Professional Darwinism: Update to OP on p.74

[Midnight Kitty]

"Visiting" because there was an increase in demand for basic computer programming courses, so they hired a newly minted PHD from the "little university down the road" in Austin that stole our name. He lasted 1 semester and was fired.

What was he thinking??? You would think you would tread lightly your first semester teaching.

It depends upon whether he thinks he was lucky to get a position at the university or if he thought the university was lucky to get him.

[icfrugal2]

* snicker Our food thief was found out when he found my breast pump in the fridge which was in a dark lunch bag with my name on it. He was so squicked out he went and complained to my supervisor who calmly asked "How do you know what was in her lunch bag?".

The sheer number of stories with this same basic theme never ceases to amaze me. How do these idiots manage to survive to adulthood without being done in by their own stupidity?

4/18/12
something like that happened when I was first in collage, they folowed the smell to the thief's room it's been over 40 years so I don't remember how it all turned out.

IC

If you steal something and find evidence of a heinous crime, then and only then can you "rat out" the person you stole from and expect to maybe come out of the deal okay. If you steal something that turns out to be "icky," how dumb do you have to be to think complaining about it to your boss is going to end well for you? It's like saying, "I cleaned out the petty cash fund and spent it all on hookers and blow, but there wasn't nearly as much money in there as usual! Get somebody on that, will ya? I've got a social life to maintain."

Somewhere there is a post about a college food thief who stole someone else's pot of food off the stove in the dorm communal kitchen when the owner went back to her room for her tupperware container. She found it to spicy, came back and screamed at the person for making it to spicy, after she threw it away because she couldn't eat it, then complained to the RA. The RA made food thief reimburse the person for the food she stole. IDIOT! 

[Slartibartfast]

DH is in a semi-professional chorus, which is currently looking for a new director.  This year they're having three concerts with three different directors, then hopefully they'll pick someone over the summer to have one of the three be a permanent director starting in the fall.

Last night DH came home from practice and said one of the pieces they're doing is a set of poems by ee cummings.  This particular director, out of the blue, told the choir "don't worry about the lyrics - they're just nonsense anyway."  She didn't know that there are actually THREE English teachers/professors who sing in the choir, one of whom reamed her out big time and explained the point of the poems to the rest of the chorus.  This particular teacher is also one of the people on the director selection committee.  I'm guessing this particular director will not be selected 

[kherbert05]

"Visiting" professor. Do NOT tell students that the student bill of rights is a bunch of craps and that you don't have to have office ours. You might find yourself up on charges before the judiciary - and fired.


In my 4 years at university it was the only time Judiciary had a case - the guy was shocked.


"Visiting" because there was an increase in demand for basic computer programming courses, so they hired a newly minted PHD from the "little university down the road" in Austin that stole our name. He lasted 1 semester and was fired.

What was he thinking??? You would think you would tread lightly your first semester teaching.

BASIC 


It was kind of funny because I was a freshman and ended up "tutoring" a bunch of sophomores and juniors. If I was in the lab - the poor managers would refer people to me when they were swamped. I had taken BASIC in HS - and despite the idiot's efforts to prove that girls don't do computers had taught myself and earned a 100 semester average.

[kherbert05]

"Visiting" because there was an increase in demand for basic computer programming courses, so they hired a newly minted PHD from the "little university down the road" in Austin that stole our name. He lasted 1 semester and was fired.

What was he thinking??? You would think you would tread lightly your first semester teaching.

It depends upon whether he thinks he was lucky to get a position at the university or if he thought the university was lucky to get him.

He still had a job at UT I think he thought Southwestern was below him. After all we didn't have a FOOTBALL (bow down and kiss the the field). It was kind of funny when our lacrosse  team beat the UT team and it was announced during a nationally televised big rivalry (Not A&M though) game.

[White Dragon]

Not sure if this is Darwinism or just egregiously classless -

If you are a federal government and have announced you are going to lay off thousands of employees, prepare your transition paperwork carefully.

Because civil servants who have just been laid off will feel just a bit insulted when their package includes stick figure diagrams to help "explain" the process of transition.
They will get upset, they will tell the media, and you will have egg on your face.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/04/23/pol-civil-service-diagram.html

[snowflake]

Not sure if this is Darwinism or just egregiously classless -

If you are a federal government and have announced you are going to lay off thousands of employees, prepare your transition paperwork carefully.

Because civil servants who have just been laid off will feel just a bit insulted when their package includes stick figure diagrams to help "explain" the process of transition.
They will get upset, they will tell the media, and you will have egg on your face.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/04/23/pol-civil-service-diagram.html

Now I want to make a screen bean graph to diagram the morale at my work for the past year.  Some of the budget issues have been very badly handled.  Making a graph like that might be sort of therapeutic. 

