I cannot believe what happened today. I actually fell asleep at my desk! I was in the middle of reviewing a document when I had no idea when I lost consciousness. The next thing I knew was my forehead connecting with my keyboard. Hope I do not get a nasty bruise! Luckily my boss and some others are away on a seminar, so no one saw me make a fool of myself. It must be due to the very good lunch that my boss treated me to as a formal welcome into the company.
I was blog-scanning last night when I came across Sentosa’s post of 18th October. It made me reflect on the types of people around, especially prevalent in a corporate environment. In his entry, he said there are Type A and Type B people. Type A are those who are willing to teach you and really ensure you learn and contribute to your very fullest. Type B are those who fear you may take away their rice bowl, so refuse to teach or guide you along.
His post brought back memories of my tumultuous working life so far. I have come across a lot of Type As and Type Bs, as well as Type Cs – willing to teach and guide you along on the surface, but talk bad about you behind your back so that you will not take away their rice bowls. Then there are Type Ds, the worst of the lot – not only refuse to teach, but still badmouth you to the superiors. I still do not understand why people must do things like that.
When I was teaching, these four types are very prevalent. There was a Type A – my immediate supervisor, the Head of English. She is really nice and friendly, and I have really learnt a lot under her. There was a Type B – the former Vice-Principal, who expected me to just sink or swim without any form of guidance, and blamed me for not being able to handle the class just because the kids got a bit rowdy.
There was a Type C – the now-retired former Head of Social Studies, who guided me along and tried to help me, but later I found out she told the Principal I set the examination paper wrongly when she had actually vetted through everything and told me it was alright. If there was really something wrong, I would much rather she told me in the face rather than telling me everything was right then tell the Principal something else.
And of course, there was a Type D – the hated one among all the teachers. She not only backstabbed me, but several others, and even a couple of the Subject Heads. She did not want to guide people along, yet still told tales to the Principal on what this teacher did, and what that teacher did, and twisted the stories to make it seem like she was the godsent angel to right all wrongs. She figured that as long as the Principal liked her it did not matter what the rest of the school thought. Honestly, so what if you are so chummy with the Boss when you get hated by all your other colleagues and superiors? Is it not better to maintain good relations with everyone?
When I started out in the corporate world, I have also come across people like these. There were Type As, Type Bs and Type Cs, but luckily, I have not met any Type D so far, and hopefully never will.
Type A is my current boss. He is the best boss I ever have so far. He is really a very good person to work for, very nice guy, jolly and cheerful, and ever willing to guide. He always made sure he explained everything in detail and I understood properly before letting me proceed. He told me soon he will make me solely in charge of all the documentation and give me higher-order legal documents to review and comment on, then he can just go ahead and concentrate on the legal advisory stuff. He said in this way I can learn and be exposed to more and in the future if I ever want to change jobs, it will look good on my resume.
Type B was the Corporate Executive I was under in one of my previous firms after I left teaching. I was supposed to help lighten her workload but doing legal stuff at the same time, but since I had not done any corporate work before that, I had to read up. I would appreciate some help and guidance, but she just refused to help me. She said if she took the time to guide me how to do, she might as well use the time to do everything by herself. I had to learn by looking through old files, and the instructional websites, as well as various notes which I managed to find, but still, what one knows in theory may not necessary be utilized in practice.
But when she found out I was able to more or less do the job independently, she suddenly resigned, quoting the job as being too stressful, lots of overtime and she had no time to go home and take care of her baby. So I was left with no “mentor”, yet still had to run the entire department on my own. Later the firm underwent internal reshuffling, and the department was merged and the workload spread among the other secretaries, so I had to leave. Despite all the problems I faced with the (former) Corporate Executive, I was grateful to her that she enabled me to learn something, so I was able to do a Corporate Executive job properly in a firm I joined later on.
Type C was one of the lawyers in one of my previous firms. She guided me along and helped me out, but in the end said certain things to the Director that caused him to be unhappy with me. Despite all the work I did and late nights I put in, she was unhappy with me just because I promised to celebrate my ex-boyfriend’s mother’s birthday way in advance and could not work late for just that one night. If it was just a normal date, I would not mind staying. Besides, it was a last minute request for me to work late, totally unexpected.
I know work takes priority over everything else, but I am sure there are times when employees are not able to stay late, so can the superiors really fault them on a one-time request not to work late? Especially since I said I would come in extra early the next morning, but the lawyer said the document absolutely had to be out that night.
But, in all fairness, most employees are not required to work after official hours. Most of us put in extra hours just to clear up the work, meet the deadlines and make sure everything is done properly, but otherwise, employees are not entitled to work overtime, just like they are not entitled for overtime pay. Anyway, it was just as well I left the company because if they are not going to be flexible over this one-time request, then perhaps it is not really worth it working there in the first place.
So which type are you? I believe most of us should be Type A. When I am new to a company, I would really appreciate all the help and guidance people render me, so if there is anyone new to the company, I will do my best to help out. After all, if the person is new, one cannot expect him / her to know everything about the job or policy or structure. Those people who refuse to help for fear of losing their jobs are really shallow, narrow-minded and non-progressive. If he / she is really so indispensable in the first place, why should he / she fear about the job being taken away?
