Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Question of the Day: Does flattery (read: kissing your higher uppers’ rear ends) help you rise up at work?


Maybe I work in an industry that is filled to the brim with excessive, stomach turning sweet-talk, but I’ve noticed that it sometimes works. Although I do not flatter anyone in both personal and professional situations since it makes me cringe just to hear someone flatter his/her boss/naïve client, I have observed that you can go from a common and replaceable employee to BFF in a matter of minutes.


I guess the thing that gets to me is the manipulative, lying bit. Why squeal and tell your lame Mr./Mrs. Boss, “Yeee! Shoo hal kalaaaym! I’d love to have coffee with you! Wait for you outside your house for an hour? Sure hayate to2mori!” when you’d be happier sharing a cup of sewer water with Satan?


Now I know that some people are more or less forced to bend over backwards since their job might be his/her family’s main source of income and if flattering someone helps secure them in their job then be it. But my curiosity is with the handful who shrug their shoulders before stomping all over their dignity and self-worth without trepidation as they slyly conform to their now-pleased high uppers’ crummy expectations that might’ve facilitated the whole self-demeaning routine to begin with.


Have you worked with or come across anyone like that?


MP3s for your ears...

Donovan - Season of the Witch

Dusty Springfield - Spooky

The Action - Brain

Elton John - Rocket Man


at 8:30 AM

4 Comments

  1. Anonymous Anonymous posted at 2:41 PM  
    all the time: they are called Egyptians!

    ZING!

    lol.joking of course. everybody does it irrespective of nationality

    well. im going to go a little bit technical here:
    common sense that a person does that because his/her boss has immediate say or effect on your appraisal. people tend to remember bad occurrences or negative behavior of others. the tool used here is the appraisal procedure in organizations to get vengeance. nearly all appraisal systems are top down. meaning directed downwards from superior to subordinate. a solution to that is something called 360 degrees appraisal: simply explained. you get reviewed by 1/2 superiors, 3 peers, 3 customers and 3 subordinates. so regardless of what your boss thinks of you you would get an honest review.

    but i think we already know that since you said you are sympathetic to those whose their main source of income is on the line. but for other group ?! hmm...

    نقص حنان؟

    lool

    @music:

    Oooo! dusty Springfield AND Elton john!... i've getting weird coincidences in what i say and listen to these days. welurk then chillout and now you... O_o

    im sure you have those but more sharing is more caring:
    http://dl.dropbox.com/u/595061/18%20-%20Son%20Of%20A%20Preacher%20Man.mp3

    http://dl.dropbox.com/u/595061/03%20Elton%20John%20-%20Honky%20Cat.mp3
  2. Blogger Erzulie posted at 9:20 AM  
    q80thug: that IS very technical & thanks 4 the tunes :>
  3. Anonymous Anonymous posted at 5:45 AM  
    I've learned that, at least in my world, those who kiss ass do better. Plain and simple. i sit there and work 16h+ a day, the cardiologist's son uses nepotism and shameless brown-nosing, works barely 6h a day, leaves in time to surf, and does better than me.

    So, should I kiss ass?

    Simple. Yes. I've learned to. I'd be stupid not to.
  4. Blogger Erzulie posted at 9:02 AM  
    trevelyana: *makes a face* really? I just can't bring myself to it. I hope my work stands for itself (!)

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