The Online Investing AI Blog

After I noticed that I only read books once, I decided to start using the library (what a concept!). I was quite surprised to find the library very different from the last time I visited one, which was back in high school. Who goes to the library, anyway?

Your Local Public Library

What I noticed today is that most of the people in the library weren’t using books at all! They were using their laptop and the free internet service, or one of the computers in the library. In fact, the library offers a bunch of free services that make it a good office or place to study. It has big tables, uncomfortable chairs (to keep you awake), it’s nice and cool in summer, and a bathroom.

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Pic by mamamusings @ Flickr

Most employees are bound by a strict code. To keep employed, they’re expected to be loyal, dependable, perform tricks on demand, and subvert their own will to the will of the organization.

If this description sounds vaguely familiar, it should. This is basically the description of both a good employee–and a good dog.

In most workplaces, employees are cogs in the inevitable means-to-an-end. And that’s the way they’re treated.

The problem is that most people want to be good employees. It’s tied in with the work ethic that makes these workers feel like they are both a bad employee and a bad person if they don’t offer anything but their best work. On the other hand, they don’t want to be treated like a faithful hound, either.

There are ways, though, that you can be a bad employee, but remain a good person. It starts with the novel idea that no matter who signs your checks, you are always working for yourself.

Here are a couple tips:

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As technology begins to accelerate, there seems to be one thing that can’t seem to catch up: attitudes. Our reality is still mired in 18th and 19th century thought patterns.

In fact, our schedule is not much different from the average Joe or Jane heading to work in the mid-20th century. As author of the Four-Hour Work Week, Tim Ferriss, says: for whatever reason, people have decided to shuffle papers from 9 to 5. (This is a great book, by the way, I’ll probably have more to say about it in future posts.)

This is despite the fact that technology and the internet makes most clock-watching, commuting jobs irrelevant. There’s probably nothing you’re doing at your current occupation that you couldn’t do somewhere, some when, and with some people you like better.

So why do we drag our sorry selves into the office five days a week, eight-or-nine-or-ten-or more hours each day? My guess is that the Office Space is nothing more than an extension of high school and, in most cases, middle school. (Probably elementary school for some of you, too.) It’s a place to socialize. Even the hierarchical structure of work (CEO-Directors-Managers-Supervisors) mimics the structure of schools (Superintendent, Principals, Teachers, Teacher’s pets) right?

Over time, I expect this to change. The latest rumblings of a four-day work week to help save gas might have unexpected consequences. It might just be the final straw for this out-moded system. Maybe the four-hour work week isn’t too far off.

Online Investing AI four hour work week, office, office space, timothy ferriss, work