What Stops at a Workstation?
Comments: 6
Old joke: if the bus stops at the bus station, and the train stops at the train station, what happens at a workstation?
The fact that offices are inherently not good places to get work done is being driven home yet again, now that I have returned to one. This must be one of the great ironies of life (well, working life at least; I try to ‘compartmentalize’ ;-).
Seriously, a list of things that previously, working at home, I would have completed before a mid-morning swim can easily take most of the day to get done. This realisation leads us to The First Law of Office Life: Progress only occurs by interruption rather than in spite of it.
A demonstrable corollary of this law would seem to be that productivity is inversely proportional to planning. No amount of scheduling can help you. ‘Time management skills’ really means surrendering to chaos.
I realise that these truths have been fodder for cheesy desktop calendars for years, but the joy of personal rediscovery just never loses its thrill.
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Posted to General Rants • 2002.03.01 (Fri) • 01:00
Comments
Posted by Mary Beth 2002.02.25, 01:55
ick. So if that is a new “folder” what’s the corresponding document icon? This falls deeply into the “what were they thinking?” category in my book.
Posted by James 2002.02.25, 13:42
Know the trick, make it look like glass. They will think they are cutting edge. yet you get the shape you want ;).
Posted by jh 2002.02.25, 16:30
Mary Beth -
The top one is the document icon, the lower one is the folder. Yeah, I know; doc icons are generally shown in ‘portrait’ orientation… but they’re insisting on the same orientation for both.
As for “what were they thinking” - believe me, you don’t want to know! This little example is just the tip of the iceberg.
James -
This would be funny if it hadn’t actually been a request. I kid you not. OS X and Windows XP must be the bane of many designers’ lives right now. ;-)
-jh
Posted by Mary Beth 2002.02.26, 13:38
ah! I struggled with the top one - document or not. Funny how the orientation is so ingrained in us eh?
I’m about had it with transparency and shadows. Geesh. Nice trick, but it’s just not THE most important thing in the world for me. I don’t care what if the menu bar is striped or not. Don’t care if the buttons are 3-d, translucent etc etc. Just keep them consistent so I don’t have to think. At least reward me for being a computer use lo these many years!
Frankly, when I read big letters on a box that say “New Aqua Interface” I wonder if that’s all I’m getting. Is the software really re-written well for 10?
OK, back to my dark hole now.
Posted by Al 2002.03.04, 11:42
I find that I can only get work done if I come in on the weekends, and well, that suks!
Posted by jh 2002.03.04, 23:16
It’s nuts, isn’t it. People do that at my place. I’ve been bringing work home over the weekend in order to get things done but was recently told that if I needed to work over the weekend I really ought to come into the office so I could clock in and clock out (it wasn’t an issue of trust, I was to understand; just that it made tracking hours easier).
Well, guess that means no more working on weekends, which of course is just fine with me. The separation of church and state, let’s call it. Pray at the alter of capitalism during work hours and let the democracy of the senses reign at all other times. Yes, indeed.
The other thing that people do, and I’ve noticed this at several companies, is to put on headphones as a kind of “Do Not Disturb” signal. People have even been known to listen to music while wearing their headphones, but this is apparently optional.
Nothing says “stay the hell away” quite like a pair of headphones. I’m learning fast.
-jh
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