Welcome back to another episode of the corporate Cowboys podcast my name is Alex today is Wednesday November 30 2022 and I’m back with another 30 minute consult getting in a couple of reps as far as you know dry firing and whatnot goes so this one is coming to us from our
Slash career advice it is a Reddit question a Reddit question and uh they didn’t tag it or to flare it they didn’t flare it with anything specifically asking for advice but it’s a question the heading itself the title has a question in it and it simply says keep getting fired why question mark
All right well I mean some of these questions are just funny and I know I laugh at them a lot and me personally I’m uh rather light-hearted person I tend to see the humor and a lot in most everything and a lot of dark things too some I call that resiliency others might
Call that coping oh this might call that I don’t know just resurgent trauma oh [ __ ] knows but all I know is that it’s got me out of some tight squeezes and uh I’m happy that I’m able to look into the face of danger and laugh at it
Because uh it’s giving me plenty of good experience plenty of learning experience too I won’t call it bad experience but plenty of learning experience in the process the body for this one says I’m 26. halfway to earning a college degree with a plan of hopefully going to law school afterwards that’s that’s cute
I actually uh yeah that that was kind of my trajectory around that age I work pretty blue-collar jobs in production factories and quarries and Etc so they’re in production factories they’re mining for Rock um inquiries and rock quarries and whatnot I’ve been discharged from so many jobs with usually no reason given
But I was just discharged from my last job I only had for five weeks I was in a manufacturing job in a super small [ __ ] company well there you go I mean you applied for it I don’t know what you’re saying it’s a [ __ ] operation maybe they’ll give us some context right
Keep in mind they say I’m 26. okay most guys I worked with there were in their 50s 60s and stood around jacking the boss off all day I worked circles around the entire crew there was a total of eight employees including myself in this building yeah that’s small okay all right
I was doing everyone else’s job plus my own I didn’t mind I liked keeping busy and made my day go by faster anyways these guys were really standoffish to me including my boss since day one I chalked that up to me being new and not part of their In Crowd yet that’s in
Quotes The In Crowd but they were even more distant after I tweaked my back on the job a couple weeks ago I took two days off to rest was denied workers comp and told I had to be cleared from my doctor keep this in mind pretty sure this specific situation has
To do with that and then in parentheses it puts they put by the way still not cleared for work for my primary technically but was told by HR to come back to work anyway so not sure if that could lead to a legal situation for the company well
I’m not an employment law but but I’m pretty sure you could be brought back on for light duty uh you could be brought back off for light duty until you were cleared or until you you received some type of uh final decision some type of final evaluation from a doctor
Now I was let go Thursday after only five weeks of working there and was given the reason as my excessive tardiness when I called HR she said my time was showing 10 minutes late every single day I clocked in which never happened turns out if you clock in even a few
Seconds late and still within the same minutes the shift starts the time clock automatically pushes your start time back 10 minutes so they stole time from me the entire time I worked there this petty little [ __ ] always seems to happen to me and every job I go to where
The boss doesn’t seem to want to associate with me I genuinely don’t get it I come in outwork every [ __ ] around X5 times five I’m not sure it’s personality based I’m not sure if it’s personality based or what I just want some advice so I can stop [ __ ] everything up
Well at least this person is is very straightforward they’re not sure if it’s personality based yeah they come off as as somewhat assertive as somewhat uh uh is the term I’m looking for boisterous I mean boisterous is kind of boisterous is kind of like Rowdy rambunctious
And I don’t get so much of that from this prompt but they seem confident overly confident claiming that they can outwork everybody that they work with at least by a factor of five it’s not a bad thing necessarily what we’re shooting for here is the opportunity to improve stick around to get better
To develop ourselves professionally that’s on a corporate cowboy level you want to be better always every day now they do include an edit in here that says I’m also not a people person so so I don’t really care to play their buddy buddy games if you don’t want to
Associate with me at work cool I stay to my I will stay to myself no problems I’m not brand new to this line of work either I was painting and fabricating in this specific role something I’ve done as a living for four plus years now
