
Forgotten Employee (2002) - jxub
https://sites.google.com/site/forgottenemployee/
======
barbs
I inexplicably love this story. Often if I'm at work and I feel like there's
not much work for me to do and I feel like I'm being paid to do nothing, I'll
read this story.

I recently found it posted to this wiki, which contains a bit more information
about its origins and legacy:

[https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/American-
Dream](https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/American-Dream)

They also reference another semi-related story which I also found entertaining
(Cubicle Jungle):

[https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/Cubicle-
Jungle](https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/Cubicle-Jungle)

I haven't explored the rest of the wiki, but it looks fascinating.

 _The Bibliotheca Anonoma is a research task force archiving, documenting, and
safeguarding Internet Folklife._

[https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki](https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki)

~~~
worble
So many good stories that I thought were lost to time are on there (especially
after shii took down his site). Thank god for the bibanon wiki.

------
layabout
Just to add probably the millionth example to this, I currently have a nothing
job where I show up for work every day, read the news, play on my phone,
network, and generally sit around doing very little. It was not always this
way, I used to do work as a developer, then I moved several times, now I work
in a special projects team that have no defined remit. The team had a remit
when set up and has existed officially for 2 years but the original head was
fired 8 months in, and since then the team has had no purpose. We tried for a
while to revive the team and have the original remit reinstated, but efforts
of myself and others were in vain. For probably the last 9 months I have had
no defined job to do, so I swan around some days trying to be useful, others
trying to do nothing (depending wholly on my whim) but always trying to look
busy (which I am not). The company is massive so I contribute to internal open
source projects when I want to, and have recently started looking for another
job in company time as I am mind-numbingly bored. Reading this story was like
reading someone living the life I've had for the last 9 months, but with them
actually seeking to prolong it (which I don't want to)...

While it's nice to know others are in this boat, it's depressing that any
company lets this happen, particularly when I see people working hard at much
less well paid things: the cleaners are working much harder than I!

~~~
chii
I just can't understand how this happens. I know it does, since I have a
friend to which this did happen, but it was a govt job and they are known to
be wasteful with budget.

For a private enterprise, the budget can't possibly be this free!?

~~~
rainbowmverse
The idea that private enterprise is more efficient than government is a myth.
Waste scales with any organization.

It's similar to how Florida _seems_ more messed up than other states, but it's
only because of the state's public information laws. There's probably a term
for the bias where something seems more prevalent only because information on
it is more accessible.

Even a "public" company only shares so much with the general public. Much less
than even the smallest government.

~~~
pwaai
It's like when a mainland Chinese student sneered at former lady Korean
president for being some brainwashed cult puppet, and proudly exclaimed the
superiority of a single party centralized architecture.

I found it sad that he thought Tianmen Square was just a nice park after
seeing nice censored pictures in the search results (he didnt know what it was
before so he had to baidu it).

This made me wonder, what other fucked up shit are they hiding from naive
citizens?

~~~
ddnb
This made me wonder, what fucked up shit is being hidden from me?

------
pwaai
God! I couldn't stop reading this it was so entertaining

but it's also similar to my experience.

The type of jobs where the incompetence of your superiors creates the absence
of responsibility due to the sheer number of hierarchial and useless processes
and departments. It's ironic that it's at these type of jobs where the bar is
ridiculously low, like you really have to seriously put in an effort to get
fired.

If you are thinking this is the life, please don't, the boredom from not
having intellctually stimulating work and responsibilities is very real...

but at the same time you are not doing hard labor and making minimum wage so
obviously it's a very good deal for most people....I just didn't feel like I
can do that for long because of the boredom is too much.....

~~~
le-mark
I've never actually been forgotten, but I've definitely spent months
unutilized. Once was as a consultant through a third party. Job was a 1 year
contract to help implement some APIs. they had enough work planned for about
one month, then nothing for a loooong time. I worked on some load testing busy
work sporadically during this period. It was the type of situation where the
on site manger knew he didn't have anything for me, so we just sort of
mutually agreed to not discuss it.

I was offered to convert to full time by the same manager. I said "Seriously?
I haven't done sh-- here?" He replied yeah but I contributed more than a lot
of the others. I declined as I had another job lined up already. But I was
stunned, still am when I reflect on it.

~~~
fyfy18
If you can afford it, it’s a lot better to have too many people (although your
case sounds a bit extreme) than too little. I’m working at a startup where we
have too little, and we are rushing to get stuff done without really thinking
it through long term. Our tech debt level is growing each day.

In your case it sounds like you - and your experience - really helped other
members of the team work more efficiently.

