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By Keith, February 8, 2010 7:41 pm

I’ve been on 3rd shift for a little over a week now.  My sleep cycle has adjusted just fine; thanks for asking.  2nd shift was eliminated, and those of us who were not laid off were moved to either 3rd or 1st shifts (mostly 3rd).  Customer orders remain very low.  Most of my co-workers expect additional layoffs in the near future, perhaps even by the end of the week.

Although the upper muckity-mucks keep us all in the dark on a daily basis, they have scheduled lectures meetings for Tuesday, in the hopes of stifling the rampant rumors.  You can probably imagine some of the rumors racing through the production areas.  I’ve heard everything from “the company is being sold” to “we’re going down to one shift.”  What I expect to hear in the meeting is that the business is going through a rough patch and that they expect sales to remain flat for some time to come.  I expect to be told that I shouldn’t panic.  Beyond that, I expect the direction of information to be bottom to top, not top to bottom.

Do people ever like hearing that they shouldn’t panic or that they are overreacting?  Hell, we were told 3 weeks ago that some people were being laid off and the rest of us were going to 3rd shift.  Then they told us there wasn’t going to be a layoff and that we were staying on 3rd shift.  The week after, on Friday, we were told whether we were laid off or going to 3rd shift.  We are kept in the dark by management every day.  Having a meeting to “explain” that they have no visibility beyond 2 to 3 weeks is not going to satisfy anyone’s need for information.

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By Keith, February 8, 2010 1:18 am

This week’s safety huddle at work deals with the use required use of proper hand and arm protection.  Along with the main page of information that I’ll read to the inspectors is a supplemental page with some stats and questions to keep the huddle interactive.  One of the activities it suggests is to have everyone tuck both (if they still have them) thumbs into the palms of their hands, then have them try to tie their shoes.  Obviously this little task is meant to demonstrate how difficult simple tasks we all take for granted would become were we to lose our thumbs, but I don’t think it’s one that makes a lasting impression.  After all, I could just buy all of my shoes with Velcro straps.

I would not be moved to stop taking my fingers for granted by merely thinking of how hard tying things would be.  Perhaps if I were made to think about how difficult blogging would be without a thumb to press the space bar, or that without a thumb, I’d have to move the mouse to click the BACK button on a browser.  Do they make prosthetic thumbs?  How would I open my candy wrappers?  How would I hitchhike?  How would I express that I like a movie?  How would I play golf (Holy shit! I just realized the PGA discriminates against thumbless people!)?  More importantly, how would I play video games (other than Wii)?!?!

Also included in the informational packet are pictures of four grotesquely mangled hands.  I’m supposed to ask for each person’s consent before showing them the pictures.  The same courtesy was not extended to me (because I didn’t READ the accompanying email)!  It seems that our employer has given up on trying to appeal to our intellect and has resorted to trying to scare safety into us.  Either way works for me.