Your boss is not a social worker

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I am in business. Most workers do fine, but they could all do better.

People do have lives, but it helps if they understand they are selling not just time, but skilled time, and the company is not a school.

There are plenty of jobs with no social contact. All office building get cleaned every night, there are other jobs where working in isolation is seen as a hardship by most.

School is to teach you how to learn, and to apply that level of learning on the job. No one in their right mind would turn a business over to a newly minted MBA. Life is constant learning.

Jobs do not last a generation, we now have to reinvent ourselves every three to five years. When the company upgrades to Vista, it is time for some home study.

Some do go through life and come out with the skills to be a Walmart Greeter, or answer a phone.

The job you have at twenty is entry level, the world will be much different in ten years, and that paycheck that pays for an apartment, food, clothes, does not cut it when you have two kids, and a house.

Management is not for everyone, sometimes I wonder about myself. But bettering yourself is open to all. You will never learn to interact with people till you do.

Even the 9 to 5 can see that if you are doing data entry in accounting, learning what those words mean would help. Reading a book on the general principals of accounting would help, and if you plan on staying around, an online course in introduction to accounting, at least makes you look like you are showing interest.

The main goal is unsupervised workers. When they show up, do their job, without anyone making them, they are of value. There are plenty of back office positions where you will see no one. I worked computer rooms, no one ever went in the computer room, perhaps it was the "Danger High Voltage" signs. They were there because housekeeping would spray windex on a keyboard.

Work is a hard place to learn social skills, join a club, Toastmasters, try acting, local little theater. Become accustomed to being around people, and even interacting with them.

"Spend fifteen minutes a day improving yourself, it is nothing from a day, but it is 90 hours a year."
Inventor

See yourself in a better future, the visualizing helps, now reach out to it. Pull yourself in that direction, and as an aimless floating human, you will move in that direction. It takes goals to reach goals.

It seems scary, but it works, and the next goals are easier.

I am not addressing Aspies, but workers. Aspies seem to have potential.

Most larger companies are willing to pay for education, if you can fit in, and show up for a year or two.
The workers cannot pass a community college math exam to get in, and will not learn math, so they cut themselves off. Someone who comes back in a few months, and says, I have the math thing covered, is soon in school.

High or low unemployment, good workers are hard to find. Mc Donalds went to picture cash registers because when they trained a checkout, they could then get a higher paying job.

Most companies are looking for people worth training, for there are too many applicants for the bottom rung, and few with skills. A copy of Vista for Dummies on your desk will be noticed. So will your Toast Masters coffee mug. Any effort toward self improvment is noted.

Until I can get the Aspie U. Business School open, we are going to have to do the best we can.

There are a lot of things in life there are no therapists for, you just have to figure it out.

As the OP said, it is life, deal with it.

I am just trying to show the other side, what is looked for in employees.

Learn Excel in your spare time, or go to ebay and buy a used book on the machine you are running. Just show a modest willingness and ability to learn.

You may think your new job is great, twice the pay for the same hours, but two years later you will find you are worth twice that. Time in the job equals education.

Some you have to get rid of, some move on, some stay in place, and some move up. Who are you?

You write: The real issue is how harmful it is for people with AS to expect the world to change for them. People with AS must be willing to grow and develop as people, regardless of their problems. Do we just let people who get into car accidents languish in a bed because getting them to the point where they can walk again is painful and miserable? No, they suffer through the pain and recover as much as they are able. But if they never end up walking again, it's of course not their fault. I don't see how AS is different. Yes, we only have a certain amount of tolerance and functionality, but you CAN improve. I will never accept people just lying down and not making an effort to do what they can to improve as people. That person in the other thread will never become more comfortable at work if they don't push themselves out of their comfort zone a little bit. "

And I agree with you 100%. The world isn't going to change for us. I have to admit, though, that I am not as far off on the spectrum as the rest of you. Unlike other people here I've been able to hold onto jobs and succeed at work. I have been able to make and hold onto friends, although it has still been harder for me than the average person. I am able to live alone and function more. However, I also know that people aren't going to let me use my past issue and current issues as an "excuse" for inappropriate behavior or not doing my job. The bottom line is that everyone has problems and the world isn't going to care what our specific "problems" are. I wish that it were different, but most people in this world could care less about each of our lives and our "problems". In a work situation the bottom line is whether you meet your responsibilities. As the original post stated "your boss is not your social worker". That is correct.