~~~
kd5bjo
This is where a retainer agreement can come in handy. The company is
explicitly paying you to keep time free in case they need the extra workforce,
but you aren't expected to even show up unless there's work to do.

------
pinebox
Many years ago I (a USian) was hired by a massive Indian company famous for
outsourcing that had begun "insourcing": Hiring US labor for jobs with US
companies within the US, but managing these hires through their offices in
India. The job didn't start for months, but the weirdness started immediately.

I had filled out all the onboarding paperwork, but as there had been almost no
vetting I assumed this was all still preliminary and my "actual" hiring would
hinge on another round of interviews (possibly with the US client company).
Then I checked my bank balance one day and found it to be significantly higher
than expected due to automated deposits that continued for the duration: The
hiring process was over, I was now a full blown employee as far as the company
was concerned.

The original position was in Chicago (a city I was not in) however after a
month or so of waiting this seemed to fall through and I was asked to select
from a short list of other cities I would be available to relocate to. I chose
New York and eventually was given a weeks-away start date that I was expected
to begin work there, however no hint of a corresponding salary bump.

Being unwilling to relocate to NY for a Chicago salary, I patiently explained
to the management in India that I would need to know my new salary first.
After they blew through a few soft deadlines while continuing to insist that I
was expected to be at work in New York on the same start date, I finally got
my direct supervisor on phone at the beginning of his workday and made it
clear that I needed this number before his close of business or else.

When that deadline was also blown, I followed through on my promise and quit
immediately (a move that seemed to surprise him). During these three or four
months I had shown up at no office or been assigned any tasks.

~~~
busterarm
I had an eerily similar experience subcontracting with a massive Indian
company that was itself subcontracting for an American contractor for General
Dyanamics. They spent a bunch of money on a background check and I was hired
but weeks dragged on without a start date.

I kept explaining to them that I had to give notice to my previous employer
and would need to know the date in advance. After several more weeks of
"soon", I told them that if they didn't give me a start date by EOW, I would
be resigning at the close of business day Friday. This was before ever
actually starting even though I'd been hired.

They blew the deadline and I quit on the spot, and they immediately countered
with telling me that I could start the following Monday. Clearly they did not
understand a single thing that I was trying to tell them or did not care. No
regrets walking away from that one.

------
austinl
This reminds me of a practice in Japan, where employees who can't be laid off
(for legal reasons) are sent to the "Boredom Room", to essentially do nothing
until they're motivated to quit.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/17/business/global/layoffs-i...](https://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/17/business/global/layoffs-
illegal-japan-workers-are-sent-to-the-boredom-room.html)

~~~
patio11
In some cases it is worse than doing essentially nothing: you're made to,
e.g., perform some data processing task on a newspaper (e.g. write the
readings of every kanji in this newspaper; that will take you about a day) and
then, at the end of the day, your work product is checked for ~15 seconds to
verify that you're not slacking and then shredded in front of your eyes. See
you tomorrow.

~~~
gaius
“Writing lines” was (perhaps still is) a common punishment in British schools:
copy something out 100 times then the teacher would tear it up in front of you
with a big grin on their face. Not sure it actually taught anything other than
“don’t get caught next time”.

~~~
gscott
That is how I learned cursive. Trying to write one line hundreds of times, the
only efficient way is cursive.

~~~
mieseratte
My trick was to write the first word on each line, then the second, and so
forth. I don't know if it was truly faster, but it sure seemed that way.

Teachers also felt like that wasn't in the spirit of the punishment so it had
the added fun of sticking it to "the man!"

~~~
bungie4
I learned to write on a blackboard with both arms at the same time (an ability
which has had me labeled a freak!). In this case, it worked great so long as
nobody saw you do it, and, the phrase wasn't two long.

~~~
exikyut
I _knew_ simultaneous ambidextrousness wasn't that unusual.

Still yet to tackle that one (after I learn ambidextrousness).