I was blog-scanning last night when I came across Sentosa’s post of 18th October. It made me reflect on the types of people around, especially prevalent in a corporate environment. In his entry, he said there are Type A and Type B people. Type A are those who are willing to teach you and really ensure you learn and contribute to your very fullest. Type B are those who fear you may take away their rice bowl, so refuse to teach or guide you along.
His post brought back memories of my tumultuous working life so far. I have come across a lot of Type As and Type Bs, as well as Type Cs – willing to teach and guide you along on the surface, but talk bad about you behind your back so that you will not take away their rice bowls. Then there are Type Ds, the worst of the lot – not only refuse to teach, but still badmouth you to the superiors. I still do not understand why people must do things like that.
When I was teaching, these four types are very prevalent. There was a Type A – my immediate supervisor, the Head of English. She is really nice and friendly, and I have really learnt a lot under her. There was a Type B – the former Vice-Principal, who expected me to just sink or swim without any form of guidance, and blamed me for not being able to handle the class just because the kids got a bit rowdy.
There was a Type C – the now-retired former Head of Social Studies, who guided me along and tried to help me, but later I found out she told the Principal I set the examination paper wrongly when she had actually vetted through everything and told me it was alright. If there was really something wrong, I would much rather she told me in the face rather than telling me everything was right then tell the Principal something else.
And of course, there was a Type D – the hated one among all the teachers. She not only backstabbed me, but several others, and even a couple of the Subject Heads. She did not want to guide people along, yet still told tales to the Principal on what this teacher did, and what that teacher did, and twisted the stories to make it seem like she was the godsent angel to right all wrongs. She figured that as long as the Principal liked her it did not matter what the rest of the school thought. Honestly, so what if you are so chummy with the Boss when you get hated by all your other colleagues and superiors? Is it not better to maintain good relations with everyone?
When I started out in the corporate world, I have also come across people like these. There were Type As, Type Bs and Type Cs, but luckily, I have not met any Type D so far, and hopefully never will.
Type A is my current boss. He is the best boss I ever have so far. He is really a very good person to work for, very nice guy, jolly and cheerful, and ever willing to guide. He always made sure he explained everything in detail and I understood properly before letting me proceed. He told me soon he will make me solely in charge of all the documentation and give me higher-order legal documents to review and comment on, then he can just go ahead and concentrate on the legal advisory stuff. He said in this way I can learn and be exposed to more and in the future if I ever want to change jobs, it will look good on my resume.
Type B was the Corporate Executive I was under in one of my previous firms after I left teaching. I was supposed to help lighten her workload but doing legal stuff at the same time, but since I had not done any corporate work before that, I had to read up. I would appreciate some help and guidance, but she just refused to help me. She said if she took the time to guide me how to do, she might as well use the time to do everything by herself. I had to learn by looking through old files, and the instructional websites, as well as various notes which I managed to find, but still, what one knows in theory may not necessary be utilized in practice.
But when she found out I was able to more or less do the job independently, she suddenly resigned, quoting the job as being too stressful, lots of overtime and she had no time to go home and take care of her baby. So I was left with no “mentor”, yet still had to run the entire department on my own. Later the firm underwent internal reshuffling, and the department was merged and the workload spread among the other secretaries, so I had to leave. Despite all the problems I faced with the (former) Corporate Executive, I was grateful to her that she enabled me to learn something, so I was able to do a Corporate Executive job properly in a firm I joined later on.
Type C was one of the lawyers in one of my previous firms. She guided me along and helped me out, but in the end said certain things to the Director that caused him to be unhappy with me. Despite all the work I did and late nights I put in, she was unhappy with me just because I promised to celebrate my ex-boyfriend’s mother’s birthday way in advance and could not work late for just that one night. If it was just a normal date, I would not mind staying. Besides, it was a last minute request for me to work late, totally unexpected.
I know work takes priority over everything else, but I am sure there are times when employees are not able to stay late, so can the superiors really fault them on a one-time request not to work late? Especially since I said I would come in extra early the next morning, but the lawyer said the document absolutely had to be out that night.
But, in all fairness, most employees are not required to work after official hours. Most of us put in extra hours just to clear up the work, meet the deadlines and make sure everything is done properly, but otherwise, employees are not entitled to work overtime, just like they are not entitled for overtime pay. Anyway, it was just as well I left the company because if they are not going to be flexible over this one-time request, then perhaps it is not really worth it working there in the first place.
So which type are you? I believe most of us should be Type A. When I am new to a company, I would really appreciate all the help and guidance people render me, so if there is anyone new to the company, I will do my best to help out. After all, if the person is new, one cannot expect him / her to know everything about the job or policy or structure. Those people who refuse to help for fear of losing their jobs are really shallow, narrow-minded and non-progressive. If he / she is really so indispensable in the first place, why should he / she fear about the job being taken away?
3 comments:
My immediate supervisor is a type A.
The definiton of "on the job training" is: "find out everything yourself, because you're expected to know. I'm not even going to show you how the program works, heck, I won't even bother telling you the name of the program, because you're supposed to know what you're expected to do, without me having to tell you what is actually expected from you. Anytime I think of a new job definition for you, you're already expected to know about it even without me having to say anything to you."
In short, I must be a mind reader. Lucky me.
That was sarcasm by the way (hard to put across in writing :P)
Yes, some people are like that unfortunately, expecting us to be mind-readers. BTW, do you mean Type B instead of Type A?
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