As it is only my third day at the new job, it’s unfair to judge it too harshly. But I’m going to anyway. From here on in it will be referred to as MegaCorp.
MegaCorp is hugely massive. Saying it’s bigger than I’m used to is a severe understatement. It’s bigger than anyone can conceive. I don’t care what anyone says, it’s too big to be comprehended by anyone, which obviously includes the C*Os. However, despite its ludicrous size, the whole functions like a well-oiled machine; a well oiled machine thats totally fucked in the most fundamental way.
To give you a taste of how it all works, or doesn’t, here are some guidelines for survival at MegaCorp.:
- You need to GLA, preferably TLAs.
- For every administrative task that needs automating, provide at least two systems that are both incomplete and incompatible
- Calculate how long any job will take by multiplying the realistic time by two and adding two more days.
- For every employee in a normal business, employ five. Then split each group of five into two competing groups with disarmingly similar acronyms. Then, each group can blame the other for failing to do any work:
“Nothing to do with us, pass it to NOBHED.”
“Those bastards are always doing that – tell FUKFAYS they have to initialise the process before we can touch it.” - Ignore 2/3 of all email. You’ll be too busy otherwise. And if someone can’t be bothered to mail you three times it can’t be that urgent.
Ah well. Once I get access to all of the things I need access to I’m genuinely looking forward to getting my teeth into some good technical stuff. Luckily the guys […and I mean ‘Guys’ – AFAICT there are only two women in the entire building…] I’m working with are technical and there are plenty of opportunities to get deep into some juicy code.