Of course I know that I shouldn't SHOW it to anyone.

[ShanghaiJill]

A person I knew (and detested) worked at an inpatient psychiatric facility for children and teens.   She had been Peter Principled from another program which was eliminated.   On top of that, she didn't even possess the slightest qualifications.

Despite the fact that mealtime was supposed to be neutral and food was not to be used as punishment, she often gave the kids three minutes to eat breakfast.   One kid (her pet) was slow getting dressed in the morning and she made everyone wait for her. 

I'll admit I ratted her out and she got in lots of trouble. 

You just don't do that.

[MissRose]

My sister was telling me to avoid this particular local party store by her due to a few employees that may be on the edge of committing Professional Darwinism by being SS's.   She said if you need to go to a party store, go to store Y or Z even if it means a longer drive.  A few of the employees thought it was funny to sexually harass her by saying a few things to her that they should not say to any woman.  She said she didn't say anything back in regards to the rude & inappropriate comments that made to her (but sometimes she said that she is tempted to show retaliatory rudeness in that situation).  Her boyfriend went back into the same store not long after that, asked for the manager, and told them about the comments made towards my sister.   He hopes the men will lose their jobs as if they make the comments to one woman, they most likely make them to other women too.

[dawbs]

I was just standing in the 'break area' on a college campus.
(by 'break area', I mean "spot with a few tables/chairs/pay copier/vending machines"--it's not a student union or a lounge but people hang out there and relax)

A group of students were LOUDLY talking (joking, but...not super jokey--in that "I wonder if theyr'e serious") way about selling copies of exams.
The Dean walked in to buy a candy bar.
They continued.  Dean made eye contact with the loudest/leaders [dean is imposing ].  They continued.
Dean said "Guys, I hope you're joking, you realize this is inappropriate".
They said of COURSE they were joking and gave a few eye roles.
Dean explained the role of the dean, reminded them of the academic honesty policy and explained the difference between 'private' and 'public' spaces.

They were at least sheepish until the dean was out of earshot (when they laughed--but it sounded embarrassed)
I know dean and the dean has an incredible memory for students...none of these folks better need a favor from our department in the rest of their college career.
(They wouldn't be penalized, they'll recover fine.  But they've burned their 'goodwill' with the dean so they'll have to prove themselves NOT to be twits to get any extra help)

[Wulfie]

One of our staff members has a true case of PD if there ever was one.  She is still within her 90 day probation to boot! I don’t see much of a future for her.

Some of this came out after the manager for the other location noticed that she showed up late one day.  She is supposed to be there an hour before the manager but the manager saw her drive up 5 minutes before he was supposed to start. He asked her why she didn’t call to let him know she was going to be late, rather than making some excuse on why she was an hour late showing up, she said nothing and walked away, which made him curious! He went back on the security cameras and low and behold, she has been an hour late every week for the last month but still puts a full 8 hours on her timesheet.

She works at 2 locations. My location (A) and Location B. One day a week she splits between the two buildings. They are about a 5-10 minute drive apart. She leaves my building at Noon and should be at B by 12:15 at the latest. She rarely is there before 12:45. THEN she takes her 30 minute lunch!

Then to top it off, she is not doing her job. She is a janitor and is constantly refusing to do anything that is dirty. Sorry but scrubbing toilets and empting garbage is part of your job.  You knew it when you took the job.

Today, I gave her a list of things that needed to be done.  There were 3 things on the list.

1)   Sweep and mop the lobby and community rooms.  The lobby was swept and mopped. Community room? Nope!
2)   Clean the graffiti and spit off of the stairwell by the outside door. – Nope.
3)   Clean some half eaten food out of the window well across from one apartment- Nope.

When I asked her if everything was done (after I had already checked) She told me that she had done so. When I told her that I had checked and they had not been done, she told me that I am being too demanding and she doesn’t want to work in my building any more.  Hmm, I want you to do your job and that is being too demanding?

[snowflake]

One of our staff members has a true case of PD if there ever was one.  She is still within her 90 day probation to boot! I don’t see much of a future for her.

Some of this came out after the manager for the other location noticed that she showed up late one day.  She is supposed to be there an hour before the manager but the manager saw her drive up 5 minutes before he was supposed to start. He asked her why she didn’t call to let him know she was going to be late, rather than making some excuse on why she was an hour late showing up, she said nothing and walked away, which made him curious! He went back on the security cameras and low and behold, she has been an hour late every week for the last month but still puts a full 8 hours on her timesheet.