~~~
chrisfinne
my high school math teacher could \- write perfectly on the board while
looking at the class \- write a complete sentence starting from both ends
meeting perfectly in the middle

~~~
exikyut
More things to aspire to with tentative hopefulness! :D

(Said as someone whose hand-eye coordination could do with some serious
tuning)

------
ufmace
I find it interesting how many people on the linked HN threads for previous
discussions say they've been in similar situations. I've never had a position
where I didn't have anything at all to do for an extended amount of time,
though I've only worked for one really large company.

I did work at a pretty reasonable pace on projects that were obviously not a
practical idea and would probably never amount to much, while numerous good
ideas that could have saved substantial money got ignored. But I didn't really
know of anyone who really didn't do anything. Though there was one guy who had
less than a dozen commits in a year, all just a couple of lines. But after
trying to work with him on something for another project, I think he really
was just that bad at coding.

~~~
flukus
> I think he really was just that bad at coding

Count your blessings, bad coders that work hard screw up the entire codebase
for everyone. They also seem to get promoted for their hard work.

~~~
PakG1
That is literally the Dilbert Principle:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilbert_principle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilbert_principle)

------
gok
Reminds me of the legend of a guy who realized his job was so unaudited and
lacking in responsibility that he got a second job... at the same company.

~~~
mdrzn
Ditto, I'd love to read that story! Tried googling something, nothing relevant
came up.

------
mamurphy
Redditor claims this happened to them in 2018:

[https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/8qmayg/update_...](https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/8qmayg/update_i_am_a_forgotten_employee_who_has_been/)

------
rossdavidh
To be honest, that sounds like it would be way more stressful than just
working.

~~~
callesgg
And soul crushing.

~~~
tw1010
Only if you let your soul be immovably coupled to a fragile and exogenous
variable like your job.

~~~
xab9
You are sitting on your ass (conidering you are a dev) for eight friggin
hours. If you include commuting, lunch break and the time you sleep, this is
more time than you can spend with your family, hobbies, recreation etc.

You don't need to like or "couple your soul" to your job, it's part of your
life and life shouldn't suck because there is a very good chance that there
isn't another one.

------
dang
Big discussion in 2013:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6087935](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6087935)

Smaller one in 2010:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1320310](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1320310)

Helpful explanation of its origins:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6088168](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6088168)

~~~
sincerely
Wow, I had no idea this was of SA-origin. Crazy how influential that website
has been for internet culture

~~~
Buge
It says SA in the first sentence, and mentions it several other times, even
addressing "SA friends".

~~~
Latteland
SA is something awful forum apparently. We should define these terms!

~~~
pc86
One of the great things about the internet is you can search for the meaning
of things you don't know. I know everyone on HN loves to use these[0][1], but
not everything needs to be cited.

[0] meaningless footnotes

[1] you're not writing a term paper

~~~
detaro
Nobody asked for a citation, and good luck googling two-letter abbreviations
unless you're lucky with guessing the right context words.

~~~
burger_moon
Even duckduckgo knows that 'sa forums' is Something Awful. Also TFA writes out
Something Awful several times throughout and doesn't exclusively use the
abbreviation.

------
piinbinary
> I am a monster of the corporate world. Within twenty seconds I can tell you
> the capitol of Madagascar.

That line struck me as oddly brilliant. It wouldn't take 20 seconds if you
knew it off the top of your head, so it means that you can have someone drop
everything and give you that information.

~~~
danjayh
I think that maybe you missed it -- it means that he can find it on his
Management Globe within 20 seconds.

~~~
icebraining
But globes don't have capitols...?

~~~
michaelt
What do they put on globes if not political maps including capital
cities?[https://www.duraglobes.com/media/catalog/product/cache/3/ima...](https://www.duraglobes.com/media/catalog/product/cache/3/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/m/i/mini201281_2.jpg)

~~~
icebraining
Capital != capitol.

~~~
michaelt
I'm pretty sure the use of capitol was a mis-spelling in the original article.

------
_Donny
I really enjoyed the story, but it really scares me that I might end up the
same way.

I am a CS student, but I have had a lot of student jobs related to my studies.
At most workplaces, they appreciated my skills and abilities, but being able
to only work 1 day a week, the tasks I get assigned are not of any real value
to the company, and I suspect my managers never really cared if I finished
them. Since nobody cared about what I did, I quickly got demotivated, and I
usually ended up browsing Hot Questions on SO, IRC, and HN. These sites look
somewhat relevant, and did not cause any suspicion, like Facebook or Twitter.

