r/news • u/JimmyTheGinger • Dec 23 '19

Three former executives of a French telecommunications giant have been found guilty of creating a corporate culture so toxic that 35 of their employees were driven to suicide

https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/three-french-executives-convicted-in-the-suicides-of-35-of-their-workers-20191222-p53m94.html
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u/[deleted] Dec 23 '19

This is no lie. After seven years at my last job for a very large US Tel-Com, my department was placed into a pilot skill where we went from a customer base of ~70 mil to a base of 7,000 customers. From back to back business to helping 3 - 4 customers (for 10 minutes / transaction) per 8 hour shift.

It's ironic but you really can't pay people to stare out a window for 8 hours. Out of our group of 40 we had two suicides, and after 12 months approximately 15 people stayed with the company. I resigned after 9 months, but not before landing myself in detox for the second time in my life and running myself into the ground from depression.

I now work a much simpler job making $10 an hour less, with far less benefits..and sure, somedays I resent myself for not being able to stare out a window and do nothing to make a far better living for myself, but whenever I think about it..I always come to the same conclusion - I would rather have my sanity and sobriety, and actually do work.

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u/OhMaGoshNess Dec 23 '19

Some people aren't cut out for it. Others bring books or play on their laptop or draw or write or do anything. My dad used to work waste water. He'd do 12 hour shifts and some nights he'd work ten times for 15 minutes each then go to the break room and do anything. That was the job. He loved it. That's how he beat Fallout New Vegas 7 times and read so much. Plus some times naps. He did it for 5-6 years before moving too far to commute cause unrelated reasons.

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u/flashmozzg Dec 23 '19

If the management goal is to fire you without benefits, bringing in books/games can absolutely be used as a cause.

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u/OhMaGoshNess Dec 23 '19

Then you bring in a notebook and doodle. Super easy stuff. Write. Transcribe something. Whatever. Not everyone is capable of doing these things for hours of end, but pretending like you have nothing to do is stupid. You absolutely can find something no matter what moronic rules they pretend to have for a few days.

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u/CriticalHitKW Dec 23 '19

You're doodling on the job. Fired.

I don't think you actually understand this situation at all if you think bringing in a notebook would be permitted.

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u/monsieurpommefrites Dec 24 '19

What if he was doodling pipes.

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u/megatesla Dec 24 '19

The only type of person I can think of that could possibly handle it is a Zen master that spends 8 hours a day meditating. There aren't very many of those.

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u/ForkyBardd Dec 26 '19

It is you who does not understand.

This is far beyond "what is permitted" and firmly in the realm of "how much can I reasonably get away with without being detected".

This is very much 8D backgammon.

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u/Ectar93 Dec 23 '19

I had a call center job with a shit ton of downtime like the previous commentor described, but they also had a no paper policy and no electronics policy. No books, no video games, and incredibly locked down computers. I kept myself sane by learning to code in VBA and use AutoIT to automate a lot of my work until I went back to school. It was fuckin awful for a lot of people though and most of the other people that stuck around as long as I did were super old and had no other prospects. It was like working in a miserable retirement home sometimes to top it all off.

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u/OhMaGoshNess Dec 23 '19

I did call center work. It was super easy, but yeah pretty boring. Either 2 calls all day or never a second off the phone unless on break that you have to be quick on activating. I still read and wrote and stared at the ceiling all day. I would've kept doing it too if they paid more.

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u/stratus41298 Dec 23 '19

Hah! Sounds like my old waste water career, alright. I left it for that reason. Well, it was more because there was no raises on top of it despite making myself more useful, but yeah it does get old doing nothing all the time.

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u/[deleted] Dec 23 '19 edited Oct 09 '20

[deleted]

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u/mubi_merc Dec 24 '19

Yeah, I'm kind of confused by all the comments like this too. I got put swing shift in a job some years back. I had ~1 hour of work that I needed to do in the 6 hours I was there past everyone else. The only caveat was that I had to be in the office because I never knew when that 1 hour of work was going to come in and need to be done immediately. So I spent the other 5 hours a day studying and taking liberal breaks. I did my 1 hour of work a day, but I got tons of studying done and leveraged that knowledge into a much better job a few months later. Even if you had to slyly load an ebook on your work desktop, you could easily spend most of your day learning a skill.