A Resilient Empathy: Mourning the Death of Work Ethic

In my shifts, I was never off my feet, and my feet were almost constantly moving. I spied customers and beat them to the cash register every time without difficulty, while they planted themselves behind the cash register and refused to move. “There’s a customer in the store,” they’d say.

Pointing out the available time and opportunity to get something done became ridiculous.

On the day I walked out, an older worker and I unloaded boxes and pushed heavy carts. They danced and joked with each other while fervently avoiding any customers. Hey, at least they weren’t draped over the counter again, right?

I’m nobody’s dog, and my early family life gave me a good grounding in how it feels to be working while everyone else is living it up. I have a repressed well of emotion in that regard, and well, I’ll be, if it didn’t rise like a dragon inside of me and declare, “Enough.”

It seems my well isn’t dry yet because I walked around the corner into the family business to see the summer student sitting on the manager’s chair pulled up to the cash register.

Trying to see over it without standing up, with two fans trained on her (as opposed to circulating the air for the entire building), she beamed at me.

In a singsong, she told me she’s doing great and catching up on her true crime podcasts.

I warned her not to get caught.

She replied, “It’s podcasts or music.”

I marched away instead of clarifying. Two sentances could help this girl: “Why?” and “I’m sorry.”

I knew she’d been told not to sit in that chair. Twice.

There had been a stool, which she used so frequently that it was removed. Now, the only chair available was being exploited.

Prioritizing Immediate Comfort

How does it feel to pay an employee only to see them ignore you and try to do as little as possible?

Angry, I hope.

When I’d calmed down enough, which is to say the impulse to form a fist and launch it into her singsong-y mouth had died down, I reported the infraction. Like a little tattle tale, telling stories out of school or whatever shame you decide is deserved upon someone who rats you out.

Not too much later, when caught in the act (so much for my warning), she didn’t apologize. She couldn’t explain why she’d done it when told not to. She justified that she was using the tip, not the whole thing.

Seriously? I can imagine some man saying this about his man parts, and I laugh out loud.

At least a dog jumps off the couch when he hears you coming, even though there’s still a telltale warmth left behind, and the employee didn’t even jump.

Can’t stand, can’t jump. Is there an entire generation with wobbly thigh muscles, glutes that don’t work, and so on along the whole skeleton?

I know that when you are happily comfortable on a record-breaking hot day because you are sitting on a cool leather chair hogging the fans while the four other workers are busting it in the heat, there is something wrong with your empathy.

Can’t you see that you are acting like you deserve better than everyone else?

Is that truly what you think? Or are you unaware and unobservant of the world around you while you prioritize your immediate comfort, unable to take even a pea in the mattress?

Sorry, we don’t hire princesses here (anymore).

Creating Personal Standards

If there’s one thing I know, the order of insults goes like this: lazy, dumb, mean. Once you get off your butt and learn, and still choose to act like that, then clearly, you are mean.

My mistake in life was thinking of mean as the first explanation.

When I am mean, it is on purpose. I assumed my order was universal, but learned I had it backwards.

As an adult, suffice it to say that my victim card is played out.

As I train my partner on what to say to these employees of his who seem to think they are paid to get through their shift with as little sweat as possible, I’ve found my words and the ear that needed them.

Lazy, I am not, although it might look that way when I am planning, reflecting, learning or strategizing. I’ve proven that I can unpack boxes for eight hours.

My second mistake is my constant assumption that any random person I meet is as intelligent as I am; no dumber, no smarter, simply about the same.

I was named best in Canada at what I do, and I found many ways to scoff at that bestowal. However, I am starting to accept the reality that my degree in chemical engineering might indicate otherwise.

An ex-summer student looked at me and must have thought, “Well, if she can.” That poor girl made it for only a few weeks. At least I might be smarter than I look.

Who do you think you are?

When that lazy summer student asked me that, I replied by quitting.

Are you someone who thinks you deserve an easier path through life than those walking beside you? How unempathetic can you be?

