solid performance and work ethic then those who try to bring you down will face a brick wall.
I also learned this from hard experience. If you're not successful that's on you. There is no blame that can lie with anyone else. If the company isn't getting you where you need to be, then you move on to one that will.
Lots of people on here have gone above and beyond but are still stuck at the same position. While many people on here does average work, moves up and get promotions.
You're making this assumption based on how people claim they work. People can say anything they want on a forum, but 9 times out of 10, their actual performance will be far different than what they tell you. After all, not many people will admit that they are underperforming or that they really just don't care. They will chalk it up to the company being against them and holding them back.
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