Do you despise the bureaucracy of the workplace?

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I have been working since age 16 (20 now) and for as long as I can remember I have had a absolute intolerance towards the hierarchal and bureaucratic nature of the workplace. Managers breathing down the back of your neck while you are working, having you conform to ridiculous procedures that seem pointless, inefficient and nearly impossible to successfully perform and get off work at the scheduled time. It never made sense to me that some guy or a group of people in a far away location can hand down decisions that even my managers disagree with but have to force onto the work force. I hate the fact that we are encouraged to and are rewarded when we rat out our fellow coworkers for the most petty and insignificant trespasses.

Anyone else have a similar experience? I have been with three employers the last 4 years and while my coworkers, environment and management have changed, my experience has been identical.

I totally agree. I don't get it. I don't want to get ahead in this sort of world. I don't understand what I call corporateness. It seems very unnatural and disagrees with me immensely. I wish I had know this before I started working in an office. I would have trained in something different.

You have no idea.

Take your four years of work, multiply it by 9. That's how long I've been exposed to the NT world of 'work'. The problem is that work and business are constructs benefiting an NT mindset. Many of the rules that govern social behavior are in play in business and work. It is a fortunate by-product that the technological nature of our present culture have made it possible for some on the spectrum to actually thrive. But it is the exception, not the rule. I work in the technical arena, but it is DOMINATED by people that understand the human side of the equation. I have to be brilliant to make up for my interpersonal deficiencies. Sadly, I am not brilliant in my current position. It is so boring that it takes supreme effort to complete my assigned duties.

I'm not surprised you'd lose respect for salesman, but I am surprised you had any to begin with!

As for following the orders of far-off executives, they can't force you to do anything, but you can't force them to pay you. I would love to be able to get paid to do things my way, but I'm afraid that's not how trade works.

Absolutely!

I first got my job when the owner was a very eccentric, results orientated boss. He was all about results. We were told to do something and he'd expect it to be done. He'd go off on vacation for two weeks giving you no support or direction. He didn't give a crap how you got the work done, but if he came back two weeks later and it wasn't done you were fired.

I thrived under these conditions. I was free to work in my own ways at my own schedule. Other people in the company hated me and the owner because we didn't do things the way they though things ought to be done. A lot of people struggled, and I think even many aspies could have struggled to because there were no specific directions given. There were no job descriptions, anyone who said "that's not my job" was fired on the spot.

Then the company grew large. We set up multiple new large facilities in many states, and the bureaucracy set in. Then the owner died and the company was sold to a private investment group.

Now business is strictly business. Results are no longer a priority. How something is done is more important than the results. The facility I work for is looked down upon because we make too much profit, don't do things the proper way, and make the other facilities look bad.

I struggled for a long while as I learned the rules for how a "proper business" is run, when run by NT's There should be a sticky in the work fourm called "How to work for NT management." Some of the rules I have learned are as follows.
- Appearances are everything. Looking the part is more important than knowing the part.
- Optional company social events are always mandatory to attend. Failure to attend will have you branded as "not a team player."
- Meetings where mangers are present are always more important any actual work you have to do, no exceptions whatsoever.
- Appearing to be smart is more important than being smart.
- Using the right words is more important than understanding what those words mean.
- "Critical thinkers," aka people who point out when something is wrong, are looked down upon.
- Ass kissing will usually get you farther than any work you do.
- The boss must see you working. Results are irrelevant. The quiet guy in the back corner who gets the most work done will get the smallest raises and never be promoted.
- Those who lie, cheat, and steal will be promoted faster than those who don't, until they get caught.
- Most companies have a small group of people you could refer to as "untouchables." If an untouchable shows up to work drunk, crashes into a tree, commits sexual assault on another employee, and steals company property, say nothing! Anything said about an untouchable will get you fired.
- If management doesn't personally like you, anything anyone says about you will be held against you whether it's true or not.
- If something is "your choice," it is not. It means you must figure out what your boss wants and come to the same choice he's already thinking in his head. If you make a choice other than what he already knows he want's you to choose, your choice was wrong.
- Appearing to work hard for long hours is much more important than getting things done. Take for example:
- - - -Employee A: Is late to work, gets his work done in 2 hrs, and gets it done right the first time. Then slacks off in the lunchroom for a while and leaves work early.
- - - -Employee B: Starts work early., works 16 hours straight to do the same work, In the end it isn't done quite right.
- -In this example, Employee A will be labeled as lazy and a slacker, he will be a "problem employee." Employee B is a dedicated hard worker who's willing to go the extra mile and give it all for the company. Employee B will get raises and promotions. The fact that employee A cost the company less creating more profit, gets his work done faster and gets it done right the first time is irrelevant to NT management.

These may be slight exaggerations in some cases and you usually do have to get some work done in balance with the above. Also there are certain departments in business where these don't always apply such as engineering or computer programming. That is why these are places aspies thrive. But even in these departments when dealing with upper management or if you wish to move up within company they can become true again.

From a young age I knew that being an employee just wasn't going to work for me. The politics, the BS, the morons, the policies. ect., would actually be the death of me.

Self employment has been my salvation and I would encourage anyone who thinks that they have what it takes to start their own business to go for it.

Absolutely. The NT world makes no sense. Yet they call any deviation from their lunacy a "disorder".

What annoys me is the way that some senior members of staff abuse their authority.Some managers and supervisors,instead of having a quiet word with someone about a possible error,will shout across an office so that everyone within earshot gets to hear them voicing their authority.In an ideal workplace that follows proper Quality Assurance procedures,members of staff should be given the chance to appraise their managers' performance as well as vice-versa but in practice most of them wouldn't accept that.They'd simply find a way of making life even more difficult for anyone who didn't simply do what they said,regardless of the company procedures.

Then there are the ones who won't accept any argument for not meeting a deadline,with their 'You'll just need to make time' mantra.
It's like asking you to run a mile in 1 minute.You argue that it's not physically possible in that time and they reply "Well,you'll just need to make time!"

Bureaucracies are what happen when aspies aren't looking
Seriously tho I can't think of why I would want to be in one in the first place. My experience with them has been because I wasn't aware a bureaucracy existed prior to getting employed there. People tried to patiently explain to me the structure heirarchy thing ie 'this is a very conservative workplace'. I'm like, 'well great; and I have green eyes. What's your point?'. I now know that that means "we eat our young".
After a while they just started getting abusive, little sly smiles to each other, patronising comments which I dismissed as unprofessional. And then HR starts telling me I'm arrogant because I don't fit in, which came as a shock and I didn't really know how to respond. The more bullied I got the more it was seen as an indication that I was elitist and a problem. When it dawned on me that I was being punished for being bullied I got out.
So now I work as a private design contractor, learning Architectural drafting as I go. And it's good. I work from home, I get paid, no politics, no friendships/backstabbing/innuendo. Yay me.
Try it, you won't look back
G