Slackesse Obliges?

Gentle Readers,

(I'm sorry in advance for this long post - I try to limit my posts to < 100 words, as I don't believe anything important should take more than that....but this isn't important)

One of the nicest parts of my job is that although I do some fairly sophisticated computer work for a living, I get to physically work in the warehouse section of our building (our server room is located here). As such, I am in constant contact with the, for lack of a better term, "blue collar" part of our company, which I enjoy very much, as opposed to the know-it-all condesending "white collar" section. I'd much rather discuss the finer points of making Lumpia or hear a debate about if or if not our president is a "Total Dick" than hear vaacuous opinions regarding the DJ Industrial average. That's just me. I'm also very happy to be out of a supervisorly role, as I was "The Man" for many years and did not care for it.

As we are a publishing house, our work is rather cyclic - we have a couple of very busy weeks every month, and a couple of not-so busy weeks. Unlike other companies I work for, at this place:

* I've never been asked to turn over anyone's email records
* I've never put a ghost on a computer to track what's being typed in
* I don't monitor which websites are visited
* While we have a blacklist of sites, it's only known-virus carrying sites that are blocked.

We don't have any sort of dress code, the hours are very flexible for the hourly people (you can work any sort of flextime you like, as long as you get 40 hours in, and can change it weekly if you want to), so all in all, it's a pretty good environment to work in.

My only real complaint is the way these people goof off.

These people have NO idea how to goof off properly. I see it constantly, really amateurish stuff, like

* trying to alt-tab quickly away from MS Hearts
* making the browser window tiny (sorry, I can still see QVC in 72 piont font at the top of the page)
* clicking rapidly on a spreadsheet to bring it to the foreground
* trying to whisper into a cell phone in a cubicle, thinking that nobody realizes it.

I've worked in some really repressive work environments in the past, and managed to not actually "do" anything at them, so I feel my slacking techniques are much more developed than those I see around here.

My question is, do I have any sort of moral obligation to help these people slack better? I sometimes feel that they're like deer in headlights; they simply aren't ready to slack in a "real" world enviornment. I worry that when they move along to a more corporate environment (many are college students interning here), they won't be adequately prepared to do nothing but not looking like it.

Any advice?

Thanks,

Taco

If the poor sods are bored enough to play MS hearts, I'd say they were beyond help

Would you guys happen to need a translator / proofreader?

I need to get out of here!!

Perhaps you could put together a brown-bag lunch series on 'Advanced Slacking.' Topics of interest include:

1. Sleeping While Sitting Up: The Creative Head Prop
2. Being Proactive About Ctrl + Alt + Del
3. Stealth Phoning: The Stairwell and You
4. Time Sheets: The Perfect Waste of Time
5. Let's Take up Smoking
6. Planning a Brown-Bag Lunch Series

(For a moderate fee, I would be willing to be a consult--just as soon as I quit slacking in the forums).

Perfect. I can charge lunch for the fee and still feel I'm being helpful. Thanks so much, this is the kind of practical advice I was hoping for.

I think you have a moral obligation to hold brown bag lunches and teach them how to porperly slack off (that's slack off not jack off)

Also - I think you could pick up some lindens by holding the same brown bags in world.

I used to hold slacking events in SL, until the damned cops wised up.

I think it is best that you do not share your techniques with your co-workers. Doing so would form an unspoken alliance that are often very counter-productive in a workplace environment. I assume that your techniques have taken years to fine tune and if you try to teach them to this group of amateurs, they will fail in their efforts and possibly expose and destroy your hard earned work in perfecting the methods. Protect yourself and let them relax in the safety of their own delusions.

But, that doesnt mean you cant share your methods with us...

Taco - this is important. You have the opportunity of fulfilling a critical role in the economic survival of the western nations (if only you can be bothered).

You have to go teach the Chinese. Immediately.
Before it is too late.

why in the FLIP would I want to ensure the continued economic survival of the western nations

I agree with Loki, it is best to not share your secrets to proper slacking as I do not share mine because it is an elite artform. This is truly an elitist affair, you have got to be good at slacking or you are doomed to utter failure. Only those who have proven themselves worthy should be allowed into the most secretive alliance known as the FIC of Slackers or FICS.

A few tips I shall pass unto you oh master of the slack:

1. Always have something in your hand(s) such as paperwork. Makes you look busy. I often carry around my wonderfully company provided portfolio type thinggy to keep wandering eyes off of my true intentions.
2. If you have a pager, act like it is going off and say to anyone near you "sorry, it is an emergency page, gotta make a call" then run off to the stairwell-o-secrecy to make such said calls.
3. Chain a minor work process to a slack process. Example I am an IT professional, sometimes I will need to replace a keyboard or mouse so thus I chain it with a small break to add some slackiness. And karry around the broken part in the new box to make it look like I am getting ready to fix something.
4. As an IT professional, there are phrases that most mortals will never understand such as the "TCP/IP port 80 is blocked, that must be the problem" I often use these type of phrases while I am carrying such said paperwork and empty part box around, this helps to continue the illusion of work.
5. Finally, the true art of slackery is an elite artform. As such, it needs to be preserved with balance or lest ye be canned. I find that adding a good amount of actual work in the mix helps to further the cause of the slacker(plus it keeps you employed to perform the art of slack in it's native environment).

Mike, we have a lot in common.

