4 ms·

Not too far off. Obviously nobody would smoke at work for the same reason they probably wouldn't drink, illegality aside. But, what people do outside of work is

Not too far off. Obviously nobody would smoke at work for the same reason they probably wouldn't drink, illegality aside. But, what people do outside of work is their own business. If my boss started seriously inquiring about my vices, first thing I'd do that night is update my resume. I've considered federal work before but every time I think hard about it, I keep coming back to the scene in Snow Crash where the fed works at a place where every little action - the time you arrive, the time you leave, whether you take the stairs or use electricity by taking the elevator - is scrutinized and judged. Yuck.

umanwizard 11y ago
Do you live in China (or Russia) and work for the Chinese (or Russian) government?
- rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
  >>I've considered federal work before >Do you live in China (or Russia) and work for the Chinese (or Russian) government? No.
Jtsummers 11y ago
> I've considered federal work before but every time I think hard about it, I keep coming back to the scene in Snow Crash where the fed works at a place where every little action - the time you arrive, the time you leave, whether you take the stairs or use electricity by taking the elevator - is scrutinized and judged. Yuck. Wasn't that the corporate guy that did that to his employees? Intruding into their homes, even? I can't speak for all federal jobs, but I doubt any involve anything like that level of busybody-ness unless a very high level of security clearance and access is involved.
- rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
  I was being hyperbolic, but the point remains: I don't want to work in a place where my behavior outside of work - as long as it has no effect on my performance and/or publicly embarrasses my employer - is a part of the evaluation regardless.
- filoeleven 11y ago
  > Wasn't that the corporate guy that did that to his employees? Intruding into their homes, even? Well, the Fed was the one that monitored everything at work and bugged its employees' home phones too. L. Bob Rife was the corporate guy who didn't think that that was good enough, and wanted to be able to partition work data in his employees' minds so that they didn't have access to it outside of work. I think Rife is mentioned in passing as doing the former kind of monitoring whereas the Feds' practices are described in excruciating (and entertaining) detail, so you can certainly be forgiven for conflating the two.
amyjess 11y ago
> I've considered federal work before but every time I think hard about it, I keep coming back to the scene in Snow Crash where the fed works at a place where every little action - the time you arrive, the time you leave, whether you take the stairs or use electricity by taking the elevator - is scrutinized and judged. Yuck. I work for a defense contractor, and while we do have some annoying DCAA-mandated timekeeping policies, it's really not half as bad as the Snow Crash FBI. We just have to write down time in, time out, and the amount of time worked on each contract each day (in tenths of an hour). The first two are only because the DCAA mandated it, and the third is for accounting purposes (IIRC, the company gets paid based on how many hours are billed to each contract). It's because of this, by the way, that overtime is virtually nonexistent here; we can't bill the government more hours than have already been agreed to, and it would be illegal to lie. Thus, if we end up staying late or working on a weekend to meet a deadline, we take time off later in the month so our billed hours for the month match up with how many the company is allowed to bill. Oh, and I'm an openly transgender person with a pink stripe in my hair, and I've never had any trouble with either. There's also no dress code, everyone knows that I'm a heavy drinker outside of work (and doesn't care as long as I don't drink at work or come to work drunk), and the environment is relaxed enough that we can talk about any subject during breaks.

umanwizard 11y ago

Do you live in China (or Russia) and work for the Chinese (or Russian) government?

rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
>>I've considered federal work before >Do you live in China (or Russia) and work for the Chinese (or Russian) government? No.

Jtsummers 11y ago

rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
I was being hyperbolic, but the point remains: I don't want to work in a place where my behavior outside of work - as long as it has no effect on my performance and/or publicly embarrasses my employer - is a part of the evaluation regardless.
filoeleven 11y ago
> Wasn't that the corporate guy that did that to his employees? Intruding into their homes, even? Well, the Fed was the one that monitored everything at work and bugged its employees' home phones too. L. Bob Rife was the corporate guy who didn't think that that was good enough, and wanted to be able to partition work data in his employees' minds so that they didn't have access to it outside of work. I think Rife is mentioned in passing as doing the former kind of monitoring whereas the Feds' practices are described in excruciating (and entertaining) detail, so you can certainly be forgiven for conflating the two.

amyjess 11y ago

> I've considered federal work before but every time I think hard about it, I keep coming back to the scene in Snow Crash where the fed works at a place where every little action - the time you arrive, the time you leave, whether you take the stairs or use electricity by taking the elevator - is scrutinized and judged. Yuck. I work for a defense contractor, and while we do have some annoying DCAA-mandated timekeeping policies, it's really not half as bad as the Snow Crash FBI. We just have to write down time in, time out, and the amount of time worked on each contract each day (in tenths of an hour). The first two are only because the DCAA mandated it, and the third is for accounting purposes (IIRC, the company gets paid based on how many hours are billed to each contract). It's because of this, by the way, that overtime is virtually nonexistent here; we can't bill the government more hours than have already been agreed to, and it would be illegal to lie. Thus, if we end up staying late or working on a weekend to meet a deadline, we take time off later in the month so our billed hours for the month match up with how many the company is allowed to bill. Oh, and I'm an openly transgender person with a pink stripe in my hair, and I've never had any trouble with either. There's also no dress code, everyone knows that I'm a heavy drinker outside of work (and doesn't care as long as I don't drink at work or come to work drunk), and the environment is relaxed enough that we can talk about any subject during breaks.