Now I am soon to finish my degree, and get a full-time job. However, I am
really anxious whether I am actually able to work for 8 hours in succession
every day, 5 days a week. University is a lot of work, but it is scattered
throughout the day. I am not sure if I have ever programmed for more than 2
hours in succession. Programming 8 hours a day seems like an incredibly
burden, and mentally unbearable...

~~~
lainga
Nobody has to program for more than 2 hours at a time (unless you want to). In
practice, actually, your time is half coding (or less) and half meetings,
design, testing, writing documentation... as you gain experience and
motivation, you may actually come to desire opportunities where you can write
code for 2 hours without interruption.

------
watmough
Oh man, I so miss slow times at work.

    
    
      * Flight simulator (on a Pentium Pro)
      * Reading Red Dwarf scripts
      * Posting on Slashdot
    

Nowadays it's all I can do to keep up.

------
tomashertus
I would love to see a short movie based on this story:) It could be
hilarious...

~~~
aidos
It’s certainly not dissimilar to the plot of Office Space.

~~~
richev
So we were wondering if you could tell us, what exactly do you _do_ here? :-D

------
BadassFractal
I miss the good old days of Something Awful, their threads where people would
share stories of that sort were priceless. A combination of it being a gated
community, no filters, anonymity and encouragement of long form writing made
for one hell of a combo. I tried logging in a few times recently but it didn't
quite feel the same.

------
jopsen
If you are a trusted senior employee then of course you can abuse your trust..
but why would you?

Seems unlikely you'd get fired for asking what to do... And if you don't want
to ask just find something and expand responsibilities..

~~~
PhasmaFelis
It's most likely fictional. It starts out entirely believable, but slowly gets
odder and odder.

~~~
nwsm
But probably written by someone on the clock with no work to do.

------
sidcool
In my previous company I had a friend who worked on production support. His
main task was ensuring that whenever a ticket landed in the support inbox it
was redirected to someone. The maximum number of tickets he had to redirect in
a single day was 20. Each ticket took around 5 minutes to redirect.

So the maximum he had ever worked in a single day was just over an hour and
half. On most days it was half an hour of work out of the 9 he had to be
available.

It continued for 3 years. No one bothered him since he was a billable
employee.

In a fit of frustration he resigned one day. Although his job was very
unskilled, there was no one else who wanted to do it, and to retain him he was
given a pay hike. He accepted the hike and continued for a couple of more
years before resigning for good.

He now teaches at a school and is very happy.

------
donttrack
Never get tired of reading this story.

------
mltony
Is this story true? The part about mid-life crisis VP sounds too good to be
true.

~~~
staticautomatic
The beauty of Kafka and Kafkaesque stories like this is that they're so
genuinely rooted in reality that they're essentially a form of magical
realism.

~~~
asfasgasg
This story and stories like it are not rooted in reality. They're rooted in
what we dream reality might be, or what we wish reality were. They are wish-
fulfillment fantasies.

~~~
icebraining
I personally knew a guy who did nothing all day, and actually started practice
shooting with an air pistol inside the office (when he got the night shift,
when the bosses weren't around). He kept this up for at least two years (I
lost contact since the person I knew at the company was fired for trading
shifts with her colleagues, despite the recognition that she was a top
performer in her group).

The details (meetings, etc) might be fantasy, but the core fact that people
get paid for doing nothing isn't.

------
rejschaap
In a similar vein [https://kenrockwell.com/business/two-hour-
rule.htm](https://kenrockwell.com/business/two-hour-rule.htm)

I don't really agree with this, but it is an interesting symptom of modern
business.

------
weirdkid
My guess is the guy worked for a Tier 1 auto supplier. It's probably the
biggest reason why any company would open a field location in Detroit that's
large enough to warrant the presence of several director-level staff.

Also, it's quite typical that an auto OEM would contractually require a
supplier to have safety inspectors at each site, so he may not have been as
forgotten as he thought.

Just a theory.

------
orionblastar
I lost a job in November 2001 that was sort of the same types of feelings.
Management was incompetent a new HR manager was appointed to downsize. I got
sick on short term disability so it made me a target when I returned. I was
fired for taking too many sick days even if I had doctors notes and an excuse.
They lost them so they had to fire me.

~~~
busterarm
This is why you never give HR your original documents and only your copies.

------
AllegedAlec
Sort of similar sort of story:
[https://imgur.com/gallery/iJD8f](https://imgur.com/gallery/iJD8f)

------
comm1
I think this is what Eric Schmidt’s life must be like.

------
pagnol
I am hungry for this kind of writing, what else can I read that is somewhat
like this story?

~~~
rogual
\- BOFH series

\- Google Ultron story from 4chan

\- "Escalation" I think it was called, a story about nerf gun wars. Can't find
it now.

\- Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect

------
isostatic
How depressing. Is there really nothing better he could do with his life than
read some crappy forums? Even if there's nothing beneficial for the company,
surely there's something else he could do other than play snake - learn a
foreign language perhaps.

~~~
RankingMember
I see it as a sort of purgatory- you don't want to do anything too involved
because real work could intrude at any moment and make you lose your place,
but doing nothing at all is too boring. You end up doing the equivalent of
consuming brain junk food.

------
DoreenMichele
Can anyone verify if this is fact or fiction?

~~~
zootam
here's a newer one:

[https://np.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/5psadr/i_have_b...](https://np.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/5psadr/i_have_become_a_forgotten_employees_for_a_few/)

>This is in Texas.

>About a year ago I was "fired" for something I did not do. Basically they
thought I was stealing from the company and had me fired in the system before
they informed me in person.

>When they caught the real thief, literally 5 minutes before I got the axe, I
got called into HR where they apologized to me profusely and told me they
would be working to reinstate me without losing my tenure or my vacation time.
They asked me if there was anything they could do in the mean time. I asked
for the vacation right then and there which made HR real happy because me
being gone for 2 weeks made it easy for them to unfuck the situation.

>While on vacation I broke my leg and was wheelchair bound for a month. When I
informed HR of this they offered me the satellite office for temporary use
since it was literally one block away and I could get there safely using my
wheelchair.

>The company had a satellite office close to my house that was basically just
2 rooms. One had a desk power socket and internet access and the other was the
bathroom. The office was purchased for an exec who was wheelchair bound
because of cancer. The office stayed empty for a few months when her cancer
went terminal and eventually she passed on. When I was offered it they moved
my PC and everything out there getting me set up.

>That was the last time I have had any face to face with anyone in the
company. Even after my leg healed I did not return to the normal building. I
stayed in the office until HR wanted to move someone else in.

>Well that never came. Five months ago my department was shuttered. My boss,
several employees, and a few other management people were quietly let go. Some
kind of thing happened at the top that caused a lot of people to be let go. By
this time I was pretty much using the office as a second home and had not had
any real contact with anyone outside of emails and the occasional phone call.

>Once this happened I was just coming in to work everyday completing my tasks
until they stopped coming. Then I just came in every day waiting until the
hammer fell. It never did.

>I have been coming in every single day, walking since its only a 5 minute
walk unless its raining, hooking up my gaming laptop and hopping on discord
with my friends to play. Sometimes I will bring my ps4 or xbone into the
office and play that too.

>I have been using this office and collecting a paycheck for the last 5ish
months with no contact other than the company wide emails and former coworkers
of mine calling me asking how things are going. To put it into context of how
much I have stopped caring, when I told my girlfriend about my job situation
she came to visit me at work. I will keep it G rated here for you guys and
will let you use your imaginations as to the nature of her visit. I do not
state this to brag but merely to pain the picture of how things are at my
current "job"

>All of this brings us to today. I have been using my free time to also study
for several PC certs and have finally acquired them. I am getting job offers
for a few places that will be a pretty big step up from my current position.

>What are the pros and cons of taking the new jobs without "quitting" my first
job? I know that technically I am currently in the clear legally. But I want
to know if that changes if I start working at another job and collecting two
paychecks? I am guessing very much yes but wanted to know more. Does the
situation change if one of the companies allows me to work from home and I use
my office to work at both jobs?

>Yes I know I am being incredibly greedy but I am legitimately wondering here
cause its like a very lucky situation I find myself in and it would be a
complete waste to throw it away without a good reason. As in I could get in
legal trouble is a very good reason to throw it all away and work at the new
job.

~~~
DoreenMichele
Thank you.

------
rbosinger
That was a really fun read. Reminded me a bit of when I used to read Bukowski
and friends back in college. I should start reading more non-technical stuff
again.

------
adrianhel
Magic stuff!

------
JokerDan
Classic read. I thought most people had read this already?

~~~
majewsky
I'm seeing this for the first time. Probably a case of "10000/day":
[https://www.xkcd.com/1053/](https://www.xkcd.com/1053/)

------
megaman22
This reminds me a lot of the Bastard Operator From Hell stories (BOFH).
Another classic

[http://bofh.bjash.com/](http://bofh.bjash.com/)

------
known
aka
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle)

------
malmsteen
Actually sad its a fake story cause its fun :(

