According to their own assessment, problems with superiors were those who loudly objected to too many hours and other forms of total involvement.
Third insight from the study: Men and women and pretty much everyone else (at least in consulting firms) find it difficult to achieve a work-life balance. Because the years of chatter about money-isn’t-everything and work-isn’t-everything hasn’t even gotten through to most bosses yet. Instead, pressure and presence fetishism reign.
Laziness can be learned: 12 tips
In your company too? It’s time to learn how to fake stress and avoid work.
- Your projects are fundamentally huge, difficult and stressful for the customers. Everyone should know that. That’s why it doesn’t hurt to curse the customer, roll your eyes or groan audibly after a phone call.
- At the Monday meeting, the list of things you have completed may not be long enough. List absolutely everything, even things that only took ten minutes.
- Move around the building a lot and always seem rushed. If you stroll, you have too much time. They should also always have some documents with them, even when they go to the toilet. If you use the place on another floor, it won’t be noticeable.
- Always write down when you are on the phone, even if it happens to be your mother. Seems important and organized.
Delegate unpleasant things
- Bring sandwiches with you once or twice a week and eat them at your desk. When colleagues ask you at half past twelve if they would like to come to the canteen, they say “again tomorrow” or “unfortunately it’s not possible today”.
- If you have an office to yourself, you should regularly and ostentatiously close the door. That seems focused. If a colleague opens the door, allow about five seconds to pass before turning away from the screen and looking at him.
- Do you have to visit customers regularly? Find some nearby and you’ll have enough room to spend an extra hour with your family without being noticed.
- Do you work from home? Then you should make a lot of calls and be reachable early in the morning and late in the afternoon. What they do in between is often not noticed. In this way, one of the people interviewed in the study mentioned above managed to go skiing with his family for a week without being noticed.
Anyone who presents has little work and a lot of praise
- Delegate systematically. Most people are enthusiastic about a job when they are told that only they can do it successfully. If your boss tries the cheap trick on you, you fall for him without protesting – and then continue to delegate the task.
- Emphasize your ability to work as a team. For example, by being the first to announce in the new working group that you would be happy to give the presentation to the department afterwards. In this way, they avoid substantive, possibly time-consuming work – after all, they already have a task. Nevertheless, this is how you get the most praise.
- Sit out the unpleasant things. Anyone who is always busy has to prioritize. The boring evaluation that the boss really wants can sometimes slip back on the list.
- Never waste any words about why they are leaving at 5 p.m. Instead, you suddenly set off, some documents in your hand, as if you had almost missed an appointment. With three or four quick steps you are at the office door, say “I have to,” or “see you tomorrow,” and that’s it.
Executives like actors
Your boss can’t be fooled that easily, don’t you think? Don’t you notice that you want to shirk and still be praised?
True. But it doesn’t matter. Because managers like actors. When Erin Reid, a junior professor from Boston, presented the results of her research to the bosses of the consultants she interviewed, their reaction was most remarkable. Rather than perhaps lowering employees’ expectations of constant availability and thereby tempting them less to act out, the senior consultants said they preferred employees who feigned chronic overwork to those who complained of too much stress.
What’s more, the heads of the consulting firm seriously asked Erin Reid how women could be taught to simulate as often as men.