While I mull over my responsibilities here in educating my co-workers in slacking (or not), I'll post a freebie here:

To blow off a meeting after 10 minutes: You can send yourself a text message via email. Write it and put it in your outbox just before the meeting, and change your outlook settings to send/receive every 12 minutes. Then, 10 minutes into your meeting, you'll get a text message (I set my phone to have a VERY loud beeping when I get a text message), and you can excuse yourself. You can even have the text be "Server Fault" and show it around.

Taco,

Brilliant! I had never thought of that one! I remember the good ole days when you could have your buddy in IT admin page you from the system account with messages like that, but this just ups the ante and helps protect the inner sanctuary of the FICS.

If I may add a littel something to this thread as well:
There is also a game the elite slackers play with mere corporate mortals, it has no name as it holds many faces and purposes. This game always changes and also promotes the type of work we really want to perform which in turn allos further slacking. I will cite 2 examples of such game:

1. Something in the mouse ball compartment of a user's mouse to keep such said mouse from operating properly. It is possible to use this trick for close to an hours worth of slacking depending on how the issue was explained *wink*, oftentimes I will use the bent pin trick or the P/S2 port driver explanation for this one.

2. The printer is overheating trick:
This takes time to prepare for. First, create a generic text document and add printer specific info such as model number,serial number, a fake date of manufatcture and such. You can print out an internal test page on most printers to get an idea of what is shown on them. Create this document to match logos and info like that. Add your own text to read
"This printer has overheated and will be inoperable until an internal reset is performed. Please contact your local support personnel for help." <---or something similar.
Next, clear out the que on such said printer and send this page, as soon as the que dumps, take the que offline and wait till the call comes in to fix it. There, kill an hour waiting for the printer to cool off. Wash, rinse, repeat. This trick is the most handy for those within a larger structure i.e. an insider to control print ques on shared printers.

LOVE the one about carrying around the dead part...

If you need a bit of time and want to slack before a meeting you can always "fix" the printer by copying several pages that appear to have a "toner" or some other type of issue. Stick those pages back into the paper tray so that other people get them when they print. Next thing you know...

The printer is "broken" When you are ready, pull the rest of the doctored pages from the paper stack and the printer is good as new.



Wash. Rinse. Repeat.


Not that I'D ACTUALLY PERSONALLY DO something like that...

Except maybe to some asshat marketing creep who was annoying the shit out of me.

As one of the people who seem to always be caught doing something I shouldn't, I want to hone my techniques. Please. HELP.

I was thinking (I know, it may break the rules of the Fetid Inner Core of Slackers to think during a moment of slack) during one of my slack moments, perhaps we all should contribute to a book. Perhaps even get this book published. As I have seen so much junk being published it is insane, we would actually have a shot at it. We can title the book something like:

Slacking 101: The inside secrets of the FICS.

Heck, we could even get Cliffnotes to slacking to boot!

But, we would need someone else to take charge of it as we would be too busy slacking to get much done.

This is a good idea. Please let me know what time the meeting is about this, so I can schedule something.

You can photocopy a paperclip in a couple of different positions on blank pages and put them back in the paper tray. Then when people print and see it, spend about half an hour behind the machine, semi-napping. The nice part about this is you only need to produce a paper clip to appear to be a hero, AND you can blame it on whomever you dislike.

Excellent idea about the toner lines and the paperclip. Staples work ok too especially on a machine that has an internal stapler.

As for the meeting, I will in SL this evening, most likely around 4:00PM ish SL time, I will most likely be slacking off so I will apoligize in advance if I do not respond to you. We can perhaps set a date/time for a more formal meeting regarding this or discuss further.

I have even devised a few chapter names that kinda sticks it to the big corporate machine:

Slacking: The hidden Empowerment

Better Slacking through Teamwork

The vision of Slacking

Creating the Slacker's agenda


hehehe. make all the chapters poke to the other side of corporate think by using their own buzzwords.

Please insure I receive the meeting memo so I can lose it in my haphazard method of hitting the delete key as soon as the inbox is penetrated

I may not be able to attend, our server will go down at about that time and alert me.

Take stuff from work.
It's the best way to feel better about your job.
Never buy pens or pencils or paper.
Take 'em from work.
Rubber bands, paper clips, memo pads, folders-take 'em from work.
It's the best way to feel better about your low pay and appalling working conditions.
Take an ashtray-they got plenty.
Take coat hangers.
Take a, take a trash can.
Why buy a file cabinet?
Why buy a phone?
Why buy a personal computer or word processor?
Take 'em from work.

I took a whole desk from the last place I worked.
They never noticed and it looks great in my apartment.
Take an electric pencil sharpener.

Take a case of white-out; you might need it one day.

Take some from work
It's your duty as an oppressed worker to steal from your exploiters.
It's gonna be an outstanding day.

Take stuff from work.
And goof off on the company time.
I wrote this at work.
They're paying me to write about stuff I steal from them.
Life is good.

(not posted from work, really!)

Ohhhhh... Good one's. Here are some chapter titles to consider as well...

The Slackers Paradigm to Time Management

Slacking with Six Sigma Quality

ISO 9000 Certified Slacking

Surviving "Right-Sizing" by Slacking

Slacking - the Cross-Functional Experience

Slackers - The Best of Breed

The Slacker's Core to Strategic Competencies

Now I know who you work for Rose !!! I have my damned Ethics class tomorrow