Saturday, October 11, 2008

The Office - Company Time Theft

The Office this week was about time theft at work, which made me very paranoid. During the show, Jim times all of Dwight's "non-work-related" activities. I've done this to myself before, and was admittedly a bit ashamed of myself. I quickly vowed to spend every minute at work being productive, and just as quickly removed the guilt from my life and fell into the same pattern of work a little-waste a little time.

I'm finding it especially hard to work on Fridays. This past Friday was especially bad. Here's an approximation of how I spent my time at work when I wasn't working:

1.) Made coffee
2.) Talked to friends
3.) Ate
4.) Went to the bathroom. Got into conversation with someone while washing my hands.
5.) Checked e-mail
6.) Slept (I didn't do the larger portion during work hours, but I slept for about an extra five minutes after my lunch break officially ended).
7.) Checked e-mail
8.) Went to the bathroom
9.) Read friends blogs
10.) Tried to sneak up on someone at their cubicle in order to scare them. I didn't work.
11.) Checked e-mail
12.) Did some research on International House of Prayer
13.) Did some research about youth ministry
14.) Checked e-mail
15.) Went to the bathroom. Got into another conversation, this time at the door of the bathroom about the nasty cold that is attacking everyone, then silently noted that I should "up" my vitamin C intake and lessen my sugar intake.
16.) Cleaned out a soup bowl that contained broth left over from Monday and was stinking and drawing fruit flies (I really felt like this was very good use of company time, actually. We all benefited from the relief from fruit flies).
17.) Tried to find a better way of formatting reports from online banking (this was actually work-related, but I probably should have stopped trying long before I did).
18.) Checked e-mail
19.) Checked the breakroom for any left over food from morning meetings
20.) Went to the bathroom. Did not get into a conversation in the bathroom, but I did meet someone in the mailroom on the way back from the bathroom. Started up conversation by asking what they were cooking for dinner (yeah, I don't know...).

Of course I worked in between these activities. It's easy to excuse my inconsistent schedule by accusing everyone of doing it, by reminding myself that I got all my work done, or by blaming the company for not giving me enough to do, but that, of course, doesn't make it ok. And now I feel guilty again.

Thanks, Jim Halpert...

3 comments:

Joel said...

Don't tell anyone but yesterday. I watch the entire series of Dr. Horrible, Musical Web Blog online. :) by the way very funny, has the guy from Dugy Houser. I was that bored and could not find much at all to do. I am thinking you may have the same issue our minds are not be challenged.

Anonymous said...

Sometimes you just have nothing to do at work. And I usually lack the motivation to ask for extra projects or "bonus" work.

Unknown said...

That's a tough situation. It's kinda like the dishes. I'm done with my work. Should I find more to do? If the answer is yes, I try to think of things I could be doing. When I think of something I ask, am I really that motivated? If the answer is yes, I do it. Most of the time, however, the answer is no, so I go back to sleep. Or at least maybe I would if I had a job where I didn't have to stand up all day. Factories suck.