You have to I mean when asked to ask themselves if this person is admittedly not a people person I don’t know what they’re expecting by uh by not flying under the radar right I mean if if you’re going to be this aloof if you’re going to be this
This not gloomy what’s the term I’m looking for not it’s not stolen either uh uh that’s the term I’m looking for if you’re trying to be a gray man I suppose you’re just trying to fly under the radar blend in with the background get in there get your job done and [ __ ]
Bounce so you could graduate from school and go to law school all that good stuff you have to set yourself some routines to not stand out so you wanna you actually want to show up like five minutes early and be clocking in you want to be taking time from the
Company not have the company take time from you now granted granted the company taking time from you while you have been working if if at any point in time see now we’re speaking legally if at any point in time it can be documented that you clocked in say you started at eight
O’clock in the morning right but you clock in at 801. and um or at eight o’clock and and 22 seconds and the time clock bumps it up 10 minutes because you didn’t clock in at exactly eight o’clock I mean that’s why I say clock in at 7 55. what’s the worst
That could happen you take five minutes of time off of the company no I mean you could be doing some prep work in the meantime to get your shift started correctly um if it could be documented at all that you have been working from 801 to 8 10
When the time clock actually punched you in or when that when the company began recording the time that you worked if it could be documented though that you were working between that time 801 to 810 yeah you can effectively prove that the company was taking your time
Um but beyond that I mean we’re just going on circumstantial circumstantial evidence um oh this person being not a people person they obviously want to set themselves some kind of system set up a system for themselves to not get fired obviously if they’re not looking to get promoted if they’re not
Actively looking to get promoted they’re just barely looking to be onboarded and get past the probationary period and not get let go for uh excessive tardiness now this one this one here says excessive tardiness and yes I get that in this uh particular situation they tweaked their
Back and they needed some time out uh for it but to the excessive tardiness isn’t because they were out for their back apparently it’s because from what this person is saying the company found the convenient excuse that the person would clock in late every day and was effectively counted as
Being excessively tardy being tardy repeatedly being consistently late um if they’re not a people person yeah I mean my my go-to without much more that they could provide us if I don’t have a one-on-one with them which you can schedule on the Instagram page you can shoot us a
DM we can set something up it’s the corporate Cowboys with a z it’s at corporate Cowboys that’s the handle and or you could listen to the podcast anywhere that podcasts are distributed that’s Apple Spotify podbean Android the corporate Cowboys podcast is also available on patreon so there are
Multiple tiers if you want to shoot us some money some donations keeping this operation not-for-profit anything anything you send is gonna go towards business expenses and legal fees additionally stale mail is also available P.O box 3372 Rancho Cordova California 95741 not having the op in front of me to ask
Them questions about uh about their experience about their day-to-day about their routine about their aspirations let’s say their Ambitions even so that I can evaluate and assess their level of interpersonality their social skills kind of uh skill set they’re working with professionally to at least be retained by these
Companies because it sounds like it sounds like this person has had a streak of bad luck of just [ __ ] luck getting laid off getting fired but the common denominator here and it’s something that they’ve been doing for four plus years is getting these jobs and getting fired consistently the
Common denominator in all of these situations happens to be them on a personal level as an employee it could be that they’re projecting something out there that they’re presenting something out there that they are that the service they provide they provide the company by way of its associates is not appreciated
And so they’re getting fired for it so then we would have to dig deeper and find what this person could fix about how they do things it doesn’t have to be necessarily themselves [ __ ] they could be on the Spectrum right still highly functional to get through interview processes
Get this job but then subsequently is fired so this person is functional to some extent and they want to go to law school so that already requires a certain a certain pattern of thinking I would like to believe because law school tense law school attracts very peculiar individuals
Who are very very particular about what they want to do there’s their I don’t know what the term is special unique eclectic in their own way and yet the majority of them are very young I know when I was in law school when I started law school I was five years
