" Obnoxious Makeover! "

" Obnoxious Makeover! "

That's the first thing that comes to my mind when I wake up every day. It’s not because I hate my job, I love my job. It’s because I cannot do justice to my job because I have got myself trapped in a thing called "Activity Traps".

Tring! Tring!

God! I hate it when my intercom starts ringing before I start my job.

Anyways……

Boss: “How’s everything going?”

Me: “I am fine, thanks for asking.”

Boss: “I was not asking about you! I was asking about your plant (My boss is talking about the lifeless plant which is sucking my life day-by-day). Is it working fine?”

AHHHHHHHH! I wish I could smack the receiver on his head. But,.....

Me: “Oh! Yes, Sir! Everything is fine.”

Boss: “And...”

Me: “Oh right!, we have received 12 notifications from the production, all 12 of them shall be liquidated by today itself. 100% tool box talk compliance has been done. I have made those reports, I will mail them along with bar charts and pie charts, and here is the total consumption on the seal and overhauling maintenance. Another 25 abnormalities have been reported, however, we have achieved 90% compliance to the TPM abnormality, which is very good. 3 near misses have been reported and 100% compliance to PM & PDM jobs... bla bla bla...”

GRRRRR! I really want to smack the receiver on my head.... This is what I actually do.

"Activity Traps!"

Activity traps are those activities in which we get so involved that we forget its sole purpose, to achieve goals.

Goals and Activity are 2 technical terms used in management language. By carrying out the activities, we achieve the Goals. When we get engrossed in the activity, the activity gets emphasis over the goal. The whole point of the purpose is forgotten.

I think I need to make it simpler.

I will give one of my own real life examples. There is this concept called "JSA- Job Safety Analysis” at my work place, introduced by our management for ensuring safe execution of non-routine and risky jobs. JSA must be done at the job site by all the people involved in the job like myself the executer, my manger & the production plant manager and afterwards it will approved by a  senior person.

I actually don't know what happening now...... it can be a possibility that the management is a fool or wants to be fooled. But people are are so lost now.  They are sitting in front of screen drafting some crap in tabulated A4 sheets and doing the same thing again and again for each activities. And then they run around bosses for their perusal and approval. JSA has become an activity now, they forgot its sole purpose - safe execution of the job. 

Sometimes I believe I have become a Robot, which does not feel, think and have values. Honestly, I sometimes don't feel my brains. If somebody had discovered an instrument to scan what going inside my head, it would have been dark, completely dark. If you are lucky you might see like a windows screen saver in which the window floats freely in the black screen. I have been robbed of my creativity and passion.I may smell like a big bag of couch potatoes. It’s not that way! Let me give another extreme example. This time you will feel what is in my mind. 

Imagine yourself in an airborne flight navigated by an activity trap brainwashed pilot who forgot his purpose was to fly you from point A to point B.Yeah! It’s not a pleasant situation. I know.

So, in this obnoxious made-over corporate world, can you bring fulfillment? Yes, you can . I can still remember my boss once said to me in a humorous way, no offence, huh! "When you are being raped, there's nothing you can do. Try to enjoy the rape." I think what he actually meant was to love the work you are given, love the difference between your and boss's expectations. 

"If i turn my enemy into my friend, has the enemy not automatically slain?"- Lincoln