Earning Just Desserts

First, I realize you haven’t noticed. If you have, then you must be congratulating yourself for getting ahead.

But your winning point is a losing one.

You lose because you don’t get to experience how time flies when you are busy. You are bored, time drags on, and you are your own worst enemy. Moreover, you are getting a poor performance appraisal from anyone who sees you, and the reference might follow you forever.

You don’t get to experience the pride of a job well done, the exhaustion from a day well spent, or the joy at having earned not just money but skills and experience.

What do you need a break for, if you are already checking your phone and resting your feet? Your career will destroy your self-concept if you can’t make it through a part-time shift. Rest assured, you are not as privileged, brilliant, or charming as you think.

Good luck, city dweller. You might have been raised in anonymity, but you can’t hide here. This entire community knows who you are. You might not get another summer job in these parts.

Ah, now that I see you as the loser you are, and feel the karmic blanket that indeed, pain and suffering will follow you, if you’ve escaped it for this minute, I can put my irritation aside and welcome back the empathy that I’d rather reside in my body.

You poor, lazy loser, you’ve got it all backwards. The point in life is not to get through it as easily and smoothly as possible, like you are a porcelain doll who might shatter at the rip of a muscle fibre.

Rips are how you get stronger.

Strength is the difference between acting like you tried and using your God-given muscles to the extent of their ability. Every woman has muscles; contracting them will do you good.

My first job was at Dairy Queen. There were no stools for staff; sometimes, two buses would unload at once. If I took one thing away, it was that higher education was for me. I quit before a year was up and dedicated myself to my studies.

Resilience is knowing that you can take it because you’ve done it before and can do it again, but it’s Practical Wisdom to plan a higher road.

What do you think you learned all summer, if you spent it strategizing ways to get to the end of your shift as quickly as possible?

So much so that you get there late every shift and leave early? It was so important to leave early that she left the cash and store unattended to check why her relief worker wasn’t there yet. Aren’t you all playing that game against the clock?

Cash, unattended! She didn’t apologize for that either. Lessons are needed on multiple fronts, but you can’t teach a narcissist empathy or remorse; you can filter them out in the interview. (Tell me about the worst mistake you’ve made. Narcissist: I’ve never!)

What happened to work ethic?

Good people are generous. They notice when help is needed before it is asked. Help is offered early and often.

As such, I offered to do the hiring and managing for next summer, much to everyone’s relief.

Small towns are tight communities through the value of mutual benefit. When it rains, we all win. When you dry the well with your lawn sprinkler, we are all angry, and there’s no mistaking the evidence.

Communicating Transparent Standards

In my life and career, I valued decision-making which was heavy with facts and data and devoid of extraneous emotion. I ignored fear/love, but paid attention to depression/rage.

Because of opaque marking systems, I dropped subjective subjects as fast as I could in favour of science and math.

In university, I was that kind of jerk who would argue with the professor. It’s right or wrong, whether you like me or not. Since most people did not, I knew I needed a transparent and concrete world if I was going to succeed.

For whatever reason, the size of my social circle was never a prioritizing criterion. It was more like something I paid little to no attention to. A stroke of luck or a source of power, being okay with being alone is required if you are going to strike out on it, which is good because that’s what I did.

In a world of engineers, things were so clear-cut, documented, and communicated that surprises rarely happened. Within the details of those procedures, miracles occurred, but one was never at a loss for what to do if that only prescribed who you needed and what you needed to discover from each other by way of a template to complete, questions to ask, or an agenda to follow.

Most importantly, it was never anyone’s fault. It was a training procedure, a machine, a setpoint, something we could change, but no one got fired.

Progress happened one prevention at a time, but elsewhere, the wheel of fortune spins with one hire after another.

Yet, I quit that engineering job because another engineer acted in plays at night and slept at his desk all day. My manager said, “Forget about it.”

I haven’t.

