New World of Work continued

[redsturgeon]

Young master RS has now settled into work after two weeks and has noted a recent influx of extra staff for the Xmas period. They all seem to be recent university graduates. I suppose at the wages being paid at least they won't have to repay their loans.

He has one of those hand held machines that the likes of Amazon use and have been much maligned. You scan orders, trolleys, shelves, groceries etc and it instructs you to follow its bidding. A very clever machine that will guide him to the appropriate, aisle, shelf and shelf position for each item and suggest substitutes if the item is out of stock.

On a slightly more sinister note, it also keeps tabs on his "pick rate" and lights up with green, amber and red lights throughout his shift depending on how fast he is working. Unfortunately this means that his interactions with customers are necessarily brief when they ask for assistance. I believe for some people this pressure can lead to stress at work!

He seems to be happy with his lot at the moment though and looking forward to his first payday...he has already spent his first month's pay on new golf clubs!

John

[bungeejumper]

Our local garden centre is recruiting for a Mrs Father Christmas, who it says will be "operating under Santa", and who will be required to adopt "a temporary position".

It is not clear what role Santa's little helpers are expected to play in all this. Or why he needs 13 of them.

BJ

[AleisterCrowley]

On a slightly more sinister note, it also keeps tabs on his "pick rate" and lights up with green, amber and red lights throughout his shift depending on how fast he is working.

[shudder] I couldn't stand that. Unfortunately, with increased automation it's easy to gather employee 'performance' metrics, but not necessarily the right ones. Call centre staff have to put up with this nonsense too - how long it takes them to answer, average resolution times and so on can all be dumped to a spreadsheet and misused...

[UncleEbenezer]

he has already spent his first month's pay on new golf clubs!

*sigh* How the other half live!

Our local garden centre is recruiting for a Mrs Father Christmas, who it says will be "operating under Santa", and who will be required to adopt "a temporary position".

Nice to see a sense of humour in a 'job' ad.

It is not clear what role Santa's little helpers are expected to play in all this. Or why he needs 13 of them.
BJ

If he wants to emulate the original Saint Nicholas, he could trade them to those in need of sex.

[servodude]

On a slightly more sinister note, it also keeps tabs on his "pick rate" and lights up with green, amber and red lights throughout his shift depending on how fast he is working.

[shudder] I couldn't stand that. Unfortunately, with increased automation it's easy to gather employee 'performance' metrics, but not necessarily the right ones. Call centre staff have to put up with this nonsense too - how long it takes them to answer, average resolution times and so on can all be dumped to a spreadsheet and misused...

I did a brief stint in a BT call centre 20 years ago
- in addition to the call tracking there was the requirement that a "comfort break" required you to log out (not sure if that was an intentional pun on their part) with any unusually long or frequent episodes requiring to be addressed by the line manager (so called because of his narcotic hobby)
- generally this wouldn't go too well
- whoever had the great idea of putting a cold calling centre in the middle of Glasgow needs their head checked for a zip

needless to say I did pretty poorly at scamming grannies to pay for their "friends and family discount" and stuck it out for two weeks
- mostly because I can do basic maths and don't like telling lies
- but also because it was a soul destroying environment, in a way that very few things I have experienced since have been

- sd