*face palms*

[kyburg]

There are days - did I call this one or not, yesterday?

Who works as a temp?

People who can't be employed due to past performance issues.

Scroll down to the bottom.

Yutz.

Comments

[actionjbone.livejournal.com]

If they don't like filling medications as prescribed by licensed medical practitioners, perhaps these people should change careers... voluntarily, or involuntarily.

[kyburg.livejournal.com]

I think that they would - and if it's after I've hit them with a cast iron skillet, all the better.

Grr, indeed. (Love that icon!)

[joiseyguy.livejournal.com]

So a pharmacist who's a member of the Christian Science denomination could prove to be really fatal? Or just most useless as a pharmacist.

[caitlin.livejournal.com]

ermmm...

Who works as a temp? I do... (stupid post office. Want last week's cheque already!)

*sigh*

C.

[pseudicide.livejournal.com]

It seems odd that they would be able to not prescribe medication due to moral grounds. I mean, really... To me that seems to defy some basic right of the person trying to get the prescription.

I work as a temp. In sydney cause of work visa limitations and back home cause i'll only be here for the summer... Still, it's alright.

[pseudicide.livejournal.com]

oh, and on another thought, do you still have the journally thing or has that made it's way to the next person?

[kyburg.livejournal.com]

It is still safe in my clutches, and this weekend for sure - it will leave them.

I type so much faster. No, really. Handwriting is just not my forte. And I really want to do a good job - so, I keep talking myself out of doing any kind of job. *bows* I suck. Forgive me.

[pseudicide.livejournal.com]

Well, you don't suck, you post informative and interesting articles... Like the stem cell research/abortion one you just posted. And piccies of guinea pigs. Oh goodness, Ican't remember what they call guinea pigs in oz, but it's funny.

That's alright, just let me know when it heads off! I'm the same way a lot of the time...

Who works as a temp?

[riverheart.livejournal.com]

Half the people in the computer industryaround here work as temps (though they are termed "contractors", it's the same thing), and not due to performance issues. It's because that's what the industry is moving toward, that and outsourcing. Not having to pay benefits is something the companies hiring the contractors see as a plus. Contractors are disposable, and that's what they want.

People who are excellent, skilled engineers work as temps because they have to, if they want to earn a living.

Re: Who works as a temp?

[kyburg.livejournal.com]

Or you move or change professions. It's that old law of supply and demand.

It really, REALLY sucks to have an engineering degree, hear the President bemoan the lack of them - and have to flip burgers or do data entry for a living because there. ARE. NO. JOBS.

But I stand by my assertion - in many, if no most professions - particularly those "titled professions" that require a significant licensure - if you're working as a temp, "professionally" - it's a synonym for something more sinister. Like "incompetent" and "conduct not concurrent with professional behavior."

Like this winner.

[moropus.livejournal.com]

You had him nailed alright. Fired, arrested for disorderly conduct, trespassing and obstructing the legal process.

I would so love to know why he was fired, but Snyders probably isn't allowed to tell.

[christophine.livejournal.com]

I've given myself a cooling off period before replying. When I first read your posts talking about this, I was too angry to reply without much yelling, kicking, and general bad conduct. Not about the pharmacist, though that does make me angry, and you know why as we've discussed that before. It was the assertions about temping. I'll agree that there are many - maybe even most, I don't have statistics at hand to say positively one way or another - temps that have performance issues and that's why they temp. My problem was that what you said was painted with too broad a brush, as if anyone who does temping is not up to snuff. This stung, since I spent many years working as a temp, by choice for many of them, and I know that I am not incompetent. I'm sure you can see how such a statement from someone I've come to respect, for all we've never met in person, might sting.

My second job, and every job after that for fifteen or so years, was a temp job. When I started temping, I wasn't sure where I wanted to wind up or what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. Temping let me try out a variety of different positions. I also dearly love to learn in a hands-on atmosphere rather than through studying a book and attending lectures, so I requested and got assignments where I could learn new skills. I was often requested to extend or come back to various assignments, and was so efficient I often completed the projects I'd been hired for before my contract period was up, and moved on to do other things to benefit the companies I temped at. "Oh, I finished preparing this year's worth of filings and copies three days early in preparation for review and taxes. Well, let me go into your file rooms, because I noticed many things misfiled and I can get that straightened out." That sort of thing. I've been a file clerk, receptionist, data entry clerk, tech support, office manager, executive assistant to the CEO of a startup, and technical writer on contract, among others. Even the one assigment I had which ended in a contract dispute that made both sides less than happy still gives me glowing references, because my work benefitted the company so much. They've freely told prospective employers who call that I did great things for the company.

When I got older and started wanting something permanent, the shift had begun toward a preference to hire contracters rather than employees. Companies liked the disposability of temps, and nearly all my skillset was in technical fields where this trend was strongest, at least in the area I lived. So, I wound up on longer-term contracts - a year here, six months there. And I still always gave of my best.

I finally got out of the tech field and started doing escrow processing, and was hired as a full employee. I discovered, at least at this company, that they treated their employees with such disrespect that I'd had better jobs as a temp. We had a quota, and the manager who came in after I'd been hired decided that she didn't like me, among a few others, and began falsifying my numbers so I was constantly being told I didn't work hard enough and I was going to get fired. Then my mysterious appearing-disappearing body odor thing started. No one I spent time around or lived with noticed anything of the sort, but this manager started telling me that I smelled and that if I didn't do something about it, I'd be fired. And, finally, I was. On my way out, I talked with several of my friends from my shift and the ones I overlapped, and they were all horrified at the assertion the manager was making, that every single person in all shifts who had contact with me had been complaining about this. Not one of them had said or noticed any such thing. (continued)

[christophine.livejournal.com]

So, all in all, my years of temping were in many ways preferable to my experience as a full employee. If it weren't for the lack or poor benefits as a temp, I'd go back to that. It's nothing to do with the quality of my work, incompetence, or other performance issues. And I'm sure I'm not the only temp who is quite good at whatever job they're contracted for.

So, when I see someone whose opinion I've come to value and respect say, "Who temps, anyway? Only people with performance issues" then it makes me angry. I don't like being painted by the same brush as the incompetent pharmacist, yet such a broad statement gives someone like me the same set of colors as someone like that. It's like someone announcing that all Mexicans are lazy, or some other form of prejudice. Obviously, not nearly so bad as this racist example, but still a similar thing, in that it applies to any entire class or subclass of people the negative traits that may exist in some segment of that class or subclass.

I've tried to explain my position without an excess of anger or ranting. I don't always succeed once my dander is up, as it is now. So, if something comes across as excessively aggressive or angry, please forgive me. It was not my intent. My intent was merely to explain why some, like me, may feel that they've been unfairly classed as incompetent because they were contractors, just like the genuine incompetent who provoked the statement in the first place. I know this is excessively long, but I felt a little background was necessary to getting my point across. Nor does this change my general opinion that you are someone to be liked, respected, and who is generally interesting. Even the best of friends, after all, disagree sometimes. Maybe there was even no real point in this whole long semi-rant of mine, but at the very least I wanted to explain, because I do respect you, why this kind broad statement stung. This is the one time I'll say anything about it, if you continue to feel this way and say so, because it's your journal and your right to say in it what you see fit to say. I just needed to put in my (overly inflated) two cents.

[kyburg.livejournal.com]

You know what REALLY sucks the hardest about this?

Wait for it.

I was that broad, it was that superficial...and DAMN if I wasn't right. In this case, that incredibly mediocre, from-the-hipshot snark was a bullseye. And I wasn't even trying hard.

Rant on, sistah. You're right, too.

(Damn. There are times I shouldn't be right.)