Almost universal incompetency nowadays??

[ekguy]

Originally posted by msommers
I'm not sure how much sense there is in moving countries because your coworkers at one company suck.....

Must have missed the sarcasm...

I've been considering moving there actually for a long time. But yes that was sarcasm.

Today was just extra special at work...Sometimes people's stupidity and uselessness hurts to witness.

[firebane]

@ekguy just out of curiosity what is it that you do for work?

[Disoblige]

Originally posted by firebane
@ekguy just out of curiosity what is it that you do for work?

Me too. Because first post ek mentioned:

Originally posted by ekguy

I can't be the only who noticed how bad it's getting. Everything from customer service, to sales, to food/service industry.

Customer service, sales, food/service, all pretty similar fields IMO. Not really a vast scope.

[Graham_A_M]

^ Assembles office furniture IIRC

[ekguy]

Originally posted by Graham_A_M
^ Assembles office furniture IIRC

More than just that but yeah we do some pretty big moves (currently doing a 5 year reno project for a massive company), set up field offices, assemble everything from furniture, to walls, to computer systems, etc.

Doing this while I go to school, pay is pretty good, hours are as many as we want to work.

But they hire people and they have 0 initiative, can't read a floor map when we're setting everything up, you have to hold their hands for everything, disappear for over an hour to get from 4th floor to loading dock, can't operate basic power tools, can't undolly or dolly up anything....And some of these are guys in their high 30's low 40's...like what the hell has to happen to you to end up at that age and still be so useless...I mean I hate my job to no end but it is enabling me to go to school and pay off my debts...Are some people really just satisfied to eke out little paychecks just to be able to buy a few beers every night.

And just generally when you go around calgary it seems like so many people are sooooo freaking incompetent at what they do from McD's on up to government jobs...

What happened for such a large chunk of the population to seem to completely despondent and apathetic?

Almost like people don't even care to do a good job, or are unable to do so at all levels and all industries...

I am hoping this is not a Canada wide thing and is localized in Alberta...Maybe this shit economy will rouse some people out of their listless lives and try harder to keep their jobs.

[Thales of Miletus]

It is the result of 42 years of PC control.

Poorer education. Poorer healthcare. Dumber mothers with unhealthy kids. All results in lazy stupid workers.

Just look what years and years of the GOP did to the southern united states. Fat as fuck, stupid as fuck, and half the population collects welfare.

[Mista Bob]

Last place I lived in temporarily for a year (Winkler, Manitoba) was dramatically worse than here. Really made workers here seem like they were all perfect employees.
I wish I was exaggerating, but every single place you went into was staffed 100% by completely inept people. Not only were they all useless at their jobs, they were all miserable to deal with and slow.

On the plus side it was real easy to eat healthy while there, as it was basically guaranteed anything you ordered at restaurants or fast food would either suck or have your order wrong.

So it's definitely not just a Calgary thing nor is it the worst here. And naturally, everyone was just as bad at driving there.

[Graham_A_M]

Originally posted by ekguy


But they hire people and they have 0 initiative, can't read a floor map when we're setting everything up, you have to hold their hands for everything, disappear for over an hour to get from 4th floor to loading dock, can't operate basic power tools, can't undolly or dolly up anything....And some of these are guys in their high 30's low 40's...like what the hell has to happen to you to end up at that age and still be so useless...I mean I hate my job to no end but it is enabling me to go to school and pay off my debts...Are some people really just satisfied to eke out little paychecks just to be able to buy a few beers every night.

And just generally when you go around calgary it seems like so many people are sooooo freaking incompetent at what they do from McD's on up to government jobs...

What happened for such a large chunk of the population to seem to completely despondent and apathetic?

Almost like people don't even care to do a good job, or are unable to do so at all levels and all industries...

I am hoping this is not a Canada wide thing and is localized in Alberta...Maybe this shit economy will rouse some people out of their listless lives and try harder to keep their jobs.

