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| The first time I heard of this concept was from a co-worker. We were gripping about the usual employement bitches and all of a sudden he blurted out that he worked for himself. Well I thought he was nuts, and proceded to tell him just that. His responce dropped me right in my tracts. I wasn't "ready" for his answer, yet! It took me quite awhile to fully understand his answer (several years and a lot of crap). Well now I get it, so here goes. What he told me was that he worked for himself. He didn't work to make money for the "company". He worked to make money for himself. If they were making money too, well that was fine. If they weren't making money, he would just move on and get another job when they closed the doors. At the time, I was young and full of the usual company loyalty brainwashing propoganda. I thought that he was speaking of blastphomy or the such. How could someone be so unappreciative of their employer? I'd never come accross such a "bad attitude". Well a lot of water has gone under my bridge since then. After 20+ years of do as I say, broken promises, and the such, I finally understand where he was coming from. Just so that you know a little of what I'm talking about, here are three examples of what I've seen. The first example happened in 1993. One day a co-worker and myself received a lecture from our supervisor. This guy spent several minutes explaining to us that our job was more important than our religion or our family. The jist of his logic was based on his belief that if we didn't have this job, our religion wouldn't be interested in us any more. We wouldn't have any money for the collection plate, so why would they be interested? Then he went on to explain that our family would treat us pretty much the same way. The second example happened a year or two later. Management had previosly devised a free overtime policy that was so convoluted in it's logic and application that I would never want to attempt to explain it here. Lets just say that I've tried to explain it before, and after about an hour, most people believe me that it was convoluted, but they still don't understand it. Well after awhile, the Equal Employement Opportunity Commission found out about this and conducted an investigation. The EEOC's finding was that the company had violated the labor laws. The company then had to calculate how much money we were due, and issue us checks for our back pay. Next, the EEOC instructed the company that they would have to pay us time and a half for all the overtime we worked in the future. Now pay attention because this is where it gets good. Our management told us that we had just screwed ourselves out of the oppertunity to work lots of overtime now that the company had to pay us for it. Did you catch that? The third example happened about three years later. The company decided to conduct a morale survey. Special forms were distributed to all the employees, and we were instructed to fill them out honestly and truthfully. This was really stressed to us because they had to know how we really felt about things if they were to create an environment of open and honest comunication between the employees and management. And of course we all know how important it is to management to have this line of open and honest comunication. So everybody filled out their surveys and turned them in as instructed. A few weeks later, the results were in. We were gathered into a conference room and scolded for having "bad moral". It seamed that the salary employees surveys indicated that about three forths of us were dissatisfied. We also found out that about three forths of the union workers reported that they were satisfied. At the time, our department had recently undergone a management transition. One of the main points that our new boss was stressing was that we weren't allowed to be upset about anything that had happened in the department before he was in charge. We were being instructed as to what we could be upset about, and what we couldn't be upset about. Well moral really improved after that! |
| WORK FOR YOURSELF AND BECOME FINANCIALLY INDEPENDANT |
| WORK FOR YOURSELF by Robert Plumb |
| SO HOW DOES THIS MAKE YOU FINANCIALLY INDEPENDANT? |
| Well, as I said earlier, it took several years and a lot of crap before I really understood what he ment by "working for himself". He wasn't saying that you should do poor quality work, or let your productivity slide, or anything like that. What he was saying was that you had to look out for yourself, because nobody else would, and this applied in particular to your employer. They have their own agendy, and your wellfare is probably fairly low on their priorities. This isn't nessessarily right or wrong. It's just the way it is. They have a business to run. And they are looking out for themselves, you can bet on that! The final event that formed my views on this was when management started to openly tell us that the only reason we were there was to make money for the shareholders. Well I was a shareholder, so I guese this was a good thing? But this got me to thinking about the conversation nearly 20 years earlier about "working for yourself". What this guy was trying to tell the "dumb kid" was that I needed to take responsibility for my own well being. Nobody else was going to, especially my employer. And it had finally dawned on me that financial independance is taking care of yourself and not waiting for somebody else to do it for you. It's all in your attitude! |
| FINANCIAL INDEPENDANCE IS BEING ABLE TO TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF AND NOT RELYING ON SOMEBODY ELSE TO DO IT FOR YOU. IT'S ALL IN YOUR ATTITUDE! |
| the "grumpy old goat" emporium grumpyoldgoat.com Your source for good advice. It cost nothin, and it's worth the price. Where attitude is everywhere, and the goat rules, so watch your backside. |
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| GOAT QUOTE YOUR JOB IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN YOUR RELIGION OR YOUR FAMILY, NOT ! |
| GOAT QUOTE SOME PEOPLE WORK TO MAKE MONEY FOR THE COMPANY. OTHER PEOPLE WORK TO MAKE MONEY FOR THEMSELVES. WHICH TYPE OF PERSON ARE YOU? |
| GOAT QUOTE WORKING OVERTIME IS NOT A PREVELEDGE OR AN HONOR. IT'S JUST THAT MUCH MORE OF YOUR LIFE BEING SPENT AT THE SALT MINE. MAKE SURE YOU'RE BEING PAYED FOR IT. REMEMBER, IT'S YOUR TIME, YOUR LIFE. AND DON'T FORGET, THE COMPANY IS BENEFITTING FROM IT. |
| GOAT QUOTE FOR A LITTLE FUN AT WORK, TRY SETTING OFF THE INDEPENDANT THINKERS ALARM. |
| GOAT QUOTE SPEAKING ON MORALE LEADERS LEAD, AND FOLLOWERS FOLLOW. |
| GOAT QUOTE WHEN YOU'RE YOUNG, YOU THINK YOU'RE A GENIUS. A FEW YEARS LATTER, YOU START TO REALIZE JUST HOW WRONG YOU REALLY WERE. |
| * This site has been made possible by the many, many buttholes who have left their lasting impressions on our souls. It's to you, that we let our pants down and curtsey. * If you have any questions or comments about the grumpy old goat emporium, please hesitate to contact us by e-mail. the old goat | webmaster * |
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