Busy Work

Sometimes your boss will ask you to do seemingly stupid tasks. Where I work it's a given. The trick however is to not complain, but to do whatever they ask. No matter how tedious or mundane it might be.

This advice might be a pain in the ass if you do something important for a living. If you work Security at an art museum then just do it, there’s nothing else to preoccupy your time for eight to twelve hours.

Things that MUST be done:

Check the gallery for any irregularities.

Check the art for vandalism.

Do paperwork for the above and for any Inventory.

Guard the art.

Walk around bored out of your mind.

Busy work, not in your job description, provided by your boss’ split personalities/voices in their head:

Use medical glove to pick up dead bug.

Pick a piece of art and write a mini book report about it.

Go on tours of locations that neither of you have authorization for.

Do duties she use to be in charge of, but wouldn’t do, such as: Delivering paperwork, shredding paperwork, and making copies of more paperwork… that will ultimately be not done and then shredded.

Being taken off post to discuss gossip and relationship issues.

Fuck it, if they get caught or snitched on (and she did) that’s not work problem. Get off the floor for a bit!

Then there’s the really messed up stuff you observe:

Asking friend in another department to make a false accusation about a guard joking about suicide.

Borrow credit from the person who runs the museum café.

Impede the Maintenance department by parking in the loading zone.

Stealing from a dead co-worker's family.

The key to success in the second and third set of items is to not bother saying anything. Especially if your boss is good friends with the head of Human Resources. In which case you are better off with a pen and paper. A lawyer’s helpful too.