Why I Won't Work Late

Some people say I'm lucky because I have the type of job where I rarely stay late and I hardly ever have to bring work, physically at least, home with me. Unfortunately for me lucky isn't exactly how I'd describe my working situation.

The reason I rarely stay late isn't because the company I work for is a compassionate employer that values their employees and wants them to have a good work/life balance. The reason I rarely stay late is because the company I work for refuse to pay their employees overtime and don't show any appreciation, or even really acknowledge, when their staff go above and beyond for them.

The reason I don't physically bring work home with me isn't because my workload is manageable and my quarterly KPI's (key performance indicators) are generally achievable within normal working hours. The reason I don't bring work home with me is because, even though my KPI's are already quite difficult to achieve, when I do meet my targets, rather than rewarding me, they assume it means that my KPI values must be too low and adjust them to make them harder to meet for the next quarter.

The is also another, much bigger reason as to why I neither stay late nor bring work home with me and that is my wage. Although I am paid above minimum wage, my hourly rate is so low that, taking into account that the company refuse to pay overtime, it makes absolutely no sense for me to give up my own time for nobody but the companies benefit.

Simply put the company I work for doesn’t make it worth my while, in any way, shape or form, to work beyond my contracted hours.

A While Ago This Image Came Up On My Tumblr Dash...

A while ago this image came up on my Tumblr dash and, being currently somewhat dissatisfied with my employment/general living situation, I ended up going off on a bit of a self indulgent rant. I re-read it this morning and came to the conclusion that it's a perfectly valid opinion, though it doesn't contain any information that most people aren't already aware of, so I've decided to post it on here too:

There's a fairly simple explanation, traditionally as people get older they get richer. Conservative values and policies generally benefit the rich, so the older people get the more they benefit from being conservative. That is not happening with this generation, largely thanks to conservative values and policies, the financial landscape has changed. Rates of pay at the lower end of the job market have stagnated, the majority of employers are no longer interested in their employees happiness and general well being, as they’re seen as an easily replaceable commodity. Meanwhile, house prices, and housing costs in general, have risen at way beyond the rate of inflation, meaning that many young people can no longer afford to get on the housing market and are forced into the rental trap. Couple this with rises in the general cost of living and it's gotten harder, and continues to get harder, for normal, working class, people to make and retain money. Basically we're poor, we’re getting to a stage in our lives where we should be seeing our hard work pay off, but we're not and as such conservative values and policies do not benefit us in anyway and are, more than likely, only making things worse.

Job Search

I’ve been in my current role for so long that I’d almost completely forgotten how hard it can be to find a new job. The stupid thing is that it’s not even that there’s no jobs out there, it’s more the fact that it seems like no matter where you look none of the jobs available are roles that you’re qualified to do, that fall within your skill set or are aimed at your current level of experience.

You either end up applying for nothing at all or for a ton of jobs that you know you don’t stand a chance of getting. Either way even just trawling through job sites is mentally and emotionally draining, and that’s before you even get to filling out the absolutely ridiculous application forms or spending hours tailoring your C.V. and crafting a well thought out cover letter, all the time knowing that you’re unlikely to even receive a “thanks, but no thanks”.

To me the thing that makes matters worse is that about 80% of the jobs you apply for are through employment agencies, meaning you don’t even know if your application is getting passed on to the company or not. The only thing that you do know for certain is that for the next 6 months you’ll be getting constant phone calls, generally while you’re at work and unable to answer them, trying to get you to apply for any position in a 50 mile radius, even though you expressly stated that you’re not wanting to commute any more than 5 miles, that has a remotely, often extremely remotely, similar job description to your current role.

Being an adult sucks.

Personal Goals Vs Earning A Living: The Working Persons Dilemma

I’m getting old, I’m already considerably older than my parents were when they bought their first house and had their first child, neither of which I’m anywhere close to attaining and both of which are things I would like to have at some point. As I become increasingly aware of my own mortality, and my body clock slowly winding down, I’m starting to want certain things from my life and from my career. To a certain degree a good number of the things are my own to achieve and will only be achieved through my personal hard work and perseverance, however, some of these are reliant on my finances and my finances are directly linked to my job and, therefore, my employer.

I have worked for my current employer for the last 8 years of my life and during that time, whilst I may not have always been a model employee (in part due to my general disregard for authority), I have been one of the most hard working, consistently performing and reliable employees in the company, a fact that is often noted by my direct superiors. Unfortunately this hasn’t seemed to make much of a difference when it’s come to career progression or getting pay rises. When I first joined the company I initially made some forward momentum, but this plateaued fairly quickly and I ended up at a dead end. Since then I have taken several lateral moves within the company, to attempt to regain some forward momentum, only to end up with a greater workload at the same salary and to discover yet another dead end.

For the last 3 years I have been working in the same role, operating under the assurance from middle/upper management that I will be getting my own team to manage and that accompanying this will be further training opportunities, a higher pay bracket and greater potential for career advancement, something that would give me the financial stability and additional income that I need to start achieving some of my goals. Seeing as none of this has materialised, and is showing no sign of doing so any time soon, has left me with a little bit of a dilemma. Do I take the secure route and persevere with my current employer, in my current role, continuing to put my goals on hold and hoping that their promises come to fruition? Or do I throw caution to the wind, risk losing it all and gaining the potential of becoming unemployed by handing in my notice and trying to find a new, better paid job?