If I were to draw a pie chart of how I divide up my waking hours, I freely confess "work" would form a rather thinner slice than it used to. Scaling back from an insane 50 - 60 hours per week to my contractual 35 has left me feeling as though I am permanently on holiday. One day last week, I left work early to go and catch the 4.30pm showing of "Skyfall" and even though I had officially booked flexi time, I still felt vaguely uneasy throughout, and kept glancing behind me as though there was a Corporate Spy in the auditorium.
So when Line Manager sends out an email to my team seeking a volunteer, I am on the point of responding in my by-now-customary manner (Skim Read Then Instantly Consign to Oblivion) when I suddenly find my finger hovering over the delete key. I scroll back to the beginning of his email and read it through properly. He is seeking assistance with a specific and time-limited project; and the nature of the assistance is desk-bound, solitary, and therefore appears mind-numbingly tedious. Unsurprisingly, despite his urgent plea for help, no-one has yet responded.
I perform a rapid "pros and cons" assessment. There are only two pros as far as I can see, but they are weighty ones:
1. The project involves some liaison with Procurement. Not as ghastly as it sounds, because for some mysterious reason my organisation has managed to attract several personable, well-dressed, young male officers into this role. (Yes, Anonymous Council's Procurement Team is sexy).
2. If I volunteer, I will float about the Town Hall for a week or two being extremely busy, which means that when the project has finished I can disappear back to my satellite office for about 3 months before it occurs to anyone to question my commitment and dedication.
Frankly, it's a no brainer!
Within 11 minutes of receipt, I send Line Manager a polite email volunteering my services, which he receives and reads straight away. At this point it is 10.30am.
As the working day wears on, I check my emails periodically but no response pops up from Line Manager. Nothing, nada, zilch. In fact if a resounding silence can be said to emanate from a desktop computer, then the one emanating from mine is positively deafening...
I realise that my offer may have come as a slight surprise - nay, shock! - to Line Manager. After all, following his formal reprimand for bullying behaviour towards me, our relationship has been the teensiest bit strained. I am doubtless the very last person with whom he wants to undertake this project. But he needs a volunteer from our team, and I am the only one who seems to be putting their hand up. So he's in a wee bit of a pickle.
24 hours later, when I have forgotten all about my kind and generous offer, Line Manager emails me to "gratefully accept".
Yeah, right.
I make a start on the project a day later, reviewing dozens of documents and making notes, beavering away quietly by myself in a corner of the main Town Hall office.
And something completely unexpected happens.
I find myself very engrossed and interested in what I am doing.
It's been a loooong time since I felt this about my work. I stopped being interested in my work when it finally dawned on me that my employing organisation was headed up by bully boys who would stop at nothing to defend their way of life. And it's been so long since I enjoyed my work, I had forgotten what that feels like.
It actually feels quite good to go home after 8 hours work and know that one has fairly earned one's salary.
Yes, it feels pretty darn good.
I wonder how long this feeling is going to last.....?
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