You just listed out the reasons I stopped at MSc! I’m all of those but only like half as much.

Obvious troll is obvious.

This is further proof that, for every statement made, no matter how whimsical, there exists at least one person online who will tell you that you’re wrong.

-The Earth revolves around the sun.
-Ackchyualllllly, they all revolve around the galactic center…

-Godzilla floats by increasing his volume.
-Ackchyually, his volume doesn’t increase because lungs are on the outside… (Wtf?!)

-Cotton candy is my favorite fair food.
-Ackkkkkkchyualllllllllly, my review of the last three years of your comment history proves your favorite fair food is not, in fact, cotton candy. I have gathered and will prove this with ten points. Point one: your childhood experience with Geoffrey the Giraffe suggests…

Same! I was wondering why it made me so uncomfortable and I think I figured it out. It reminded me of the kind of things my friends and I would do to play when we were little kids, but it was done - ostensibly - by adults for adults and with high production value.

While it’s all fine and good to just say “hire the right people”, that’s a gross oversimplification. Those people became “right” through time and dedication, which led to experience. Not every employee will be a “right person” and none of them started out as one. Also consider that not every manager is a “right person”, so making SMART goals protects you from their managerial inadequacy.

SMART lays out how to both set and receive tasks, goals, assignments, etc., that are clearly defined. A goal lacking in one or more of these elements is what is commonly referred to as a “shitty goal”. Why? I’ll lay it out using the acronym from the perspective of an employee, plus an example for each of what can happen when that information is missing.

Specific: what does my boss actually want from me?
Converse - I completed the wrong task.

Measurable: how do I prove I did the task and how well it was done?
Converse - I did great work but can’t prove to the client how great it is.

Achievable: can the task actually be done with the time, knowledge, and resources available?
Converse - I agreed to complete a task which turned out to be impossible given our resources.

Relevant: how does the task relate to the job/project/etc?
Converse - I completed an unnecessary task. Now I have to work even more to undo it and complete what actually does need to be done.

Time: when does this need to be done by?
Converse - I completed the task after it was needed, putting the project behind.

If you’re missing any of those parameters, you’re either not giving your people enough information or they aren’t asking enough questions. I’d love to hear how work can be consistently done well if any of that is missing.

Those “right people” you mentioned are likely already incorporating these elements into communications with you. Dare say that makes them… SMARTer than you? Heyo!

I think he does help some people, primarily his rich donors and the rest of the do nothing class.

Holy hell that’s terrible. I only got about a minute in before I had to stop it.

Happy cake day and good luck getting enough sleep!

Camp out front with a big signboard laying out their anti-LGBTQ+ donations. If money is an issue, I’ll pay for it.

To anyone with the math skills, I just explain it as a piecewise function. It’s pretty easy to model.

And board game players!

Seriously. This person filed 20,716 complaints about flight path noise pollution in a year. Just one person. I need to see a zero added behind that 12,000 figure, then I’ll know at least six people are truly dedicated.

But think of the art!!!

/s

A few jobs back, my employer promoted me once within a year of starting from a new college graduate position to a junior position, then strung me along for three years with “you’re just not quite ready for a mid level position but you will be. Any day now!” This was all in spite of me doing the work of a senior position within the company for the last two years.

So I got a job at a different employer and went from a junior position to a senior position, like magic, nearly doubling my total income in the process. My coworker did the same, hopping from a senior position to a management position at my current employer. I’ve increasingly observed how corporate United States is painfully stupid and inefficient and it continues to boggle my mind

I feel that. There’s a lot of smug superiority online in general, where people seem to think that someone being incorrect about something is an invitation to insult them, and where the harder you insult them, the better. It’s sad. I blame television to some extent. TV shows and movies love to portray tough conversations ending with some sort of hard but true emotional jab that snaps the other person into understanding. Total bullshit, that rarely works in real life.

I’ve taken to politely calling them out and questioning the rationale behind their behavior. That’s what someone did to me about twenty years back and it helped me get my ass in line. I’m hoping it’ll do the same for a few of them. As the least, I know who to block if their response is just as nasty. My block list is long but my time here is much more peaceful!

Let’s talk this out. Not the biochemistry aspect, but the smuggery.

Was their post smug? Yes. Factually incorrect? Also yes - I’m a microbiologist, I took my share of biochem courses.

Your response was equally smug as well as condescending. Their comment was wrong but innocent in its intent. Yours, conversely, intended to disparage their comment and them as a person.

What do you intend to gain here? Not with the correction - that is valid, but it’s entirely possible to correct without being smug, condescending, and denigrating. What do you think that adds to the conversation that a simple, polite correction would lack?

I’m sorry, but yes. She couldn’t resist my encyclopedic knowledge of self-hosted streaming options.

All spouses can be taught to use Plex or Jellyfin. It just takes the right approach and some determination. Mine is now sailing the high seas with the finest of us.

Does it look purple to you too?