In all honesty? perhaps you need to have a serious talk with the people in HR. Or perhaps their managers. To hire and keep such a vast array of fucking idiots is costing you guys a lot more then you likely realize. Loss of productivity, more staff then you likely need, seemingly endless training, cost of fixing the endless screw ups since the people you're placed with are useless.... it just goes on and on. The funny part is? in this economy, its not the least bit hard to find a good number of very capable, hard working, smart individuals that your company could VERY well benefit from. LOTS of trades people were laid off (myself included). They'd have a good skill set you guys could very much use to your advantage, and would require very little training.

Strange, at every company Ive been for the last number of years (at least 6 that I can think of), everybody pulls their own weight quite well. No idiots really.... Id like to see people that can outwork me for once (thats never happened before), or know more then me... but... even so they do a great job.

I guess it just comes down to HR, and the managements decision to keep the dead weight around, which is quite frustrating for guys like me that work incredibly hard, know their shit and are very dependable. Id be more then happy to take over some of their jobs, but alas, cant for reasons such as this.

[Tik-Tok]

Originally posted by Thales of Miletus
It is the result of 42 years of PC control.

Poorer education. Poorer healthcare. Dumber mothers with unhealthy kids. All results in lazy stupid workers.

Or maybe it's because our booming economy attracted all the lazy stupid workers from all over the country in search of easy money.

I'm definitely no PC fan, but blaming them for lazy workers is the dumbest thing I've read since whatever Arash posted last.

[spikerS]

Originally posted by Tik-Tok


Or maybe it's because our booming economy attracted all the lazy stupid workers from all over the country in search of easy money.

Pretty much nailed it.

With the worker shortage over the past 10 years, companies settled for any warm body to fill a chair, or man a station. All those people that worked on an assembly line came out here for double or triple the pay, but now they have to think for themselves, and can't, and in turn, you get shit service or products.

The good news is, with all these lay offs, the bottom of this worker pool is going to head back to Toronto where their economy is starting to boom now.

[Robin Goodfellow]

Originally posted by ekguy
Has anyone noticed that it seems almost everywhere you go now people literally either don't know how to do a proper job or are so stupid they are completely incapable of doing a proper job..

Am I the only one getting utterly frustrated at the lack of good workers in their company? It's unreal...

I suggest there's two things going on here.

1) Decades of customer "Deal chasing" have driven wages to the bottom, and hurt employee-employer relationships to the point that folks understand they are merely numbers, not stakeholders, and don't give a shit.

2) Without any real challenges to their society, Canadians have gotten soft, and lost their fire. In fact, we have to fly halfway around the world to bomb goat farmers now, in order to find existential threats.


"...And now, so many years without a war, we have a generation rotten to the core". - Anna Domino

[HiTempguy1]

Originally posted by Graham_A_M

I guess it just comes down to HR, and the managements decision to keep the dead weight around, which is quite frustrating for guys like me that work incredibly hard, know their shit and are very dependable. Id be more then happy to take over some of their jobs, but alas, cant for reasons such as this.

I've made it fairly clear on these forums I am a union employee.

But this is exactly it. There is NOTHING in our policies (union contract or company policy) that stops the company from firing bad employees. Management simply doesn't do it

It blows my mind, and I've never understood why companies keep poor employees around.

[Graham_A_M]

^ Yeah thats a typical bastion of unions. Yes the pay and benefits are great, but wow is there ever a lot of human garbage you have to continually deal with. Not only that, but saying your a part of union can be quite a deal breaker with most companies, since they're fully expecting you to fit into that clout to some degree. To this day Ive yet to even apply to a union in my trade (Millwright), just because Im worried about the repercussions following it potentially. Id assume such a gig would be nice while it lasts, but its not something Id ever put on my resume'.

