5 ms·

This seems harder in our modern world where everything is contracted out to the lowest bidder. I've had great conversations with custodial staff at schools, pa

This seems harder in our modern world where everything is contracted out to the lowest bidder. I've had great conversations with custodial staff at schools, parks, and other areas that actually hire the workers. At my day job, a giant corporation which hires its engineers but outsources its janitors, chefs, and so on, there's a totally different vibe. Even the few janitors that speak English are both rushed to complete their tasks in the insufficient allotted time and almost terrified to talk to the normal employees, presumably due to the perceived power balance - were an employee to complain about them, the vendor would almost certainly fire them rather than risk offending the client. It's not fair, but it is reality, and it means that even when I do say hello or hold a door or whatever I don't get a response.

theteapot 4y ago
> ... it means that even when I do say hello or hold a door or whatever I don't get a response. I'm sure they find it condescending. This whole post is kind of condescending TBH.
- turboponyy 4y ago
  Yeah, you shouldn't need an article to tell you to say hello to people working in the same building as you - especially if they're service workers.
  - idorube 4y ago
    Absolutely agree, this is a condescending humble brag that never should have been posted in the first place.
- rocqua 4y ago
  Are you arguing it is condescending to say hi to custodial staff?
  - theteapot 4y ago
    I'm arguing treating "custodial staff" as some distinct group that deserves special treatment, in deep need of your smiles and door holding is condescending. The tone of the original article and this reply came across like the authors think they're somehow above the "custodial staff". Like they are lords talking about the peasantry.
    - Arainach 4y ago
      I chat with/hold doors for everyone I encounter. I said custodial staff here because that was the thesis of the original article. No one's "in need of it" in any sense other than most people benefit from social interaction and being acknowledged.
  - vertis 4y ago
    The way I read it they're arguing both that it's condescending to think that they need to be told to say hi to custodial staff, and that the custodial staff might find it condescending for someone to hold a door. One of the interesting things I've found while travelling is the different forms of interaction with customer service, hospitality, custodial staff. US tends to have a 'customer is always right' sickly sweet interactions. China has custodial staff that almost live at the office (the feel of Mum doing the dishes and washing, and that you're almost in their house). France/Paris you always say hello (bon jour) when you enter the store or it's rude. I've never had such "rude" blunt interactions as I did in Sofia, and thought it was me/tourist/english, but no, I witnessed equally gruff dismissive interactions for locals.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
thro388 4y ago
Perceived power imbalance? Many workers are in country on semi legal basis, ex prison... any false accusation could literally destroy their life.
- jrootabega 4y ago
  I'm betting that if I, and most of my colleagues, ever complained about custodial staff, it would be totally ignored. My charitable interpretation of that phrase is that "real" janitors probably don't realize that many of us are "just" janitors of computing, even if we get free vitamin water.
lambdasquirrel 4y ago
One of the janitors in my high school once gave us a lecture on linear algebra. I don't know what he did before he left the former Warsaw Pact country he was from, but it was one of those whoa kind of experiences.
- inglor_cz 4y ago
  In the 1990s, when the former USSR had gone to shit, you could meet a lot of menial workers from the ex-Soviet republics who had academic degrees and could hold a conversation to prove it. I studied mathematics in Prague in 1996-2003. More than once I met a janitor or a taxi driver who, albeit with a heavy Russian or Ukrainian accent, knew what a uniformly continuous function was and what does the Chinese Remainder Theorem say.
  - actionfromafar 4y ago
    I hope those days don't come back. This migration wave hopefully can get jobs more according to their area of expertise.
    - nisegami 4y ago
      The scale has changed, but those days have never really ended. I'm from a Caribbean country that people are usually quite eager to leave. I've seen numerous cases of people with post-secondary education and jobs to go with it leave for the US or UK and end up doing "unskilled" labor because their qualifications don't carry across.
      - spaghettiToy 4y ago
        >because their qualifications don't carry across. New (US) grads have significantly less qualifications than anyone wants to admit. It's getting 2 years of experience that makes the difference. When looking to hire people from South America, there was lots of manufacturing experience, but we needed Design experience. When we hired CAD guys, they followed directions fine, but possibly too literally or would stop too prematurely. When getting local, non engineers to do CAD, they would read our mind more. Not that this is a show stopper. If we met 3 times a day for a quick meeting with our SA CAD guys, we achieved just as much. It just required more meetings/phone calls.

