Wednesday, October 26, 2005
To Be Young, Single & Stupid
Last week some people from our company attended a Trade Show in New York City. I was unable to attend, and my boss was pretty upset by this. He sent me an angry/hurt email and I had to reply in a very diplomatic manner and explain things to him. Poor guy has little in the way of perspective to really understand why I would decline the "privilege" of travelling to New York on business.
There are various reasons I did not go. I will not cite them all here, but I have picked one very poignant example of company treatment to illustrate my aversion. At present in New York City it is 50 degrees and cloudy. From what I understand of the Weather Channel there is a Nor' Easter blowing through and the conditions are not fun. One of my colleagues has been in New York since Thursday last week with no umbrella and they put him up in a hostel. That's right, a friggin' hostel. Granted, they gave him a suite during the weekend but now he's sharing accommodations with backpackers from all over the globe. Not my idea of a business trip, but to each his own. This poor guy had to drive a van from Vegas to New York loaded with equipment for the show and now he is waiting to drive to Chicago for another Trade Show. Talking to the IT guy about the situation he commented "Oh to be young, single and stupid."
I second that sentiment. I suppose, to be fair, that the guy isn't in all that bad a straight. He is salaried so he's kind of on a little vacation out there for the time being. But being forced to drive a van across the country? I don't know if 12 hour days on the highway would be worth the salary he receives (I'm speculating here because i don't know what he makes, exactly). There are little lines we draw every day with people. In a business environment where capitalism is the name of the game those lines are being erased or impinged upon daily as the volume of business and the pressures of the market make the workload swell and drain. Things have to be done and who will be available to take up the slack?
In theory this is where the real "guts" of capitalism kicks in and the "everyone has a price" cliche pops up. What's your time worth to you? The IT guy was right; my colleague is 24, single, and has a situation where he doesn't have to pay rent to anyone. The guy has little in the way of responsibility beyond a car payment. I don't think he's stupid, I think he can just afford (that is to say he's willing to pay via time) to do some things which I consider a little too inconvenient in terms of cost to my life for work. The ol' private life versus work balancing act.
¶ 2:24 PM
There are various reasons I did not go. I will not cite them all here, but I have picked one very poignant example of company treatment to illustrate my aversion. At present in New York City it is 50 degrees and cloudy. From what I understand of the Weather Channel there is a Nor' Easter blowing through and the conditions are not fun. One of my colleagues has been in New York since Thursday last week with no umbrella and they put him up in a hostel. That's right, a friggin' hostel. Granted, they gave him a suite during the weekend but now he's sharing accommodations with backpackers from all over the globe. Not my idea of a business trip, but to each his own. This poor guy had to drive a van from Vegas to New York loaded with equipment for the show and now he is waiting to drive to Chicago for another Trade Show. Talking to the IT guy about the situation he commented "Oh to be young, single and stupid."
I second that sentiment. I suppose, to be fair, that the guy isn't in all that bad a straight. He is salaried so he's kind of on a little vacation out there for the time being. But being forced to drive a van across the country? I don't know if 12 hour days on the highway would be worth the salary he receives (I'm speculating here because i don't know what he makes, exactly). There are little lines we draw every day with people. In a business environment where capitalism is the name of the game those lines are being erased or impinged upon daily as the volume of business and the pressures of the market make the workload swell and drain. Things have to be done and who will be available to take up the slack?
In theory this is where the real "guts" of capitalism kicks in and the "everyone has a price" cliche pops up. What's your time worth to you? The IT guy was right; my colleague is 24, single, and has a situation where he doesn't have to pay rent to anyone. The guy has little in the way of responsibility beyond a car payment. I don't think he's stupid, I think he can just afford (that is to say he's willing to pay via time) to do some things which I consider a little too inconvenient in terms of cost to my life for work. The ol' private life versus work balancing act.
¶ 2:24 PM
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The weather in New York has sucked for the past four weeks. I invested in a very expensive umbrella which was broken within minutes due to the wind.
# posted by 
: 2:58 PM
: 2:58 PM
Ya, that does not sound like an "Business Trip" to New York for a trade show. Living in an hostel, that sucks , I don't know how big your company is, but it sounds really shaky for someone to drive all the way out there and stay in an hostel. The company head cannot even give him an motel. I don't think it's worth the neither the time nor energy to invest in those kind of "Business Trip". As sad as it sounds, there are still couples of medium size company offer great benefit to their very buttom employee. I recently encounter one myself. The name of the company is Martin Group. Not too long ago, I had an interview with them, the job that I am interview for require extensive amount of travel around the country, and with up to 50% of travel. You will think with that amount of travel that they will try to save some money, but they gave you extensive amount of coverage on every thing. They will give you $40 a day for your breakfast lunch and dinner, and you get to pick your hotel, (as long as it's reasonable, like Holiday Inn *sort of standard for Business Travel in my standard anyway, they will fly you to your location and they will also pay for your rental, any expenses that comes with Business Travel will include their coverage. Even with the parking fee in the airport. However, I think this trend is going to go away soon if wall street does not consider it is beneficial to treat its employee well.
Sleeplessboy
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Sleeplessboy
# posted by : 8:06 PM
: 8:06 PM<< Home
