I Hate People...But It's Nothing Personal

Ten Great Reasons To Hate Yourself

Sometimes we're the people we hate. That's one factor that Jonathan Littman and I point out in I Hate People — that we all, occasionally if not more often, exhibit the signs of the Ten least Wanted. So if you're concerned about navigating around the lunkheads in your office, it's probably wise to begin figuring out when you're the hazard being navigated around.

When you don't, you can be in danger of having your actions (or inactions) catch up with you and falling prey to the pitfalls Steve Tobak warns about in his BNET blog entry 10 Ways To Destroy Your Management Career. Whether it's Cutting Corners on Something Important, Documenting Something in an Email No One Should See, or even Getting in the Crosshairs of a Psycho Employee, chances are you could have prevented any of the mishaps Steve outlines from happening if you develop a little self-awareness about your own occasionally annoying personality traits.

Jump over to Steve's piece and take a read. And don't be afraid to hate yourself up once in a while — it's good for the soul.

— Marc Hershon

We Should Have Attached More Strings

Introducing a New Member of the Least Wanted Cast

According to reports out today, Big Business is continuing to build up cash and strong earnings are expected to be announced later this week. Great news...unless you're a small business. One of the thousands that can't get loans or hire more people because they don't have the money the loans would give them.

The problem seems to be — surprise! — the Banks. They just won't give any money out to the little guys. Ironic, considering that they were the little guys when they came before Congress last year groveling for mass cash infusions to keep them afloat. Money that, when all was said and done, came from us, the actual little guys.

According to an AP story, Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke was speaking at a Federal Reserve conference that was being held to look into ways to increase lending to small companies. Not that the Fed has the authority to make the banks do squat. Or do they? Back when the economic crisis hit hardest, in 2008, they did set up such a lending program to provide low-cost loans...to banks.

"Making credit accessible to sound small businesses is crucial to our economic recovery," Bernanke said. "More must be done."

Gee, Ben, like maybe when you gave all that money to banks you might have thought to make it a condition of the handout that they return the favor?

All of which is a preamble leading up to our big introduction. When Jonathan Littman and I wrote I Hate People! last year, we included The Ten Least Wanted. This is the group of archetypes one tends to find in every place from business, from the Bulldozer boss to the Switchblade co-worker to the Sheeple subordinates. We knew then that we couldn't hope to corral all of the Least Wanteds in the world into just 10 categories. And so it is that Ben Bernanke is a fitting intro to our newest cast member...

Ineffectual

STEREOTYPE: Larry Tate from Bewitched, Colonel Klink from Hogan's Heroes, or Homer Simpson from, of course, The Simpsons: "D'oh!"

PSYCH SHOT: Unable to render the simplest decision, most likely due to being constantly browbeaten and/or second guessed by parents and peers even at a very young age. Low to no self-esteem, often covered by bluster.

Ineffectuals exist at every level of society, in every tier of business, government, and religion. One would think they'd be doomed to failure for their inability to successfully complete any but the most mundane of tasks. (And, often times, even those elude them.) It's for this very feature that they often bumble their way upwards instead of down.

For it's Ineffectuals that step in where angels fear to tread, more so than fools. Because of their very ineffectiveness, these poor souls don't even realize why it is that they are powerless to accomplish much of anything. There are always, "many forces which we're still coming to grips with," or "studies into the matter have been inconclusive." If the Ineffectual had any real ability to suss out a problem, the trail would lead right back to themselves.

Certainly there's more to be said for — or is that against? — the Ineffectual, but that will stand as an introduction. As we explore the Ineffectual more we'll also reveal some solutions for dealing with this ceaseless challenge to productivity and advancement.

It's should be clear to most that there actually are many confusing elements behind the current economic mess that continues to march on. Nonetheless, there's no denying that certain members of the government, the banking industry, and the Federal Reserve stand to be stamped with the label of Ineffectual.

— Marc Hershon

Feel free to post your comments about how you've dealt with Ineffectuals on the job or in daily life. The frustrations. The solutions. Whatever you feel the need to get off your chest about these stumbling blocks to humanity's evolution.

Personal Peeves, Commute Dept.

The environment being in the state that it is today, I can't help but admire those who choose to ride a bicycle rather than drive. (I'd do it, on the days I have to be in the office, but the 60-mile roundtrip makes it more than a little daunting.) And I'm all for "Share The Road!", that initiative that bikes and autos should be able to co-exist on America's highways and byways. But, once in a while, when I get behind one of those "Own The Road" cyclists who plant themselves mid-lane and then have the audacity who think their pedal-pumping is propelling them somewhere near the speed limit, that's when I find myself muttering the "I hate people" mantra again.

It's always on a two-lane road where there's a bike lane they choose not to use, steady oncoming traffic, and not enough room to pass. Invariably, when you finally do find a spot to get around them, they shoot you a dirty look just for having the nerve to pass them in your exhaust-belching, speed-limit exceeding motorized planet killer.

The only thing to compound that headache is to add a lumbering truck with an odd-sized trailer that you can't see over, under, around or through.

That's what delayed my arrival at the office today. A truck with the aforementioned dimensions lurched into my exit lane, directly in front of me, just as I was getting off the highway. It was driving just fast enough to catch one of the bikers I talk about above. So now the slow-moving truck was unable to pass an even slower moving cyclist.

So there we were. A very slow, sad parade making our way down the road. Five miles later, a second lane opened and we all finally went our separate ways.

In retrospect, there had been a perfectly  reasonable workaround if I'd only had the stones: I could have passed 'em both in the bike lane that had gone unused.

— Marc Hershon