Finding Subjective Fault

In absolute contrast, in the world of service professionals, there was a library of templates, agendas, and questions, but there was never consensus on what applied when and how. As such, leaders competed, experimented, and yanked the ship’s wheel back and forth while we lowly spreadsheet masters got jerked back and forth.

The results were equally different. People were always getting fired or let go.
I wish I could have communicated better, led better, or done whatever I needed, but I was unable. I doubt anything is different today, even while tariffs loom. They will raise prices, lay people off, and beg for tax relief.

It’s hard to win in a subjective world, but it’s hard to lose, too. When all the waves are crashing together, you don’t know what boat is at fault, but then finally, all the tourists go home, the wind stops, and there’s that jerk testing everyone’s docks and mutilating the shoreline beyond worldly repair.

Yes, I see you, and I bought better binoculars.

Amazon can solve problems, but shopping shouldn’t be the first step in your toolkit – it should be the last. That includes your HR department and their search for a better whomever over the one who made the mistake.

Perhaps your culture is upside down because of a shared belief that work is something to be avoided, minimized, and endured instead of a source of fulfilment, pride and joy? And in such a risky yet stagnant culture, who wouldn’t want to avoid it?

It’s not them that’s wrong, it’s the environment.

Instead of finding fault with the person, find fault with the process. Where’d things go wrong? What would have prevented this from happening? How could it have happened to anyone?

Engineering Human Protection

Instead of innocence becoming an excuse, make it a rallying cry.

A great effort installs two fail-safes before the triggering event. Yes, it’s going to look like a spiderweb, and you’ll wonder how many more bad things haven’t gone wrong yet. Then you know it’s time to get to work.

Take your list, prioritize it, and tell all those lazy losers about it. Ask how they’d like to contribute to crossing things off the list.

There’s no end to the lists, the efforts that could be applied, and the good fortune that will flow in return. I’ve seen it happen in spades, but I won’t be naming any names.
You’ll find holes instead of hope. You’ll look for things to detract instead of things to extract. But if you are interested in the how-tos and the ways of doing them, you can help yourself here.

An engineer works to improve the human condition. When we exit a burning building with our hands held out, engineers ensure that doors are equipped to take the hint—unlike Tesla car doors, which will kill the uninitiated.

Sometimes, humans need protection from ourselves, and that includes when we are acting on nothing but basic instinct (or profits). When that instinct is fundamental and universal, it creates a solid foundation upon which to build better.

Such was my goal when it came to applying my engineering skills and values to how humans think. I say that we are lazy, then dumb, and finally mean because that’s the way our brains work—quickly and immediately, then slowly, and finally, only after deep and considered reflection.

Ah-ha! It’s not just these three kids—the only three I’ve met—it’s their generation of easy answers, constant distraction, and social media specialness.

First, we act on instinct. We breathe, jump when spooked, and our body tries to tell us when to do critical things like eating and drinking. Some of us listen better than others, some are the managers, and some allow their urges to lead.

The startling moment in my life came when I realized that it’s a spectrum, and where you are on it is more important than the number on the scale or even a heart rate monitor.

It’s an effort to move along this spectrum, and the effort is often unseen. Being lazy is to live purely on instinct, or within a small range of slight discomfort. Or, as I call it in What Could Be, it’s without the freedom of composure.

Next, I say we are dumb because ignorance, as in unawareness of this domination and how to change it, is a lack of awareness and knowledge. It takes effort to become educated and develop skills (though I tried to make it clear and concise).

Finally, we are mean because we realize that the meek and unaware sometimes require protection and a loud wake-up call. Their inability to assess and understand the world around them makes them vulnerable and potential victims, and we do what we can to help them.

Sometimes it’s a well-directed and deserving siren to the uninitiated.

Or at least we try.

Or at least I try.

Dare you embrace your work ethic by unleashing your empathy toward yourself and your fellow humans?

It’s not for the lazy, nor the dumb, but now you don’t have those excuses. (You’ve proven not to be lazy for reading this far, and I’ve given you the necessary information.)