When work simply doesn’t work for us..

Yesterday my place of work had an “away day”. 

I suppose you could call it that. I’d called it a waste of my time and thankfully, my Autism means that I really don’t play well with others in forced situations like that and, if I do go, I get stressed and start acting up. 

I’ve been to a few in the past. I’ve almost always found them to be staged managed events promoted as giving “everyone a voice” but which invariably result in any dissension being slapped down and the whole idea of “democracy” being trampled upon. Any bright ideas that are actually put forward are immediately commandered by management and promoted as being their own and the usual feelings afterwards are those of depression and demoralisation. 

I understand that yesterday’s was along those lines. 

That makes me sad, that makes me angry and, quite truthfully, I wonder why I should go in on Monday and put in the same effort I put in last week, the week before and the two hundred weeks before that. 

Okay, I’m at the bottom of the pile in terms of seniority. I’m just the guy who does their job and struggles to get through the day due to miscommunication and mismanagement. The guy who actually works damn hard for little financial reward (as do my colleagues) and who, when they question a decision as being illogical or poorly explained seems never to actually get the logicality or the better explanation. And when you’re Autistic that is just so frustrating. 

It’s frustrating when you can see what’s wrong. You can see how to fix it. You can see how morale could be improved but (a) because you’re Autistic and “”hey, you know nothing about interacting with others” (b) you’re just a dumb answer the phone person so don’t get ideas above your station and (c) this isn’t a democracy!, that’s never going to happen. 

I like work that is logical, ordered and that I can follow. Where the process makes sense and improvements to that service are welcomed, where ideas are given due credit and where, as you’re part of the team you really are part of the team. 

I’ve had four people’s opinions about yesterday. 

None of them enjoyed it. None of them came out of it feeling positive. None of them feel wanted. None of them feel their opinions matter. 

They feel demoralised. Fed up, disillusioned, used, humiliated and other words that don’t mean anything good. 

Work isn’t working for them..

And if that’s the case, it simply won’t work for me.