I agree though, since the money was so good for so long, Alberta has attracted a lot of shit people just looking for a decent paycheck. Now that thats not available anymore, these goofs are infiltrating other jobs that cause situations such as this. I just wish they'd pack up and go home so that good hardworking people such as myself would have half a chance at landing something. But alas, shit Ive applied at many places, and no luck..... frick its very frustrating.

[Arash Boodagh]

Its the cheating culture.
"Todays turbo charged system of global capitalism has given rise to a culture of self interest...
Americans are more focused on money, status and cheap thrills and are less concerned then looking out for one and another."

Speaker talks about the super rich cheating the most and shifting rules in their favour.

[Thales of Miletus]

Originally posted by Tik-Tok


Or maybe it's because our booming economy attracted all the lazy stupid workers from all over the country in search of easy money.

I'm definitely no PC fan, but blaming them for lazy workers is the dumbest thing I've read since whatever Arash posted last.

I will tar them with anything that will stick.

They cut education, they put mentally ill people on the street, and they defund childrens programs.

Yes the boom had a negative impact on the workforce. To fill labor rolls, anyone with two hands got accepted into the trades. Those people only learned about sitting around and earning a pay cheque. They never had to bust their ass to ensure they would be picked up on the next job.

[syscal]

TLDR

Found last year in Parksville on Vancouver Island the customer service was amazing. Ask a simple question in a grocery store and get the most enthusiastic answer from someone that genuinely cares about their job. I was speechless and I've been raving about it ever since.

In Calgary, they hold a mirror under your nose to make sure you're breathing and if there's a 50/50 chance you're alive, you're hired with bonuses and RSP matching.

We've gone through many a tech in the last 7 years but finally have a team we can count on. We'd be a lot bigger company right now if it weren't for the tech's we've had to fire. I could go on forever about those idiots but I guess that's what happens when you use kijiji and beyond to advertise jobs lol. Workopolis and a higher wage offering FTW.

IT is a stupidly hard industry to hire for, especially with O&G hiring techniques to compete with.

[Thales of Miletus]

Originally posted by syscal
TLDR

Found last year in Parksville on Vancouver Island the customer service was amazing. .

B.C. has always been a Province of people with work ethics.

[syscal]

Originally posted by Thales of Miletus


B.C. has always been a Province of people with work ethics.

I think it has to do with demand. Anyone with that level of work ethic here gets taken to a much higher level much faster, leaving the mouth breathers to fill in the customer service related jobs.

[ZenOps]

If you ask me, the money has only been OK in Alberta.

Realistically, most of the US is lobbying for minimum wage to be $15US/hour - which historically speaking should work out to be about $19CAD/hour.

States and cities are starting to mandate the minimum, Seattle should be at $15/hour for unskilled or no skilled workers in seven years.

Bangladesh should raise its minimum wage from $38/month to $380/month. In order to achieve that, they must print at least, at least 10x more of the local currency.

Factor in that many things are more expensive in Canada, gasoline, DVD's, milk and you can see somewhat how "you get what you pay for". And with the current monetary system of money printing to the moon, you will have to accept the fact that no matter how skilled or unskilled your children are - they might just be making 10x what you did (in cotton, plastic or electronic dollar form)

I hate to quote numbers in dollars (because it is all just a numbers game afterall) But to keep up with the US, given the high cost of living (Hongcouver) Its not totally unreasonable to assume that in the near future $25CDN/hour for no skilled labour might be on the outside chance of plausible. But long before then, half of the no skilled workers will be replaced by killer robots.

Of course, in imaginarylanddollars - because noone produces 20 to 40 pounds of nickel for an every day wage of $100 to $200 anymore. I will work for a 20-pound box of real nickels and a $100 bill each day, but how many employers can actually do that? I'd also work for two billion gallons of senior water rights in California.

[speedog]

Hat's off to ekguy, don't know if it was ekguy's intent or not but in less than an eight hour timespan you have managed to engage the abominable quartet in a single thread - ekguy, probably without even trying you have succeeded where others have failed.