So when you sign up for a salaried job, I really thought the deal was you do your hours, a bit of unpaid overtime and then you get paid …right? Unfortunately, this no longer seems to be the deal. Last week, my boss (a different boss than last post)  tells me if I don’t have any billable work (I’m a consultant) then I have to take leave so that it doesn’t pull his utilization stats down. That wouldn’t be so bad accept that when the works on he wants me to do unpaid overtime… so I lose when there’s not enough work and I lose when there’s too much work!

Unfortunately, this seems to be part of a wider trend to pass on costs and risks to employees (and really I get off pretty lightly). This trend includes:

• Unpaid overtime
• Cutting hours / forced leave
• Using employees as a credit facility e.g. by delaying expense refunds
• Using employees’s stuff e.g car, mobile

I think part of the problem is that employers know that good employees don’t complain and almost never go to court. So, these practices have evolved overtime… I guess it’s the recession.

So, I just have to share this. Last Friday, I was having a bit of a heart to heart with my new boss. The moment was right, so asked him, why he had fired one of my colleagues. I thought he would say the guy just didn’t perform which is understandable but also pretty uninspiring. However, to my complete surprise he told me it was because the guy in question hadn’t defended a junior staff member when a project went bad! It was then realised that I finally had a really good boss! Someone, I really wanted working for.

It made me realise how important it is to me, and how rare it is, to have a boss that really backs his team.

I’ve struggled with cynicism in almost every job I’ve worked and to be honest it can be very hard work. It can rob you of the good times at work, isolate you and make it very difficult to find motivation.

The conventional advice—usually given by happy go lucky self-helpers—goes something like this: suck it up, think happy thoughts, tell yourself your awesome, maybe just agree to agree and whatever you do, do not hangout with negative sorts. I’ve tried this, if you’re a true cynic it doesn’t help, but all is not lost, there are solutions. Admittedly, they’re not perfect, I still struggle but they do help:

1.      Accept how things are

Workplace cynics see the hypocrisy and injustice in a company and generally want to make things better, or at least cannot stand to listen to all the BS.  However, all this fighting just wears you down. So, my first recommendation is just accept the world and your company as they are.

Accepting doesn’t mean buying in to all the hype or condoning what happens. It just means choosing not to get emotionally involved in everything. Just let it go … the bad stuff is just one side of human nature and you can’t fix it all. In fact if you can just fix one little corner of the world or your company that is probably pretty amazing.

2.      Find the beauty in your job

Every job has some beauty in it and it often hides in the seemingly mundane. For instance, if you write reports then find beauty in the turn of phrase, the layout and the structure. It sounds unlikely, I know, but if you can focus completely on the work at hand and ask yourself “what does it really mean to do a good job” then often you find it.

3.      Put you job in perspective

Think about what you care about. For me that’s my family, friends, me, the world and my life with all of them, and no matter what happens at work today, none of that really changes.  Instead of worrying about the work crap you don’t really care about, consider everything else. I know that’s easier said than done. So, here’s two ways to get there:

• Ask yourself what happens if I lose my job: For me, in the very worst case, I move back with my parents, spend more time with the people I love, develop a new skill set and grow some vegies… not the end of the world.
• Meditate: Seriously, this helps. When it works well all the workplace dramas become curious little jokes.

4.      Don’t argue , reserve judgement, be honest and subvert playfully

You’re a cynic, so you are always going to see things and feel a need to say something, but starting a never ending argument doesn’t achieve anything. Instead, you can try a bit of playful subversion. When a colleague is talking about the ‘amazing’ opportunity the company has just given them, ask them about it, test their perceptions but in a positive way and if you still think they’re actually getting done, just keep that to yourself…. If you really do need to say something, for instance if the manager just gave you an ‘amazing’ opportunity, that you don’t really want, then say so but say it in person and without any of the personal accusations.

5.      Exercise

Cannot emphasis this enough! It just feels good.