The Office
February 14, 2008
In last week’s Salon, a chronic job-hopper wrote into Cary Tennis’ “Since You Asked” column, prompting what I consider one of his best responses in ages. Tennis urges her to carefully consider her steps, but also validates her continued dissatisfaction with the modern workplace. I never really thought of it this way, myself:
“When we think of ‘an office,’ we think of the place where productive activity is coordinated. The work takes place in the factory or the fields or the classroom or on the road or in the streets or at construction sites, and then ‘the office’ is where people just keep track of stuff and do the accounting. But these days ‘the office’ seems to be the central location of labor for so many millions of us. How did that happen?
How did those of us who do all kinds of work end up working in identical areas, in areas that seem to be designed for clerks, supervisors and the like? Are we all just clerks and supervisors now?
Maybe part of what he’s saying here is that the modern workplace is so centralized, so lacking in variety, that it forces us to abandon the our natural skills and talents. According to some folks, that’s just the problem. Tennis continues:
“… That may mean that the thing for you to do is stop working for other people and start working for yourself. “
