Monday, October 26, 2020
PURPOSEIf you're on my "close friends" list on instagram, you would have seen countless of posts of me ranting about work. Work has been absolutely crazy for the past few months. Company going through an expansion, more workload, coupled with bad planning from management, ridiculous demands from managers, human errors, all of these with an extremely tight schedule. That is extremely stress-inducing.
It all started with one sentence my big boss said to me sometime in April. I had forgotten to follow up on certain issues and I admit that it was my fault. It was hard for me to follow up on things when I wasn't able to go to the office. So he said, "If this is the case, then why am I hiring you as an engineer, I might as well hire a technician." This was said during the morning meeting where my managers and fellow engineers were all present. This short sentence affected me more than I thought it would. It started spiraling down from there.
Some backstory about my boss, he's had some bad reputation among the fellow engineers that I work with. They told me that he's a boss that doesn't protect his own people. During meetings he would be questioned by other managers and will turn around to question his own people instead of defending them. Engineers who have worked long enough have seen him nitpick on someone until they leave, just so that he can bring in his own people - people whom he's worked with in previous companies. He likes to taunt people and seldom tries to understand things on the ground. His mentality is very simple, if I've got a problem, I will deflect it to my engineers. At the end of the day, the method is not important, as long as the problem is solved. That's just how he is.
I have 2 managers and this big boss, only 1 of them said "thank you" when I was able to produce what they wanted. The other 2 have said it before, but I believe I could tell that it was just manners, it wasn't sincere at all. As such, the morale in the department and I dare say the company, has been the lowest it's ever been. People have been talking about quitting and moving on to another opportunity. Here comes the sad fact, most of them have commitments and some would just rather suck it up than to find another job. This is when I started to think for myself. If I were to switch, it'd have to be now because I'm not tied down by anything.
I know I'm not cut out to be an engineer. 6months into this job, I've realised that. I figured I'd stay and try things out since this is my first job after all. I didn't want to be a quitter, I wanted to learn how to work at a place I didn't like and in a job I found no fulfilment in. With all that has happened in the past 6 months, I know it's time for me to take a leap of faith.
The fact is this, no matter how much I don't want work to define me, it does. When we were students, we were going to school for at least 7hours a day. Work requires us to give it 9-10hours a day, that defines our life to a great extent. There needs to be a purpose in work, there needs to be a healthy challenge so that we can continue to improve as a person through work. Right now, all I'm feeling is misery and dread. I have no idea why I'm going to work everyday, it's not making me a better person. If anything it's making me worse because I always feel anxiety before going to work. I sleep late because I know once I wake up, it's gonna be to go to work. I feel anxiety when my phone vibrates because it could be a text from a work groupchat saying that my machines are experiencing some issues. This can happen late at night or during the weekends, it simply doesn't matter. I'm always on edge about morning meetings because, what if my big boss questions me and I don't have an answer for it, is he gonna compare me to a technician again? All these things brings my mood down and drains my energy. Some things, are slowly losing its meaning and joy.
I've had days where food was mere sustenance. I haven't been able to enjoy music as I once would for months now. Games felt boring to me. I'd be binge watching youtube for hours and hours as I laid in my bed, simply letting time pass. A sense of purpose is absent, very absent in my life right now. Maybe I've lived too long like this, just sucking it up and working a job that I feel is meaningless. To the point where I couldn't see how much it was affecting me and eating me up inside. I used to think work is just something I'd have to endure to be able to enjoy certain things that money can buy. I'm beginning to think differently. Work is one of the things that gives a person meaning and purpose.
Brian
10:48 PM