Over the average age in my class still these young and still these young people that are in undergrad today and in graduate schools professional schools they have a certain mindset it’s a high Achievers mindset to some extent but they don’t know how to direct it sometimes they don’t know how to focus it
May be misoriented misguided and I I mean I feel like a lot of people are in today’s Western Civilization but that’s another episode I think this person needs to um well first fix their backup because first address their back pain let’s put it that way because they’re back
Holds them up while they work physical health is priority number one you want to eat right you want to sleep right drink plenty of water stay hydrated all that good stuff so that requires that you work out regularly stretch even so that you are flexible and not prone to physical injury then then
Set yourself up for success by not getting fired I think of what you want to do is fly under the radar I’m not sure how much money you’re making but if you only want to sustain yourself while you get through law school then you might not be on the on the train
For uh promotion or advancement that might not interest you in the short term what should be a short-term priority is staying on the job not getting fired and to do that you need to become self-sustaining but you’ve also got to be aware it’s like I’m imbuing
A way of thinking on a person to be a stand-up guy but you’ve also have to think criminally right so Most states are right to work states or formerly known as I still know them as fire at will States meaning that you could walk in tomorrow and they could
Say hey we don’t like your [ __ ] face so you’re fired right and getting let go at this stage of civilization shouldn’t be a tremendous a tremendous obstacle right because just as easily as they can let you go you can also walk away now I understand that office politics might not be
Appealing they’re not appealing to a lot of people the practice of law mind you is full of office politics you claim you claim to not be a people person you’re gonna [ __ ] love law or law is going to love [ __ ] you oh man but you’re not a people person
You don’t like buddy buddy games fine hey doesn’t mean you cannot learn how to be social how to be sociable you have to learn how to shake hands and Network for the sake of personal interest yours and others and make those interests come together and build something worthwhile
You might not do that you might not do that on your next job right your goal your goal is to go to law school but if you choose to uh to move up in the world at any rate it will require social aptitudes to be able to navigate corporate
You don’t you won’t have to be you won’t need to be a people person but you should want to know how to work with people and how to work people otherwise you’re going to be stuck in a in a certain State of Mind in a certain mentality
That just makes you easy to fire let’s take a look at some of these comments real quick so the first one says while it does seem like a toxic workplace trying to work circles around your cohorts won’t earn you any awards and May subject you to
Being targeted see and that’s why I said that they might be on the spectrum because they’re working at five times the rate of of others so I mean I don’t know one could I do know don’t say that one could draw conclusions that this person is uh is awkward to talk to even
And um and they might compensate for this awkwardness by just working harder working through breaks maybe working through lunch we don’t know that I mean that’s something that I would ask if I really wanted to get into the knit nitty-gritty of the corporate culture that they just got let go from so that
We could assess and evaluate we could go through the motions of potential causes even though no cause termination exists we we still want to run through the potential causes of what they could fix to be a better professional right whether the objective is retention whether the objective is promotion
Whether the objective is renegotiation determination we don’t know now this person says yeah while it does seem like a toxic workplace trying to work circles around your cohorts won’t earn you any awards and May subject you to being targeted work to the level of your immediate supervisor not more not less
And while it may be a generational thing if you’re not clocking in five minutes early you’re late all right yeah no that’s that’s perfect because that’s my recommendation that’s how I got brought up in the game there are some folks who want 15 minutes early short 15 minutes early and and it shows
How much more professional you are I personally don’t do 15 minutes early because my time is valuable and if I’m not getting paid to show up there 50 minutes early what am I going to do I mean less unless I’m setting somebody up unless somebody’s getting framed unless it’s a
[ __ ] hit unless I’m trying to close I might only show up to five minutes early and call it a day call it call it good there now it says you might not see it as a big deal if you click if you clock clock click this is it says you’re click you
