Social networking (jerkin' off) in the workplace

"Here's my assessment of not just the vote in Massachusetts, but the mood around the country: The same thing that swept Scott Brown into office swept me into office. People are angry, and they're frustrated. Not just because of what's happened in the last year or two years, but what's happened over the last eight years."--Barack Oblahblah

Yeah, Bush did it. There’s his entire repertoire in one 3-word sentence. Bush did it.

The man is becoming delusional.

Was anyone as surprised (to put it mildly) as I was to read this one?

From the Citizens' Voice:

Urban readies run for lieutenant governor
　
Luzerne County Commissioner Stephen A. Urban confirmed Friday he is preparing to run for lieutenant governor in the Republican primary election on May 18.

"I'm planning on it," Urban said, adding an official announcement could come "maybe next week."

Urban expects about 15 candidates will seek the GOP nomination for lieutenant governor. The first day to circulate nomination petitions is Feb. 16, and nominating petitions must be filed by March 9 to secure a spot on the primary election ballot.

If you follow this link to his under-construction Web site and read his bio, you’d have to conclude that he’s got quite the impressive resume. Even if you’re one of his detractors, you’d have to concede that he’s got quite the impressive resume.

It’s just that the timing of this move is awfully peculiar. At least, for me it is.

Luzerne County is embroiled in a corruption scandal that will surely result in a screenplay one day. And Luzerne County, for all intents and purposes, is bankrupt.

And as a county commissioner seeking to be the next lieutenant governor of the state, those are selling points?

It must be me.

What, are you guys--Gort--Lu Lac--blogswarming me?

Cool.

Jeez, we should be disagreeing about important stuff like who really killed JFK and why. Or how about how JFK’s ill-advised executive order allowing the creation of public sector unions has been draining the economic life out of our communities ever since. Good, hard-hitting stuff like that.

Basically, we’ve got two grown men defending the ‘rights’ of other grown men to goof off at work. That’s it in a nutshell, correct? You guys are telling me that surfing the Web while drawing pay and benefits is an acceptable practice?

And “social networking?” Um, last I checked, a social event was something that was done after work, not during the work day. As in, face-to-face.

And “social networking’ by adults? That’d be hilarious if it weren’t for the fact that the Internet is dominated by the nameless and faceless that all too often pretend to be somebody, or something they are not. Adults really need to be social networking while on the clock?

I just sat through my annual performance review with my supervisor. It’s an expansive undertaking that leaves no aspect of my job uncovered. As always, I was rated far, far above average. And the thing I’m most proud of is that I consistently deliver to my company a dollar figure per hour worked that is far, far above what any of my coworkers have achieved. This year it wasn’t even close. It was a rout.

And how does one become the productivity champ? Well, there’s not enough time and space to cover all of that here today, but I can tell you that you don’t set productivity records (as I did this year) by sitting in front of a computer and playing with all of your pretend friends.

Personally, I have absolutely nothing against Len Piazza. As a matter of fact, I think he’s done an outstanding job of modernizing his department. And I also think he’s made some very wise rulings when questions or discrepancies have arisen regarding certain aspects of the voting task at hand.

With that said, I wholeheartedly reject the asinine notion that’s it’s somehow acceptable to be playing on the Internet on company time. If it were my employee, I’d sit them down and ask them point blank what they want and need more, social networking, or a job.

And I also take issue with this misguided notion that since somebody addresses the demands of the job after hours, they should be allowed leeway, some slack while officially on the job.
A management position of any importance often requires after hours phone calls and what have you. Trust me, I know. And nowhere is it written in anyone’s job description that they can goof off today because they were bothered after hours last night. And for anyone to suggest otherwise should eliminate said person from consideration for any management positions that may come open.

In addition, the private sector produced things that are measurable. And the public sector pushes piles of paper around while trying to figure out how to further hamstring and overtax the private sector. And it seems as if you guys are suggesting that it would be okay for the private sector to mimic certain destructive and unproductive aspects of the public sector. And if that’s the case, if I’m reading this right, you guys couldn’t be more off base if you tried.

And rather than belabor this thing any further, I say let’s post our resumes and see who’s got the business acumen and management experience necessary to be determining who should be allowed to screw off and when.

I’ve hired, fired, trained and promoted more people than I care to remember. And I really don’t remember excusing people when they purposely chose to be unproductive. That probably played a huge part of why I always showed a handsome profit.

Now tell me, how’s the bottom line of the county government looking these days? In my estimation, there’s too much social networking and the like going on when the situation clearly calls for brainstorming.

But who am I to chastise people who see the government as the end-all, be-all?

Later