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After leaving the Army in 1997. I noticed that I do circles around those who have never served. Also my coworker feels intimidated because of my worldly knowledge and skills to learn very quickly. He has been working their only 3 years before I started. He seems to have Napoleon syndrome also. I just bite my tongue because he never wants to work as a team like I do.
Posted >1 y ago
Responses: 12
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Sounds like he is fearful of someone who outshines him. He better step up his game. ;-)
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Bear in mind "motivation" as a factor. Few people work in jobs they truly love or feel passionate about; they pick jobs because they need the money and they find a job that is close by, they can do well enough, and that doesn't force them to compromise their values too much. They work to do something that is frequently unfulfilling so that the person who runs the company can pursue *his* (or her) dreams, with yours not really factoring into the equation. In a lot of states, employment can be pulled away at a whim from the boss, too, so by the time all is said and done most people are just doing "whatever" to "get by".
I know this paints a bleak picture of the modern workplace, and I also know it doesn't apply everywhere. Some people are lucky enough to work in career fields they actually find engaging and interesting, but while those people are doing something cool, there's still the ones that are just checking a box. No kid grew up thinking, "Man, I can't wait to become an insurance claims adjuster!" or something like that.
Another possibility is is someone has a "coaster" job, where you find the work so easy you're done in a couple hours and can relax the rest of the day. If the job is dull or tedious, and the boss is satisfied, there's no reason to go out and take on even *more* "dull and tedious" for no reward.
Very little of what we do in the modern workforce is truly necessary for human survival, or contributes meaningfully to greater human endeavor. For every rocket scientist or AI programmer or brain surgeon there are countless people serving them lattes, vacuuming their floors, driving the buses, etc. You can gripe about them being "lazy" if you want but the truth is for many people there really is nowhere to go, no ladder to climb, so it isn't logical or realistic to expect people to bust their humps just to become senior Whopper-Flopper for that extra .50 an hour. Or, the next step up comes with so many headaches (managing other malcontents, perhaps) that they write it off as not worth it. When they balance the scales of their lives, that's the sober and rational choice they come up with.
If they're motivated, they'll do it. They'll find a better job or find a way to climb where they're at... but a lot of people just make peace with where they are and get comfortable, and find their rewards elsewhere.
I know this paints a bleak picture of the modern workplace, and I also know it doesn't apply everywhere. Some people are lucky enough to work in career fields they actually find engaging and interesting, but while those people are doing something cool, there's still the ones that are just checking a box. No kid grew up thinking, "Man, I can't wait to become an insurance claims adjuster!" or something like that.
Another possibility is is someone has a "coaster" job, where you find the work so easy you're done in a couple hours and can relax the rest of the day. If the job is dull or tedious, and the boss is satisfied, there's no reason to go out and take on even *more* "dull and tedious" for no reward.
Very little of what we do in the modern workforce is truly necessary for human survival, or contributes meaningfully to greater human endeavor. For every rocket scientist or AI programmer or brain surgeon there are countless people serving them lattes, vacuuming their floors, driving the buses, etc. You can gripe about them being "lazy" if you want but the truth is for many people there really is nowhere to go, no ladder to climb, so it isn't logical or realistic to expect people to bust their humps just to become senior Whopper-Flopper for that extra .50 an hour. Or, the next step up comes with so many headaches (managing other malcontents, perhaps) that they write it off as not worth it. When they balance the scales of their lives, that's the sober and rational choice they come up with.
If they're motivated, they'll do it. They'll find a better job or find a way to climb where they're at... but a lot of people just make peace with where they are and get comfortable, and find their rewards elsewhere.
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Capt Seid Waddell
Evidently the military selects for motivated people, so we get disappointed when we find that much of the rest of the world isn't like us. But there still are dedicated people in the civilian world if you look for them - I have been fortunate enough to work with/for some of them.
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Cpl (Join to see)
I disagree with that generalization. I will caveat what you said with "some." One of my co-workers, a first generation citizen who's father retired from the Navy as a Corpsman and who is younger than my son, has one of the best work ethics I've seen for someone her age. Before she was 21, she graduated from UT Austin an overwhelmingly liberal school with a very conservative political view. She works circles around a lot of her peers who lean to the left, politically.
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