She works at 2 locations. My location (A) and Location B. One day a week she splits between the two buildings. They are about a 5-10 minute drive apart. She leaves my building at Noon and should be at B by 12:15 at the latest. She rarely is there before 12:45. THEN she takes her 30 minute lunch!

Then to top it off, she is not doing her job. She is a janitor and is constantly refusing to do anything that is dirty. Sorry but scrubbing toilets and empting garbage is part of your job.  You knew it when you took the job.

Today, I gave her a list of things that needed to be done.  There were 3 things on the list.

1)   Sweep and mop the lobby and community rooms.  The lobby was swept and mopped. Community room? Nope!
2)   Clean the graffiti and spit off of the stairwell by the outside door. – Nope.
3)   Clean some half eaten food out of the window well across from one apartment- Nope.

When I asked her if everything was done (after I had already checked) She told me that she had done so. When I told her that I had checked and they had not been done, she told me that I am being too demanding and she doesn’t want to work in my building any more.  Hmm, I want you to do your job and that is being too demanding?

Hmmm, I'm pretty sure this is our old janitor.  We noticed that NOTHING was being cleaned and our trash was piling up.  When we asked her about it, she pretty much asked why she always had to do the cleaning.  So one of our tech guys rigged some cameras overnight and discovered that she was using some of the computers to watch Hulu instead of working.  We went to the management and they said, "Well we can't find people to work this job so we have to keep her."

Since we're doing our own cleaning anyways, how about we just fire her and save the money?

Six months later, they finally found a new janitor.  She is a lovely woman who is an immigrant from a country that is impoverished by civil war violence.  Not long after she was hired (Tell me if this is too political) someone visiting made a comment about people who were not born in the US taking our jobs.  I wasn't sure what to say besides, "GOOD.  The dangdity American wasn't cutting it!"  (No, I didn't say that.  I just said, "We're very happy with her and it's hard to fill that position.")

[JadeAngel]

I was looking for some restaurants for dinner the other day and stumbled across this page on Urbanspoon

http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/71/760185/restaurant/Melbourne/Beluccis-Albert-Park

BG - This restaurant is close to where I live and boasts an enviable position right opposite the beach with an uninterrupted view. However we always referred to this place, Belluci's, as the 'Ghost Restaurant' because even on a beautiful Saturday afternoon when all the other places within walking distance were packed and struggling to keep up with demand, Belluci's would be completely empty. Occasionally you would see a bored looking bartender polishing some glasses, but in all the times I drove past the place, I never saw a single customer inside the restaurant. - End BG

Two people posted poor reviews on Urbanspoon, and the owner of the restaurant came back with a spectacular vitriolic tirade against both, ending with the phrase 'We've been here since 1977 and we don't need customers like you' (read the whole thing at the link above)

Three months later the restaurant was out of business. Professional Darwinism at it's finest (although I do feel entirely sorry for the couple who booked their wedding reception there and had to find a new venue at short notice)

[JoW]

I've got another one from the pharmaceutical industry for you -

Now I work for a company that makes a powerful prescription tranquilizer.  A few weeks ago an employee at the facility that makes said tranquilizer was fired and arrested for murdering her husband with a large dose of said tranquilizer. 

[Ceallach]

I was looking for some restaurants for dinner the other day and stumbled across this page on Urbanspoon

http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/71/760185/restaurant/Melbourne/Beluccis-Albert-Park

BG - This restaurant is close to where I live and boasts an enviable position right opposite the beach with an uninterrupted view. However we always referred to this place, Belluci's, as the 'Ghost Restaurant' because even on a beautiful Saturday afternoon when all the other places within walking distance were packed and struggling to keep up with demand, Belluci's would be completely empty. Occasionally you would see a bored looking bartender polishing some glasses, but in all the times I drove past the place, I never saw a single customer inside the restaurant. - End BG

Two people posted poor reviews on Urbanspoon, and the owner of the restaurant came back with a spectacular vitriolic tirade against both, ending with the phrase 'We've been here since 1977 and we don't need customers like you' (read the whole thing at the link above)

Three months later the restaurant was out of business. Professional Darwinism at it's finest (although I do feel entirely sorry for the couple who booked their wedding reception there and had to find a new venue at short notice)

Oh wow, the owner's post was horrible.   It's easy to sympathize with business owners who receive maliciously bad reviews, but it doesn't seem to be the case here.  The business owner seems to think people should feel "honoured" to be her customer and abide by her concepts of what is right or wrong.    I hope she has found work in an industry to which she is better suited - not hospitality!!