You write:

"It is very easy for boards like this to become a source of enabling people to not try their best. I am not interested in turning every thread into a pity party because I do not believe that this is what a "support" forum is for - making waves or not."

I agree with you 100%. That's why I told the person who dropped the pickles that he deserved to be fired. AS or Autism are not excuses for inappropriate behavior. While it can perhaps be used to explain why an employee acted in an improper manner, it doesn't--and shouldn't--excuse the behavior, nor should it shield the employee from negative consequences. The employee should still face accountability for his actions.

This whole discussion has brought home to me how much the "soft" skills of being able to manage people are lacking in certain organisations. No, our bosses are NOT our social workers but you do realise the saying "honey catches more flies than vinegar" is particularly apt here.

Most people respect a boss who is fair and strict - they don't respect one who is capricious, unfair, untrustworthy, has favourites and the like. It doesn't cost anything but time to show a bit of concern for one's workers. It reaps massive dividends in higher productivity and good will.

MaritimeBlaze, it is so obvious to me that you haven't overcome your issues. That in itself is not a problem as we all have our issues and are stuck with some of them. I am disappointed to see what an intolerant attitude you take with your fellow aspies, particularly when even you concede that most of us are more impaired than you.

The divide between you and many of us is if anything, larger than that between NTs and yourself. I do try hard every day to do my best, but I am also quite aware of my limitations and I don't see why people who do their best should be dissed just because they don't meet up to your high standards of perfection.

Wouldn't it be better to be proud of your own achievements and cut the rest of us a little slack.

Do you know why I am so "tough"? It's because the world isn't going to tolerate or accept excuses. The real world just isn't like that. And I think that we on this board do our fellow members a disservice when we coddle them. The world isn't going to be "fair" or "understanding a great deal of the time. There is another thread here about someone who willingly smashed a rack of pickles at a Wal-Mart and then expecting sympathy from the board. Frankly I think it does this board a disservice when we say "poor baby" instead of giving an honest, though polite, assessment of the facts.

Society can and will change to a degree if we stick to our guns. If we don't fight for justice, we are co-conspiritors in our oppression.

In my experience, what they really want is for someone else to train their employees for them. Just the other day I saw 3 years of experience plus fluency in a foreign language as requirements for an entry-level position at 9.00$ / hr.

I'm pretty much sick of hearing businesses whine about how they can't get good people.

-You want someone with 10 years of experience but you won't hire at entry level. Who trains your workers for you? Where do they get the experience in the first place? Somewhere else, I guess. You also want smart people, but for entry level you'll only hire employees who will be happy to answer phones for the next 5 years and never think of leaving. I am sick of watching high school grads land jobs I can't because the company thinks they'll stay. Most importantly, you employers hire us at will and can fire us at any moment for any reason, yet you expect us to be loyal and go above the call for you.

Tell you what, boss man. Give me a decent benefits package and a wage I can live on, say 15-20 dollars per hour, and I will be the most loyal employee you've ever had. But what do you think 9.00$ an hour buys, exactly? Would you expect a 500 dollar computer to perform as well as a 1000 dollar box? Hells no. Bare minimum wages buy bare minimum effort, that's what I say.

Beautiful Spam--I can totally relate to the issue of being "overqualified". For example, after I left college, I went immediately to graduate school for my MA even though I should have worked for a few years. When I tried to find jobs out of school, I ran into difficulties. Entry-level employers didn't want me for their positions because I was "overqualified". I couldn't qualify for higher-level/mid-level positions because "I didn't have enough experience". My one regret is not working in a job for a year or two before getting an MA. I would have had an easier time finding work otherwise.

Yeah, I completely get you on this one. I would even go so far as to suggest that high school grads work a year before college. Working really gives you a sense of what life is like for people who don't apply themselves and make the right decisions early in life. If I had worked a bit before college I would have been a much more diligent student.

Some kids are doing that. I sometimes wish that I had taken a year or two off and worked before I went to college. I probably would have handled various situations that confronted me back then much better.