How to survive an office job

At some point in every mookychick’s life, whether it’s to fund a year in Nepal, get your parents to stop shouting or just to afford the latest must-have New Rocks, it becomes necessary to get oneself an office job.

The office is one of the quickest ways to allow the mook to drain out of you, rendering you either a happy-on-the-outside coke-fuelled marketing-speak bint – or the kind of librarian chick that doesn’t look beautiful when they finally take off their glasses – before your time.

Here’s how to avoid that while still making enough moolah to have proper blow-outs at the weekend.

by Cathriona Tobin

1 – Wear something empowering.

Whether it’s a skull-and-crossbones tattoo or your Wonder Woman underpants, there’s nothing they can do to you if you can run off to the bathroom and be graphically reminded of who you are. It’s like an invisible shield against mediocrity.

2 – Avoid marketing-speak buzzwords.

If at any time you hear yourself use the phrases “think outside of the box”, “pushing the envelope”, “stir-frying a concept in the opinion wok” or “customer-centric operation”, RUN. Put down the pen, shove away the keyboard, grab your bag and GO before it’s too late.

3 – Find yourself some eye-candy.

To ensure that you don’t spend all your time at work thinking about work, find a mookychap to ogle. Design powerpoint presentations to show him why you’re the ideal chick for him; develop your programming skills to hack into his personnel file and do up spreadsheets tracking how often he’s looking at you per day.

4 – Take frequent bathroom breaks.

Tell them you have “bowel problems” (no-one will ask about bowel problems) and go to the bathroom every fifteen minutes. Paint your nails, read a good book or listen to some of your music, then return refreshed to your desk.

5 – Liberate your peers.

In every office, there are potential mookychicks hiding behind masks of ground-down acceptance. Find them and explain to them that life doesn’t have to revolve around filing and staplers, then show them this article. Don’t go it alone – conquer corporatia together.

6 – Control the office grapevine.

Nothing works better for the removal of irritating colleagues then some well-placed gossip in the right ears. Hang around the water cooler and find out who spends the most time there, then use them to spread inventive rumours about your co-workers. After a while, you will become sought out for gossip and can hire and fire at your own convenience.

7 – Promote high boss turnover.

Use your new-found grapevine control to discuss your bosses’ sexual habits, removal of office equipment or hatred of their boss. When they are replaced with a new one, repeat the exercise. They can’t force you to work harder if they’re too busy worrying about their own job prospects.

8 – Refute all corporate brainwashing.

Most companies will encourage you to believe they are the saviours of the business world, thus earning your loyalty and ensuring you remain their employee for the best part of your life. After every attempt to tell you how great they are, insert an appropriate addendum, e.g. “This year our company’s profits were up by 150%… due to murdering small, innocent children in the remoter regions of Africa.” This is the best antidote towards being too loyal to leave your job.

9 – Encourage team-building exercises.

People in senior positions spend a lot of money to be told by other people that they need to develop team spirit. Usually, this involves taking a group of employees out of the office and putting them in a more fun environment, e.g. paintballing, playing with Lego or doing personality quizzes. Point out the lack of unity and high staff turnover in the team to each new boss, and wait for days upon days of not having to do any actual work.

10 – Maintain your life outside of work.

The biggest mistake made by people working nine-to-five is the denial of fun outside of the workplace, like not going to the pub because you have work the next day. Allowing your job to control your life is the easiest way to become a corporate automaton. When in the pub, have one drink more than you usually would. When at a club, stay out longer than you usually would. Rather than turn down invites, ring in sick. Have more fun and work less, and you too can survive the terrors of the office job.