I’m back. In the office. Wearing a tie. Joy.
Have I ever mentioned how much I loathe neck gear? The whole concept of ties baffles me. I’m a Man. Why the hell do I need to accessorize? Hell, I hate just tucking in my shirt. Now I have to add a noose on top of it?
But we have Important People in the office this week (i.e. people who give my company money), so even we peons are expected to dress to impress. Even if it makes us grumpy. And increases the likelihood of peon-on-peon violence by approximately 25.8%.
Justin + Tie = Colin Firth-ian expression of annoyance and discontent.
The picture of misery, made worse by the fact that every ounce of the 5-6 pounds I regained over the past week of travel decided to homestead on my face and neck, making that top-button-and-tie combo that much more fun.
Why the hell do IT people need to ever wear ties, anyway? I spent the first hour of my morning crawling around the floor, hooking my PC back up after things were moved around while I was out. Hardly the kind of activity that’s easy to do when tucked and tied. Granted, it’s not one of my normal job duties, but it is something our front line help desk guy does all day, and he’s been hit by the dress code bus, too.
Of course, if the tie thing helps convince Important People to hand over their cash, I suppose it’s worth it. Keeps me ably employed, right? And keeps the company coffers full (especially important come bonus time).
And honestly, I don’t mind doing my little part for this place. Not exactly my dream job, but if you have to do something to pay the bills you might as well do it for a good company.
Case in point: I came back to the office to find a little burlap bag on my desk with assorted crap inside. No clue what it was. When I opened it up, though, I found a little booklet explaining that this little sack was the first step in a company-wide contest to raise some cash for a yet-to-be determined local charity, organization, family, etc. Seems that the company’s 25th anniversary is coming up and, rather than spend their budget on an extravagant party, TPTB decided to celebrate by kicking down something to the local communities.
Each team (office) gets some seed money, and they get to pick who they want to help and how they want to do it. The goal is to use that seed money to generate as many dollars as possible for the chosen recipient by the end of the calendar year.
And the seed money? Fairly generous. I don’t know exactly how much the company is kicking down to start with in total, but given the amount our office is seeing I suspect it’s well into the six figures.
Sure, there’s a part of me that wouldn’t have been too upset if they’d decided to split up that seed money and hand it out to the staff as a surprise bonus, but I still think this charity thing is pretty damn cool. Definitely not something a company could afford to do if it couldn’t convince Important People to give it money.
And if I have to wear a tie to make that happen, those God damn poor people better appreciate it.
