Date: Sun, 18 Aug 2013 21:55:46 -0400
From: Meg Newark
Subject: Things that make you go hmm??
I am responding to the post (copied below) about “shoddy work.” First, I am clearly coming in on the tail end of the topic since I was away for a vacation. My only real point of contention is the statement calling “manual labor degrading.”
People who do hard manual labor deserve a lot more than being micro-managed from you “standing off to the side, making helpful (???) suggestions. Though, you were correct that, perhaps you should do it yourself if you are so skilled.
Plenty of people do not wish to be executives, managers or whatever but prefer to work with their hands. I agree there are plenty of work crews that do not accomplish what they were hired for. Maybe they have a “management issue.” It really is irrelevant. People working, no matter what their life choices…is not degrading.
Again, I would like to say that people doing manual labor are not degrading themselves. Hopefully it was a poorly expressed thought.
Date: Tue, 13 Aug 2013 19:03:14 -0400
From: Doug Berg
Subject: Shoddy work
I get disgruntled as the next guy about shoddy work. I know I’d be better off doing it myself, but that would involve degrading manual labor. I prefer to stand off to the side, making helpful suggestions.
Things were different when I was young. The boss left me in charge before my skills merited it. Eyebrows were raised but, nevertheless, the boss got paid, I think.. All too soon I became a boss, myself—fretting over some worker I’d left unsupervised. Eventually you learn to cut loose soon from those with whom you are not going to be doing any repeat business. Be they worker or customer, say you do that first deal and, say, it leaves a bad taste: no more deals, no hard feelings. But, say, you get a favorable track record going but then mess one up?
Hey! No big deal.
Meg N.