A bad smell

I’ve been listening this morning to Radio National Talk-back regarding taboos in the workplace.

 

I was particularly taken by a comment by someone describing what I believe they thought was the perfect work lunch – everyone with their alarms set to signal the end of the scheduled one hour, no alcohol consumption, only mineral water, no risque, racist, sexist,  ageist, leftist, rightist, religious or political conversation. I thought to myself: If I was at that table I would be poking out my eyes with the dining fork.

So, the discussions led to two taboo types:

• One the things you cannot do in the workplace; and two

• The things you cannot talk about.

 I expected the former to focus on acts of intimacy enjoyed between two people in the privacy of their own non-work environment, but no, the conversation was about  aromatic foods and swearing. 

I know what a salmon can opened in the air does – it wafts into every crevice of the universe and lingers until it has sucked all the air into itself and exploded into a million pieces, reminding one for weeks that it had a brief, but mind (or nostril) numbing existence. The same could be said of egg sandwiches and some curries.  

No-one mentioned the crunch of celery sticks or the persistent whistler, but they did bemoan the demise of the sick room – a bex and a good lie down for half an hour used to do it.

We covered off perfumes and how a good cuppa with the team first thing in the morning will get your worries off you chest and you can tell the non-soap user that they really do stink and then go blithely about your work for the day content in the fact that you have it off your chest. 

Do I want to work there? 

I think not!

 It appears that one cannot talk about ‘flexibility’ for workers. It’s a taboo. I was alarmed to hear the academic positing about this that flexible workplaces are not productive because flexibility for some means impost on others. Now, I say, show me the evidence of the former, and show me the actions management has taken to mitigate the latter. My experience is when you give people flexibility and some control over their work arrangements, you end up with more bang for your buck, so to speak.

I was pleased to hear someone say that we have moved to trying to regulate good manners.

As for swearing, I think it’s about context. I recall being in my private office once letting off steam  about a particularly difficult client who was outside hyperventilating into a paper bag having behaved like a mad person and burst in demanding the universe and my first born. A colleague came in, overheard my rant to myself and chastised me about my language being offensive to her. 

My advice: Don’t come in to my office unannounced!

You see, I think there are a range of tabbos that are much more significant than any of the things I heard cited this morning. 

My list includes:

• Red tape and process for the sake of it
•  A culture that values presence rather than outcome
• Workplaces that promote inept good talkers into people management roles and who then destroy everyone within their arm span
• Managers who can’t find anything valuable in what existed before them

I’m reminded that women were once a workplace taboo

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Art Work of the Week.

I think some of my tea cosies might be taboo in the office- a bit phallic me thinks

Rocket Man

I had a dream

I have just returned from a trip to Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast. It’s been a while since I was there last, but Kangaroo Point did not fail to please: wonderful hotel overlooking the river, great breakfasts at the nearby corner store, spicy Bloody Mary’s at the Story Bridge hotel, and a short saunter to the ferry.

 That’s the first time I have used the river transport, but it is a highly efficient and leisurely way to wend one’s way across to the city, down to New Farm for a Saturday morning stroll and BBQ, or to wile away a number of hours nautically partying on a paddle steamer.

My only complaint is that everything has River in it’s name and you can end up totally confused  - or was that the G&T’s?

Yandina sits just behind Coolum Beach and I was lucky enough to be a guest with the family of a friend.  This was the closest you get to resort living without a resort – laid back on the verandah, birds coming in to feed, a champagne in hand while the dinner sizzles away in the webber. And we topped it off with a booking at the Spirit House restaurant – a must if you visit the area . Great service, fantastic food and almost genuinely Thai ambiance.

All together, a hedonistic adventure. 

But I am puzzled by a couple of things I have only ever seen in Queensland:

What is Post Box Man Parking or a Limbless Soldiers Club? 

I have, however, not been left wondering about whether our prominent politicians have had an dictionary injection in my absence. It’s the same old, same old.

It’s budget week, but the election campaigning is on in earnest.

Look for recurrent use henceforth of:

·         Cut to the bone

·         Stop the boats (……Oh spare me please)

·         Age of entitlement

·         Governments should only do what people can’t do for themselves.

·         Cuts to the Public Service

After all that I had a dream:

I dreamed that I had lost my job due to cuts to the public service, and that it didn’t really matter to my local member as I was not a farmer with a drought stricken business, or a manufacturing worker whose job was being shipped off shore. I knew I couldn’t expect any sympathy or help because governments should only do what people can’t do for themselves. I thought to myself, this is the age of enlightenment and no doubt we will soon see brilliant and exciting ideas spinning around in the ether, seeping through the community so we are transformed into a higher state of being. Unfortunately I had misread the day’s headlines and mistook Entitlement for Enlightenment. A closer inspection proved even more disappointing as I realised that the age of entitlement was over. – before I even knew it had begun.

So like a true Aussie digger, I picked myself up and decide to do some civil service and get my hands dirty by stopping the boats. I tried holding back the local fishing fleet by paddling in to its path as they headed for shore to unload their catch, but I was overcome by seagulls and had to concede. I  tried to hold back a neighbour’s 15ft tinnie and stop it floating up the channel as he parked the boat trailer, but I slipped on the boat ramp cutting myself to the bone on half a dozen oyster Kilpatrick shells. 

I thought I could join the limbless soldier’s club having all but severed my forearm, but I couldn’t find one nearby. So I just propped myself against the post box man parking sign and cogitated whether  a man with a post box would come along to park it any time soon and hoped he would have a first aid kit.

It all got too silly and I woke up.

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Art Work of the Week 

You can see all my tea cosies at the Old Bus Depot Markets in Canberra this Sunday, May 19

Check Mate