[Short Story] Company Employee Story: Plussit Jobbers

Thud!

I can't take it anymore!

beer glassAlex slammed his Alex said, spitting out the words. As if in agreement, several people around him nodded in affirmation.

We were in a country in Southeast Asia, in a dining district lined with stalls like a hawker center. While on an
overseas business trip, I had been invited to dinner by the local members of my workplace, and now I was here, beer in hand, snacking on spicy Asian cuisine. I had thought it was just a simple dinner, but it turned into an opportunity for the local members to vent their pent-up frustrations, and starting with Alex, the curtain rose on a

grand grievance session.

Do you know, Mr. D, what my usual work is?

No, I don't. What is it? Tell me.

I never expected to be listening to complaints overseas, but it sounded interesting, so I urged him on.

I have to do a double check on product dimension inspections. But I don't actually measure them; my job is to imitate the dimensions written by the person before me.

Huh?

The answer was so far beyond my expectations that I was left dumbfounded.

Measuring takes time, you see. That's why.

......

And it's bad if all the numbers are the same. So sometimes I change the numbers just a little bit... What is the point of this?

When I remained silent, unable to answer, Alex continued.

So I made a macro that combines a random number table and a probability distribution to make it look like normal distribution variance, but sometimes it feels so empty!

In the end, Alex slumped over onto the table.

(A macro for a normal distribution... Amazing. But it has absolutely no meaning!)

Naturally, I didn't say that out loud, and instead poured beer into Alex's glass.

Then, another local staff member, Alisa, chimed in.

Mr. D, listen to my story too.

She was a second-year employee hired around the same time as Alex, and although she could speak Japanese, her sentence endings were a bit strange.

My job is equipment inspection, but why do I have to inspect equipment that is stopped?

Huh? Stopped? What do you mean?

Well, there is some idle equipment, but they don't want people to know it's stopped, so they make me inspect it. There's an item that says 'No strange noises or odors,' but since it's not running, of course there aren't any. Does this have any meaning?

W-well... there's a lot going on...

Without giving a clear answer to her question, I silently poured her some wine.

Next was the leader-type, Yochin.

I also have something similar to Alex called a leader check. But recently the rules got stricter, and it became a leader double check. But there are very few leaders. So, after I check it myself, I switch to my other hand to change my handwriting and do it under a different name. Does this have any meaning?

At Yochin's words, Alex nodded in agreement.

That sounds... tough.

As a regular employee with no authority, I had no choice but to just listen to their complaints.
It looked like it was going to be a long night, so I called the waiter to order more drinks and food.

Once those arrived, the usually quiet Hannah got involved.

Me too, Mr. D. I'm just constantly making work standards.

Aren't work standards important?

Then, Hannah shook her head vigorously and started ranting all at once.

No! I'm drawing the work standards as manga! Using Excel functions! The other day, when I asked why photos weren't okay, they said our printer has poor resolution and can only do black and white printing, so it's hard to understand, and that's why it's manga! I don't get it! Why don't they just buy a new printer!

......(sweat)

Hearing this story reminded me of something.
Nadak, an older guy I know. He was always in front of his computer, so when I asked him what he was doing, he replied,

"I'm drawing up work standards with pictures. Some people can't read, and there are foreigners too, you know."

And yet, no one ever looked at that 150-page
epic, and it was left to gather dust without a single wrinkle on it. I'm sure her work standards will meet the same fate. Thinking about that made me feel a little sad.

The real kicker wasPanittan.

"The other day, my senior told me to keep holding down thewobblein the processing machine door."

"Excuse me?"

At first, I couldn't understand what he was saying.

"The machine has a loose door, and if you don't hold it down, the lock won't engage and the machine won't start. So, while the samples were being processed, I had to hold the wobble the whole time. Then, my senior praised me, saying'You're good at this,'and after that, holding the wobble became my job. Today, I held the wobble for five hours."

"......"

(Are you from some kind of'Otokojuku'academy?!)

I shouted in my heart, but I suppose this wasn't the job he wanted. For his sake, as he wore a somewhat resigned expression, I ordered an extra
dessertthat the locals like. After that, we continued to bond over shocking topics (or rather, complaints), and the meal lasted until late into the night.

--------------------------------------------------

A few months after I returned home.
While I was doing administrative work, mybossspoke to me.

"Hey, did you hear?Four localsarequittingthis month."

"Oh? Who are they?"

"Alex, Alisa, Hannah, and Yochin, apparently."

(Ah, those guys...)

I felt strangely convinced, and at the same time,

(Panittan isn't quitting?! Could it be that he actually likes holding the wobble?!)

I was shocked, though for a different reason than my boss.

"Honestly, we went to the trouble of hiring people who can speak Japanese... People overseas just quit so easily. It's a real headache."

My boss shook his head in exasperation and walked away.

(I don't think they're quitting'because it's overseas'...I shouted silently at his back.

After that exchange, I started on a job due today.
The content is a report on'The vision for our department five years from now.'It's something we create every year based on an initiative from upper management to tell so-called dream stories.
However, since reality is regressing rather than progressing, the dream is passed on to the next year as a dream. To avoid using the same material as last year, we base this year's on the material from two years ago, and next year we'll base it on last year's, tweaking the details so upper management doesn't notice. We're just making documents.

Naturally, this is a document that doesn't matter whether it exists or not; it's a fine

'Bullshit Job.'

(What I'm doing isn't much different from what they were doing.)

After drinking theexcessively sweet canned coffeeI bought during my business trip, I buckled down to work on the document in front of me.

The End