Corporate Snakes and Ladders
Posted: 03 October 2005
Word Count: 104
Summary: observation at work todap...
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Content Warning
This piece and/or subsequent comments may contain strong language.
Snakes and ladders.....
I see only snakes but no ladders
A way up and out, not for me.
corporate back stabbing politicians!
Out for themselves, and fuck everone else.
A favour for a favour,
Nothing ever done for friendship or help
just for gain, greed - what can I reap...
Only one thing matters, promotion up the ladder
They just stamp on everyone to get to the top,
If "playing the game" is done like this
the game is wrong
Help people because I can
A favour, because I can, not for gain.
They can have their corporate game.
I dont want to play.
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Comments by other Members
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 joanie at 21:34 on 03 October 2005
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Oh dear. Not a good day at the office, then? It's nearly a year since you wrote 'Investment Bank' - I just went back to check. I think you have conveyed this well, especially the last two lines, which link in to the first. It's a particularly good analogy, isn't it? ...either climb up to the top or slither down.
I enjoyed it.
joanie
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 Cornelia at 22:25 on 03 October 2005
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Hmm,this reads as very idealistic, written by someone not suited to commerce. I would suggest teaching or some other badly paid public service work if the POV is yours, except I can't imagine you'd have thought it any different. You still get the politics in pubic service, but not so (predictably ) nasty, and at least you know you are trying to help society, not ripping people off for the sake of some capitalist enterprise. These people are by definition not vey pleasant, when ruthlessness is the well-advertised name of the game.
I did enjoy the opportunity this poem gave me for a bit of a rant.
Sheila
<Added>
Ha, ha! I meant public service, of course.
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 cust at 10:59 on 04 October 2005
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I can see what you're saying, but I feel this could maybe be usefully taken further, perhaps a consideration of how to live against a backdrop that doesn't suit you, given that these ways of being exist (as well as many others). I'd be interested to read one of those poems, as this issue affects me as an out of step person.
It's perhaps too first-step for my taste - an outpouring of anger that's not been kicked about quite enough to mature into something richer. Sometimes I write stuff like this and it feels great to get it out, but often I leave those poems altogether or for a few months and come back and recycle part of them for another related one.
Just a few ideas. Hope they are of use.
Lucy
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Cornelia at 15:20 on 04 October 2005
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Oh, it just registered with me that you work for an Investment Bank - I didn't read the remarks of the first commentator properly. In that case, you do the crime, you do the time. Whilst you don't have to stand on the highway with a gun in your hand, in my opinion there's very little difference between that and what these companies do. I expect you have a nice warm office and a sports ground. No, I'm being harsh.As you see, I am not a fan of capitalism. I've known a lot of corporate office workers living lives of quiet desperation who take up bridge. Just a suggestion.
Sheila
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optiplex at 21:06 on 04 October 2005
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Hi all,
Thanks for you're comments.
Sheila, with reference to you're last comment, i have "made my own bed" so to speak, however - one thing this is trying to convey is that some people that work in these environments are "nice people", whilst others are not...As for bridge, tried it and got far to confused! :-)
S.
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Cornelia at 21:38 on 04 October 2005
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Yes, same here. I think you could make some great stories of your experience of working with both nice and nasty people.
Sheila
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Chem at 12:24 on 05 October 2005
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Hi Stu,
You've been here before and so have I! It's an american investment bank and it's never going to change its mentality. You're too soft and sensitive for a place like that and you know full well what it does to people, many good people. I'm sorry to sound completely unsympathetic but if you're still not happy there then get out of that field of work. You're a talented man and there are many things you'll be able to do instead which don't involve back-stabbing and nastiness. The best decision I made was walking out of there and I'm so much happier for it. That corporate 'brown-nosing' is the only way to get to the top of that kind of place and that wasn't for me and it's not for you either.
Good poem.
Em
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Cornelia at 13:00 on 05 October 2005
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My husband used to work for BT as a salesman, or 'Marketing Account Manager' and he was excellent at brown-nosing. His ex-boss ( they went for early release) is still one of his closest friends. Some people are just like this, but I think men are more prone than women. They just can't help saluting the pack leader. His ex national-service background didn't help, I suppose.
On the other hand, there were some women in that patriarchal set-up who had ways of getting on, and I won't say too much more about that in case I am done for libel, but I think you know what I mean. There is an extra dimension of unpleasntness, too, even if if a personable young woman doesn't set out to exploit the potential. I have a daughter-in-law who works for Meryl Lynch and what she has to put up with would be intolerable to me - I mean the assumptions about women's roles in business, especially hospitality functions, rather than unwanted individual attention, although that is rife, too.
The money in commercial ventures is good, no doubt about that, and perhaps that's how Em was able to save up enough to fund a course. Maybe that's not possible for you, but if you have family commitments that's all the more reason to get away from a set-up that is so corrosive to the morals, no matter how much resistance you try to put up. I could hardly bear to socialise with some of my husbands BT colleagues and their casual sexism, racism, etc., not to mention the tantamount to pimping he had to go in for to please some buyers, and although I enjoyed the considerable expense-account benefits for a while, if they could have blotted out the obnoxious employees it would have suited me a lot better. I was quite relieved when my headmaster wouldn't let me go on one 'jolly', as they called them, to Jamaica , when my husband was salesman of the year or something. I was sure to have said something untoward and part of the point was to vet wives to see if they were suitable so their husbands coul dbe promoted! What a world! Thank goodness he went for early release, even though we were much poorer. All those drunken lunches would have shortned his life if he hadn't given up, I think.
Sheila
Sorry to rant on.
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optiplex at 21:43 on 05 October 2005
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Hi - thanks for you're comments...
Nice to see some reactions provoked!
Hey Em, good to hear from you! :-)
the one thing that i was not looking for here was sympathy - I have learnt my lesson and how these places work.....
it was more an observation and statement.....
1 - there are a bunch of corporate brown-nosers
2 - observations of what goes on
3 - at all costs, I wont make myself like them
I also agree - its not got me.... I am already in a way differnet job now, which is less "involved" ...... anyways -> keep well - email me some time.... please
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