What Is The Cost of Quiet Desperation?

Last Thursday, I wasted much of the day in quiet desperation.

I started out small, moping over the sinister new howl in my transmission and worked my way up through the hierarchy of daily worries. Along the way, I brooded about the Vikings quarterback crisis, grieved over my declining mutual funds and agonized about the global financial melt-down. By the end of the afternoon, I had succumbed to a white-knuckled panic at the prospect of an eternity spent in the hell so luridly described by my fourth grade Catechism.

You know, just the usual stuff.

Why do I get like this?

The odometer in my Honda reads 200,000 miles; the transmission should howl. The Vikings are always in crisis. My retirement funds have tanked yet recovered before and the financial collapse is global -- which means it's happening somewhere way out there. As for hell, why should I worry? Modern religion has gone through a complete make-over.

Hell is now a kinder, gentler place.

But none of that is my current problem.

What I am trying to figure out is what to code on my timesheet for the hours I spent fretting.

You see, the place where I work has an elaborate time-reporting system.

A couple of years ago, somebody way up there asked somebody way down here what we do and no one was able to provide an answer.

Our management panicked and hired a gaggle of highly paid consultants to figure out what our business is. After a year of study and analysis, the consultants admitted they were clueless about what we did, but to rationalize a year of study and analysis, they left us with a detailed time-reporting system. Now, even though the agency still can't say what it does, at least it's employees could say what they do.

I have perused the tables. I have clicked every drop-down. I have consulted with my colleagues but I still cannot find a category for despair. Nor can I find a sub-categories for moping, brooding, grieving or panic.

I am forced therefore to admit that we have no way of knowing what these things cost us in productivity and if we cannot measure moping, brooding, grieving and panic, how can we manage them effectively?

This got me thinking. What about other similar costs?

So I made this list of codes and descriptions to add to our tables.

DESPR: (DESPAIR) A catch-all category for despair, depression and the blues. Any time you show up in a funk or find yourself staring out a window, use this code.

LOVE: (LOVE) Time spent on office romances as well as time wasted staring out the window thinking about a new flame or stewing about an old one.

WHSPR: (Whisper) Use this to account for time spent in whispering campaigns, back-stabbing and rumor spreading.  Also include under this category any time spent smoothing the ruffled feathers and damaged relationships caused by office politics.

CYA: (No description necessary).

THNKU: (Thank You) A code that will never be used enough.

MMSTK: (My Mistake) A code I predict will be used even less often than THNKU.

Have you any suggestions?

I think every organization should look at these things. We need to quantify what love costs us. What hate and fear cost us. Maybe it will not make us more productive, but it definitely will give us an appreciation of what our humanity costs.

But then -- it's probably best to ignore such things.

Otherwise we will spend too much time worrying.

© Greg Schiller, 2008

Author: Greg Schiller