Monday, January 25, 2010

Find a Soup Kitchen

"Work somewhere in a soup kitchen or something
if you can't take the pressure."

Any political position has pressure. Any job affiliated with politics has pressure. Any job that has responsibility of any kind has pressure attached to it. You will always get the complainers. In our city you get much more than that. Our economy has produced a pressure never experienced before by workers as companies downsize. Budget cuts and hiring freezes have added to the responsibilities of all those workers still with jobs. Sometimes there is just too much work for employees. But even if there isn't, they lose their enthusiasm and start to complain to anyone who will listen as departments are asked to cut budgets, watch for waste and become more efficient. Sometimes it is the simplest of things like reporting to their boss once a week that will provoke the complaint.

In my last job I worked long hours as does our City manager. I didn't complain, nor does she. I did not get extra compensation for those hours; neither does she--it is part of the job. I just liked to work and I really enjoyed the self-satisfaction I received from doing the job better than the next guy. Here we have many people protected by Unions that just don't want to do anything over and above their job description. Afterall, they have the "right to complain" or so they believe.

When you have a city in crisis as we do in Lake Worth, it takes a city manager who can make the tough decisions. Because of past city managers, we are in the mess that we are in today. Because of past managers, employees are used to the status quo and not having to answer for anything. They feel offended if they are asked "What's going on?" I believe that this is the major change within our city that has attributed to the stress, real or invented, of some employees. When the CM asks them to write a written report, they say it is micro-managing and that is just an excuse to rebel against any added duty.

We hired a city manger to clean up the mess. We didn't hire Mother Teresa. If we do not get on track here we will not have a city in five years. Let's allow her to do the job. For all those who believe that they don't have to listen to their boss or if they can't take the pressure, there's always that soup kitchen.


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