a theory about employment troubleshooting

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in talking with one of my bosses at my new job, I got to thinking about one of the possible reasons we may have more difficulties with employment than most folks might:

it goes back to our loyalty level vs NT loyalty level.

We invest ourselves emotionally & loyally into the work we do; we take pride in it to a very high degree.

We do that with friendships too....and we know what usually happens when we do that with friendships; they can't live up to our level.

I think we go in really trying to do everything by the book, and it winds up smacking us right in the face because even the higher ups don't live up to the very level they preach.

Of course then, we feel disappointed and discouraged. I'd go into more detail right now....but I have to get to bed soon to get up for work.

Lemme know what y'all think, and I'll try to elaborate on it more in a bit.

That's interesting - though I don't think it has applied to me in the jobs I have had. In my case I hated the jobs and thought that they were pointless. It's hard to take pride in things like sweeping hair off a hairdresser's floor. Despite this, I tried my very best with them and did everything I was told, but because I'm not personable and friendly people seem to use any excuse to get rid of me. There are some other reasons that I think employers don't like me:

I don't smile or talk much, especially if I'm around more than one person at a time. Consequently, any co -workers I might have immediately think of me as being 'weird' or 'snobby'.

I tend to keep drifting off into daydreams.

I get dizzy really easily and keep having to sit down, which I think is something to do with sensory overload (all my employers have been annoyed by this, and seem to view it as laziness or awkwardness).

I can't cope with music all day and keep asking for it to be switched off - again, for some reason this seems to make them angry, despite the fact that it would help me work.

I sometimes start crying for no apparent reason, even if working on a shop floor (I put this down to stress and PTSD).

Yes I think we could be more loyal because we need to try harder and we take our job more seriously because of that. yet we miss lots of things.

I can understand all those other probs too - not smiling, not knowing what to say, daydreams, sensory overload etc.

I've had some good accommodating employers but tend to quit when I think I'm being too much of a burden or it's getting too much, embarassing episodes of shutdown etc.

Exactly, we get too much involved and obsessed about anything.
For most people game are just games, collecting something is just not important and job is place where they earn money. For an aspie anything could be life, for NTs social life is a life.

For an Aspie job easily can be most important thing in life, but than you get dissapointed when you work your ass off, get them best ideas and someone else get promotion because of better social skills or if company fails to reach its goals just because other people didnt wanted to try harder.

Even worse you can end up being hated by co-workers for making standards higher. Person with low social skills is already an easy target for any type of intrigue and whispering campaign, ending up being hated makes sure they will set you up somehow.

In any organisation your best position is a position of something like consigliere, being the boss's right hand.
He is on position high enough not to feel threatened by your knowledge and capabilities and he also knows that he can trust you because of your low social skills, even if you want to take him out you cant.

Waylon Smithers?

I'm afraid my attitude is almost exactly the opposite, that of a modern day Condottieri. When I work (and I'm unemployed now, sigh) I tend not to make friends at work, but do my job...and then go home. And if a better offer comes along, move on without so much as a look backwards.



I can only do this if I find the topic interesting, or posing some kind of special challenge or perhaps by doing the task I learn something new. But repetitive tasks, or those that are only small variations on a theme? At best I'm emotionally neutral, at worst I'm likely to do a half-assed job. I certainly felt no pride in the latter case I describe.



I don't think I agree with the unstated premise here, which seems to be that all Aspies/HFAs require the same level of commitment from friendships. I hope I'm not putting words into your mouth, but that's how I'm reading the above. (And if I am, I apologize, but I'm just not sure how else to interpret "our level." or honestly what level it is you're referencing.)



I agree with you here, at least to a point, but one issue I have is realizing at what point I've reached the level of "good enough" ... now move on to something else. Time is a very precious commodity, particularly if you work in a profession that bills clients based upon time spent. (And I did... my firm billed me out at rates varying from $90 to $150/hour. Of which a fraction of a fraction found its way into my weekly check. But that's a whole 'nother topic, I suppose.)

Anyway, more often than I care to recall my workload backed up as I fiddled around getting that last 2% just right, so everything would be "by the book," as you say....But this behavior still pissed off the clients getting billed for my time and the clients whose work I hadn't started. And of course didn't exactly endear me to my supervisors.

I believe that is fairly accurate. I grew up in my father's RV factory where my loyalty and all of that were even expected, and then I spent the remainder of my life frustrated while not understanding the dynamics anywhere else. Fortunately, however, the last job I ever had was within a family-owned business -- I adopted those folks as my own "family" -- where loyalty and personal commitment were again truly appreciated.

I will attempt to elaborate more on this later, but in my case I aim to do the best job, no matter where I am; however, I don't expect any company to emotionally invest in me or have the loyalty to me that I have to them...it's why I own my own business.

Once that gets off the ground, I'm doing that--and nothing else--full time.

Exactly