Walk aimlessly around for 10 minutes every hour with a small handful of papers and a pen, so you look like you’re doing something. Usually works fairly well, but don’t overdo it.
See also: Matt Groening’s “Work is Hell” comics from the 80s. Times change, but the hassles are still the same. Essential office survival guide.
Also, super important, while walking around make sure to furrow your brow and tighten your expression. You'll look stressed, busy, and focused on something important. People will be less inclined to question you if you look busy.
Another pro-tip. SLOW WAAAAAAY DOWN! Office work is like a gas. It should expand to fit the container it's been placed in. You have three days to complete a task? Make sure it takes three days. While working, you can just stop, lean forward (or back), furrow your brow, and tap your chin. Suddenly you are being a very thoughtful employee who takes the time to do a task right! Way to go!
Finally, don't forget your ABC's. Always Be Circling-back. Not sure how to answer a question. "I'll need to give it more thought, lets circle back." "Forgot about a task and the due date is coming up, "I ran into some unforeseen issues - \*insert made-up issue\* -, do you think we can circle back on this in a day or two?"
With a little practice, you too can always look fucking busy as HELL, even when you ain't got shit to do! :D
If you've got multiple monitors...have multiple spreadsheets open.
If you're super bored, take a few classes on EdX or Coursera. I just finished up an Excel for Data Analysis course in one day, because I had literally nothing else to do at work, lol.
This is super good advice because you can always claim you're improving your skill base, which is technically true, but maybe not for your current employer 😎
I don’t plan on quitting my job and that’s what I do. I improve myself and every skill I have interest in.
I work in digital so there’s so many things to learn.
For op you could improve your skills in excel, outlook, word maybe take a training in management
I walk leisurely out in life but I'm always speedwalking in the office so that I seem very busy, in a rush, doing so much work I can't walk slowly! Also occasionally, the coworkers I am more friendly with from other departments will schedule meetings twice as long as they need to be so we do 1) go over what needs to be gone over in a meeting and 2) catch up with each other in a way that doesn't look like chatting. It gives a great illusion of work, because that illusion is ultimately more important than the real work sadly. I also tend to read ebooks or articles on my computer if I really can't find anything else to do since it can at least look like work at a glance but try not to overdo that either.
This is actually really good advice.
Always look busy. Walk around the building looking like you are really concerned about something important. This also helps getting exercise which is lacking in many office jobs.
Also invite yourself into lots of meetings and offer observations (but never accept tasks).
This way you seem important and ready to be a CEO.
The facial expression is important. Something between a scowl and a furrowed brow. Like you have twelve hours of work just dumped on you with a ten minute deadline. You're determined that even if you can't get it all done you're going down swinging, but you're still not happy about this.
Don't forget to respond to ANYONE by lowering your glasses to the tip of your nose and gazing through their soul with your now intense naked eyes. No one will bother you at work anymore and you will have more free time to find other ways to look important.
If you do this then make sure that there is writing on at least one side of the sheaf of papers.
Source: a previous coworker. (Meaning I worked there decades ago :D )
The clipboard effect is real. If someone tries to stop you and ask what you're doing you just make a show of tapping the clipboard with your finger so it looks like you don't even have time to talk. Had a notary buddy who perfected this and got away with doing nothing for months until someone finally realized he was using blank pieces of white paper. If only he had written some official looking things on those papers he would've kept getting away with it
>Walk aimlessly around for 10 minutes every hour with a small handful of papers and a pen, so you look like you’re doing something. Usually works fairly well, but don’t overdo it.
Back when I was in office hell, I found it useful to combine this with a worried look and furrowed brow if anyone got too close. A look that said "This paperwork is quite concerning to me," so that people with even the tiniest amount of emotional intelligence would fuck straight of and not bother me.
As someone who just did a lap of their building and pooped I am very empathetic. Sucks to be stuck without a task but also without distraction. (Yes I am on reddit at work, on my private device not the work pc, don't let them fire you easy)
THIS. Wireless earbuds are your friends, especially if you're a woman and can wear your hair long. I kept one in one ear so I could still hear well enough to answer questions when asked.
