Some workplace practices are scary as this guy.
When I was in high school I volunteered at a haunted house to raise money for charity. It was so much fun wearing platform shoes, a black cape and hood with chains around my neck. The combination of face make-up and my black costume with chains, I was one very scary creature. Tucked away in a dark corner, nerve-racked visitors unknowingly walked within inches of me. Then I would jump out and scare the living daylights out of most people. There were times I thought we should have paramedics there for potential heart attacks or seizures.
Although the workplace should not resemble a haunted house, there are a some very scary practices that occur in the office that send chills up my spine. Here is my list of scary office practices:
- Meetings – Meetings are usually a waste of everyone’s time. Not all meetings, but most are like being in the Twilight Zone.
- All Hands Meetings – When companies only utilize all hands meetings to discuss bad news.
- Brown-nosing – A culture that allows the general practice of brown-nosing, kissing-up, or flagrantly massaging the egos of his/her bosses to gain favor. Imagine the deviants your culture will attract if brown-nosing is an expected practice.
- High Turnover – People don’t leave a great workplace unless there is a very good reason. Just like smart or conscious people run out of a haunted house, there is a reason people are running from your company.
- No Exit Interviews – When management does not consider the information from a departing employee to be important, I wonder if there is blood in the leadership’s veins. Either you have real big problems, or you simply have some minor human relations tweaks to be made here and there. Don’t you want to know?
- Lay-offs – Companies that expel their “most important assets” – employees – is a very frightening practice. Especially when leaders have not tried to find other areas to cut expenses, including the executive budget.
- Never Having Fun – A company that does not know how to have fun is like working in a funeral home. I’ve never worked in a funeral home but it doesn’t seem like a fun place to work.
What are some scary workplace practices that you have experienced or observed?
