Alone In The Wilderness

Okay, now that Spurs is "On The Road Again" blech, he has put me in charge of posting. Beware, no witty posts will ensue, not much going on in my world at the moment. So bear with me, he will be back Friday!

However, I have noticed the extreme differences of working from home versus working in an office. It's a very strange thing to me. Granted, at my last company I relished the days where I could work from home. Given - I had the best boss in the world (*wink to Mo*) but the "work from home days" meant a little more relaxation. Get up, no shower necessary, sweat pants and most ratty t-shirt were the required uniform, go straight to computer only a mere room away, answer emails, phone calls, etc. and do anything else around the household you felt necessary in between.

Fast forward to my new job. Contractor, thrown into a project half-way, expected to pick up the ball and run with it. Laptop delivered, connections to various company networks, etc. First 1/2 day = random conference call with two people whom I am guessing are my direct reports (still no idea) giving me basic instructions but not a whole lot of info as to what is expected of me, etc. Gave me some direction as to online training I should complete regarding the software that is the whole focus of this project. Okay.

First full day = doing lots of online training (which by the way sucks in every way possible).

NOTE: As you may know by now, both Sissy and Morrigan and I used to work for the same company and Training was our focus. Mo was the best boss and gave us lots of direction and we knew exactly what was expected of us. Bottom line = I knew my shit!

Second full day = Okay, I've had enough of this online training BS and I want to know exactly what is expected of me. Call my (I think direct report) to make sure I'm getting what I'm supposed to be getting. All is good, I'm doing the right thing (so they say).

All of last week = doing online trainings and looking at their timeline as to the real live training that I'm supposed to be helping with in lieu of spreadsheets, forms, docs, etc. (Blah, blah, blah)

Fast forward to yesterday - I get an actual project to do! YEA! All is good with the world. I can't stand not having something to actually work on. The birds are singing, the flowers are blooming. I'm feeling I'm making a difference. Woo Hoo!

Today = I'm continuing to work on my project and feel very lost and really just want to go from cube to cube and say, "Is this right?, am I doing this right?" But alas, no cubes to go to!

Therefore, I feel I have to illustrate the pro's and con's of working from home versus working in an office below. See if you agree!

Pro's

• You are on your own time schedule as long as you get your work done
• You can wake up 5 minutes before you have to work and just walk over to your laptop (Spurs hates this fact)
• You don't have to shower or put on clean business like clothing (Spurs hates this too)
• You can get general stuff done during the day like laundry or house cleaning (yeah, right)
• Your cat loves you that much more for having multiple scratching of the face time during the day
• You can drink, do drugs, eat mutliple things out of your fridge, etc. if you choose
• You can switch over to your home computer and read blogs as you wish during the day
• You can play all the Yahoo! games you can during your "breaks" and not have to switch to a spreadsheet when someone walks behind you

Con's

• No swiping of company stuff (post-it's, pens, paper, legal pads, etc.)
• No getting all the good gossip from your co-workers
• No interruptions like your fun co-workers coming to tell you about a good sale or make-up purchase, or the hot guy they met on the elevator (*Mo*)
• No going around to others and asking advice on particular projects or problems
• No 25 cent Diet Cokes from the vending machine or free food from the Board Meeting
• No having lunch with your favorite co-workers and defending yourself against wanting Burger King over the Salad-bar (*Mo*)

There ya go. Which would you prefer?

I miss working in my office but the times they are a changin' I guess the "contractor" world doesn't totally suck ass but I miss my co-workers and my office environment. I guess I will adapt. (Hell yeah (quoting Spurs) "you will adapt because the pay scale is much more significant"). LOL - this is a great opportunity, just different from what I have done in the past, but I'm a worker bee and will do my best!

Told ya you would hate this post :) Spurs is back on Friday - don't forget!