theteapot 4y ago

> ... it means that even when I do say hello or hold a door or whatever I don't get a response. I'm sure they find it condescending. This whole post is kind of condescending TBH.

turboponyy 4y ago
Yeah, you shouldn't need an article to tell you to say hello to people working in the same building as you - especially if they're service workers.
- idorube 4y ago
  Absolutely agree, this is a condescending humble brag that never should have been posted in the first place.
rocqua 4y ago
Are you arguing it is condescending to say hi to custodial staff?
- theteapot 4y ago
  I'm arguing treating "custodial staff" as some distinct group that deserves special treatment, in deep need of your smiles and door holding is condescending. The tone of the original article and this reply came across like the authors think they're somehow above the "custodial staff". Like they are lords talking about the peasantry.
  - Arainach 4y ago
    I chat with/hold doors for everyone I encounter. I said custodial staff here because that was the thesis of the original article. No one's "in need of it" in any sense other than most people benefit from social interaction and being acknowledged.
- vertis 4y ago
  The way I read it they're arguing both that it's condescending to think that they need to be told to say hi to custodial staff, and that the custodial staff might find it condescending for someone to hold a door. One of the interesting things I've found while travelling is the different forms of interaction with customer service, hospitality, custodial staff. US tends to have a 'customer is always right' sickly sweet interactions. China has custodial staff that almost live at the office (the feel of Mum doing the dishes and washing, and that you're almost in their house). France/Paris you always say hello (bon jour) when you enter the store or it's rude. I've never had such "rude" blunt interactions as I did in Sofia, and thought it was me/tourist/english, but no, I witnessed equally gruff dismissive interactions for locals.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]

thro388 4y ago

Perceived power imbalance? Many workers are in country on semi legal basis, ex prison... any false accusation could literally destroy their life.

jrootabega 4y ago
I'm betting that if I, and most of my colleagues, ever complained about custodial staff, it would be totally ignored. My charitable interpretation of that phrase is that "real" janitors probably don't realize that many of us are "just" janitors of computing, even if we get free vitamin water.

lambdasquirrel 4y ago

One of the janitors in my high school once gave us a lecture on linear algebra. I don't know what he did before he left the former Warsaw Pact country he was from, but it was one of those whoa kind of experiences.

inglor_cz 4y ago
In the 1990s, when the former USSR had gone to shit, you could meet a lot of menial workers from the ex-Soviet republics who had academic degrees and could hold a conversation to prove it. I studied mathematics in Prague in 1996-2003. More than once I met a janitor or a taxi driver who, albeit with a heavy Russian or Ukrainian accent, knew what a uniformly continuous function was and what does the Chinese Remainder Theorem say.
- actionfromafar 4y ago
  I hope those days don't come back. This migration wave hopefully can get jobs more according to their area of expertise.
  - nisegami 4y ago
    The scale has changed, but those days have never really ended. I'm from a Caribbean country that people are usually quite eager to leave. I've seen numerous cases of people with post-secondary education and jobs to go with it leave for the US or UK and end up doing "unskilled" labor because their qualifications don't carry across.
    - spaghettiToy 4y ago
      >because their qualifications don't carry across. New (US) grads have significantly less qualifications than anyone wants to admit. It's getting 2 years of experience that makes the difference. When looking to hire people from South America, there was lots of manufacturing experience, but we needed Design experience. When we hired CAD guys, they followed directions fine, but possibly too literally or would stop too prematurely. When getting local, non engineers to do CAD, they would read our mind more. Not that this is a show stopper. If we met 3 times a day for a quick meeting with our SA CAD guys, we achieved just as much. It just required more meetings/phone calls.