simple living
by ermine
16 comments
Archives
- May 2013 (4)
- April 2013 (4)
- March 2013 (4)
- February 2013 (6)
- January 2013 (5)
- December 2012 (3)
- November 2012 (3)
- October 2012 (8)
- September 2012 (10)
- August 2012 (5)
- July 2012 (7)
- June 2012 (5)
- May 2012 (12)
- April 2012 (5)
- March 2012 (5)
- February 2012 (5)
- January 2012 (7)
- December 2011 (6)
- November 2011 (8)
- October 2011 (6)
- September 2011 (3)
- August 2011 (8)
- July 2011 (5)
- June 2011 (8)
- May 2011 (7)
- April 2011 (9)
- March 2011 (9)
- February 2011 (3)
- January 2011 (8)
- December 2010 (10)
- November 2010 (7)
- October 2010 (10)
- September 2010 (8)
- August 2010 (6)
- July 2010 (10)
- June 2010 (13)
- May 2010 (10)
- April 2010 (16)
- November 2007 (1)
Why Office Work is Bad For You
Why Office Work Is Bad For Us
I’ve just read Matthew Crawford’s The Case For Working With Your Hands, subtitled Why Office Work is Bad For Us and Fixing Things can Feel Good.
It’s a great book, marred by writing that ranges from the turgid to the sublime. The author’s observation of “knowledge work” echoes the changes I have seen in the modern workplace, accelerated by globalisation. The problem, basically, is that wages in the West are high relative to emerging economies, so work that is relocatable will be relocated to cheaper regions. His advice is to choose a career in fields that require a physical presence – doctors good, radiologists bad. Image files can be transferred to cheaper wage economies for radiology, by the surgeon who opens you up has really got to be there with you…
At the same time, the separation of thinking from doing makes knowledge work increasingly unsatisfying. It is hard to see where your piece fits in, unlike the example of an electrician, who knows he has succeded if the lights come on and stay on. This deracination of work makes management of knowledge workers harder. You can see if the carpenter’s door fits or the shelves are level, but performance management is virtually impossible for knowledge workers – what on earth do you measure that you can ascribe to a particular individual’s efforts? The description of the essentials of knowledge worker management is inspired. When reduced to its fundamentals, the principles of much contemporary management is
“push details down and pull credit up”
A good carpenter’s work will develop his career for him – people will favour someone whose work is aesthetically pleasing and stands the test of time, whereas progression in offices is frequently down to luck, being in the right place at the right time in reorganisations and avoiding being associated with any projects that become train wrecks.
The original title of the book as “Shop Class as Soulcraft, an Inquiry into the Value of Work” but British readers wouldn’t recognise [work]shop class; older readers might be able to relate to shop class as woodworking and metalworking subjects at school but there is little current equivalent.
I think I read it shortly out of uni, and I was working at the BBC in London. They had some management muppetry, but not enough for the message of the book to get through 
You made me think about the shift in tolerance as one gets older. You’ve put your finger on something there, something I hadn’t really realized before. I feel a why office work is bad for you 2 post coming on…
Sounds like a very interesting read. And yes, we’d probably all be wise to get into work that can’t be exported. Or create more demand for locally produced items. I notice that the French seem to need to learn that lesson. All the striking and protesting you can do will not save a job that is more cheaply done overseas.
[...] Why office work is bad for you – Simple in Suffolk [...]
Some of that French striking and protesting seems to be part of the national culture, leastways that’s how it looks from Blighty; they’ve been at it for decades My partner used to live in France and observed that there are some things the French do that are very in tune with local living and consuming local produce, and the Mairie system in particular helps local communities and puts people in touch with each other. They’re nuts to be thinking of giving that up!
[...] are the way to get the best out of their knowledge workers. This sort of micromanagement is why office work is bad for you. It saps your soul. The tragedy is that it is a lose-lose situation – the company [...]
[...] and investing in establishing a business that I can use to generate an income after finishing office work at The Firm. That way I am riding the bulls with long-term pre-tax savings while trying to hedge [...]
[...] on the farmland, he’s quiet today. It is a good midsummer, too good a day to be spent in the office but good nevertheless. [...]
[...] This is but one small part of the problem, however. Up to the 1980s, it was quite possible to run a family on one person’s income. That isn’t so easy now, largely as a result of the high cost of housing in the UK. This can’t so easily be laid on the door of capitalism, more to social changes. House prices will always rise to the level where they become marginally affordable to the typical household, because supply is limited on a small island and the only countervailing force on price is the ability to pay. The fact that it takes two average salaries to be able to afford a house makes those with dependents into particularly fearful wage slaves, and contributes to the anomie of modern working life. [...]
[...] realised in 2008 that working in an office is not the way I want to spend the rest of my life. Some events before then had made me re-evaluate [...]
[...] I am no cabinet-maker, my carpentry is imprecise, so outdoor construction is good for me. It has the satisfaction of working with real stuff with my hands, unlike how I earn a living at the moment. Plus it costs less than £50 in wood, [...]
maybe I’ll fulfill a life long dream of becoming a chef…
@Matt, That’s another one that’s not easy to relocate or outsource, and indeed a work where skill and reputation is in the art and execution. The proof is in the eating.. 
you know what…. i am going to look in to this a bit more… maybe 23 is too old to change careers !
by The Quiet Man reckons we want to all work till we’re 70? Dream on… « Simple Living in Suffolk
[...] How I yearn for the old ways where my work stood for my competence. As Matthew Crawford said in Why Office Work Is Bad For You, you can tell a good carpenter by the way his doors move smoothly and are set well in the doorway. [...]
[...] not the sort of performance management that is ruining office jobs by making them paint-by-numbers, I’m happy to say. What I’m looking at here is how do you know if you should get out [...]
Did you ever read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance? It sounds a bit like this, albeit it fictional form and with a dose of 70s hippy chic.
Funny how these things tend to go in waves.
I think office work is bearable in your 20s when it’s an extension of school, you go out with your mates after work, and you’re trying to get off with Meg from the PR department.
Once you’re a grown up, it’s patronizing childishness becomes pretty unbearable unless you’re very lucky with where you work.
Sadly I haven’t made the leap to working with my hands – unless you count typing!