Might not see it as a big deal if you clock in at 802 but your employer might they know it’s going to take another 10 minutes to get ready to work and be proficient well those that time they get ready to work like if you’re changing out of your civilian clothes into your
Work clothes uh and like you have to put on special clothes all of that is company time I mean I think that that has even been ruled in case precedent that the time it takes you to arrive at work once you arrive at work you’re essentially working
You’re essentially like if you have to change your clothes to put on special work clothes that’s work um that says here however they are not typically allowed to penalize your paycheck you must be paid for hours worked it says here to call your State labor department and file a wage claim
Yes I like that somebody else says if you run into an [ __ ] in the morning you ran into an [ __ ] if you run into [ __ ] all day you’re the [ __ ] and that I guess is a quote from raid land Givens from Justified a show I believe on TV
And that makes sense yeah I mean it one or two jobs I could see that happening but if it’s a pattern and I mentioned the comma denominator seems to be this person who just gets fired for no reason there’s always a [ __ ] reason but again this person wants to work
Around work circles around their co-workers their Associates their managers even managers that are up in in years 50s and 60s when this person is 26 half the rage less than half less than more or is it more than half less than half their age yeah less than half the ridge
Less than half the range I guess it depends on how you word it less than half saying less than half like a person is 60 and I say they are less than half your age they’re going to be less than 30. when they could be networking with these folks
And this is something that this person has done for four plus years so this is an industry this painting and fabricating this is this sounds like industrious work so these old heads must know a little something about the work right but this person doesn’t want to associate with
Them it doesn’t sound like they have plans of networking with them if anything they show up a minute late and a dollar short but they could be showing up there five minutes early striking up some Chit Chat maybe not chit chat but striking up productive conversation even about the work
And could ease themselves into a pay raise could it ease themselves into long-term employment but again this person is this person may be uh maybe adverse maybe averse to that interpersonal communication maybe that they don’t know the benefits of it yet I mean they’re 26 right everybody was a [ __ ] rookie at one
Point I stopped being one at [ __ ] 20 or some [ __ ] but we all some hey some folks are late bloomers I don’t blame them but the later in the game that they wake up the faster the faster I’m I’m snapping my fingers the faster they’ve got to run and put in the work
And by work I mean professional work social work that’s another form of emotional labor if you want to put it but it pays dividends this person might not see it yet with these buddy buddy games standing I like how he said these people stand around jacking the boss off all day bro
It sounds like it sounds like they’re doing something right even if it is standing around the boss making the boss feel well if the company is making money you’ve got to ask yourself how do these people work five times less than I do because you can’t be I mean I I refuse
To believe and until I’m proven wrong I just refuse to believe that the this person working five times more than everybody else is the reason the company is profitable right if you have bandwidth use that don’t take up don’t soak up other people’s responsibilities and you not
Get paid for it you’re also [ __ ] yourself you do five times the work and it sounds like you [ __ ] and complain five times more than everybody else you’re still only getting paid your original wage your original pay rate what the [ __ ] are you killing yourself for you wanna you want to make more
Negotiate for more you want to work more then do it for the logo Do It For the Love of the Game work twice as hard work three times as hard and then those other two degrees that amounts to the five times more invest it in talking with your Associates talking
With your colleagues networking with them that way you have a reputation and you have a network coming from it they’ll know you’re a hard worker and you’re a good networker but if this person again is not a people person they’re probably awkward as [ __ ] somebody else comments real quick and I
Might end up with this one this person says you made the lifers look bad you got an injury on the job and applied for workers comp you didn’t know the clock in trick and in parentheses they put because you didn’t get along with the lifers and they didn’t tell you
Somebody else says uh well well they say they say uh ETA I’m not really sure what that means ETA not saying this is how the world should be but it’s how the world is if you want to survive law school read The Art of War before you
Enroll The Art of War ain’t gonna save this [ __ ] man yeah I’m gonna just cut it here
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