Supercut: Workplace Survival Skills
The 12 best workplace-related ideas and concepts I've come across (so far)
If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved, and never will achieve its full potential, that word would be 'meetings'.
—Dave Barry
Welcome to the absurd world of the modern workplace. If you’re struggling with unproductive meetings, failed projects, hidden power dynamics and unsolved workplace conflicts, give the following ideas a go. I’ve compiled the most interesting workplace-related skills and concepts on how to survive a day in the office. As always my selection is characterised by subjectivity and availability bias.
1. Recognise a Kafkaesque Office
/ˌkafkəˈɛsk/ adjective
characteristic or reminiscent of the oppressive or nightmarish qualities of Franz Kafka's fictional world.
Franz Kafka’s work transcends time and office spaces. Here’s Noah Tavlin of Ted-Ed explaining the disorienting nature of Franz Kafka’s work in the context of an office:
In the short story Poseidon the ancient Greek god is an executive so swamped with paperwork that he’s never had time to explore his underwater domain. The joke here is that not even a god can handle the amount of paperwork demanded by the modern workplace. The reason why is telling. He’s unwilling to delegate any of the work because he deems everyone else unworthy of the task. Kafka’s Poseidon is a prisoner of his own ego.
This story contains all of the elements that makes for a truly Kafkaesque scenario. It’s not the absurdity and bureaucracy alone, but the irony of the character’s circular reasoning in reaction to it that is emblametic of Kafka’s writing. His tragic comic stories act as a form of methology for the modern industrial age.
—Noah Tavlin, What makes something ‘Kafkaesque’?
2. Beware of Bikeshedding
The Law of Triviality, aka Bikeshedding, claims that meetings are largely useless because most time is wasted on trivial matters. It was formulated by C. Northcote Parkinson in 1957:
The time spent on any item of the agenda will be in inverse proportion to the sum [of money] involved.
—C. Northcote Parkinson, The Law of Triviality
Parkinson illustrated his point with an elaborate fictional case study about a committee asked to sign off on a $10,000,000 Atomic Reactor. Little time is spent talking about the actual reactor, a highly technical, difficult and complex matter. Considerably more time is spent on discussing the intricacies of the staff’s $2,000 bike shed, a topic everyone can contribute to. Most time, however, is spent debating a trivial agenda item about $5 coffee refreshments for future committee sessions.
3. Guard Against the Dark Triad
The Dark Triad is a fateful set of personality traits with malevolent features. The term comes from psychology and comprises three distinct qualities particularly callous people display:
Narcissism: The craving for admiration, having an inflated self-image and a lack of empathy.
Machiavellianism: Being manipulative and having the belief that the ends justify the means. (Named after Italian philosopher Niccolò Machiavelli.)
Psychopathy: Lacking empathy and a sense of guilt. Often results in antisocial behaviour.
Among other things, the Dark Triad is studied to predict criminal behaviour and has been researched in the context of the workplace and office politics.
4. Use the C.R.A.P. Framework
The C.R.A.P. Framework is a scientific approach to dealing with workplace bullshit. In their 2020 paper Confronting Indifference Toward Truth: Dealing With Workplace Bullshit, Ian P. McCarthy et al. explain this phenomenon as follows:
Workplace bullshit comes into existence when one or more members of an organization are intent on pursuing an underlying agenda of their own, such as protecting themselves against criticism or perceived threats, or attempting to benefit themselves in the pursuit of opportunities. That agenda may be exclusively self-serving, or it may be intended to serve the organization; it can have selfish or selfless motives. The bullshitter makes a decision to further that agenda through communicative acts and decides on a message and a medium that will help them to achieve that agenda.
The C.R.A.P. Framework to combat workplace bullshit itself comes in four stages:
Comprehend: Understand what BS is and isn’t
Recognise: Learn how to notice when it is used knowingly or unknowingly
Act: Either exit the situation entirely, engage with the bullshitter, accept the BS out of loyalty, or disregard the nonsense
Prevent: Exhibit and cultivate behaviours that don’t leave much room for BS, such as critical thinking.
This is probably completely unnecessary at your workplace. But just in case, here’s a useful chart in case you ever need it.
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