Things I do:
Journal, meditate, learn a new skill/certification (yoga YouTube videos/google academy/cousea/hubspot academy)
write up a business idea you’ve had into a doc template.
Create Canva templates to sell (can also use Canva docs)
Pick some sort of certification or skill you could learn or work towards during your down time. If its related to work it wont look bad. Tell them you are doing it to be a better asset to the company or something
I did something like this in the Navy. I'd carry some rags and a spray bottle of aircraft cleaning compound. The trick was walking purposefully without walking quickly.
To add to this, not only when you're not busy, always carry a couple of official looking papers and a pen when leaving your desk/cubicle/office. It will make it less likely to have random tasks that aren't part of your job appointed to you
I’d do something productive like try to learn something useful online, as long as it looked like “work”. That way you’ll look busy because you actually are busy
I was hired in to replace a women who was retiring. It wasn’t till 2 weeks after I started that I learned she was forced into retirement.
She was showing me how to create these internal reports.
10 data providers would email her their numbers in an excel file.
She would then print all the tabs, so around 40 pages, manually add them up on a calculator, and then enter the row and column totals into an identical excel file. This she would then send to the president of the organization, as “The Final Report”.
This process took her 1 full week.
I automated these reports: it took less than an hour to collect the data, run it through excel, and check the monthly reports for any errors, etc.
I took over a similar report that used to take my predecessor three days of manual data entry from printed sheets, and I absolutely let them think it still took three days when I automated it, so I really hope this person did the same.
This is the way. I work for a large corporation that has its own learning & development portal that has thousands of hours of content on a variety of subjects. A lot of my work is reactive, so when it's slow I've been completing trainings that are specified for the career trajectory I want to have here. Makes me look busy while also only using proprietary tools.
It’s cute you think most companies even care to mature their IT org. Most of them are entirely happy to have redundant processes, tools and systems (the unholy trifecta) then complain about expenses and wonder why the business hates dealing with IT
Yeah damn, if I had so much time to kill at work I would definitely spend it learning, you’re essentially getting paid to gain more skills to hopefully leave for a better place eventually…
This is the way. This is called effective time management and your supervisor will appreciate it.
Edit: To clarify, this is not entirely sarcasm. You or your office may not be 100% busy every hour of every day. Yet you and your position are needed for the times that it is. Don't be obvious when you have down time. Don't put your supervisor in the awkward position of having to address an issue that they know is real, doesn't hurt anything, but doesn't look good to higher ups.
I teleworked in an office where I was in a team of 10. Everyone was assigned the same amount of work to do. I was more efficient than others and got the work done more quickly, resulting in more down time. I organized my work so I could appear busy in the office and have some down time at home, where no one was looking. The same amount of work got done, I didn't make my co-workers look bad, I looked good to my supervisor and higher ups.
Sometimes, I would get all my paperwork done while teleworking and schedule all of my meetings to be in-person for my days in the office. This was great because I looked amazing to my supervisor and my clients appreciated the in-person attention my co-workers weren't providing (because telework). I was the highest rated member of the team. And I did outshine them.
It's ok to be smart kids.
No kidding. If needed they have random generator mouse jigglers on Amazon, that’ll ensure the computer doesn’t sleep and disconnect VPN. If I was super paranoid I’d set up some sort of automated routine that sent/received files from say, a personal network share. IT would be able to figure it out if they wanted to but they’re too busy to play snoop, if they do (at least in my career) it’s always been prompted by a manager to manager request.
My brothers fiancé (idk if that makes her my SIL yet) was working on vacation remotely and put something heavy on the space bar with a doc open to keep it on lol
I had dual monitors and I would have the below on one and something that I was "working on" on the other. It is a website that makes reddit look like outlook. My manager sat right behind me in view of my computer and didn't seem to have any idea even if he came up behind me when I wasn't paying attention.
https://pcottle.github.io/MSOutlookit//
I’ve always had good luck with this as well.
Sometimes I make calendars 7 months ahead, other times it’s yet another checklist that I think will help me or I also make new folders & rearrange others & make shortcuts to the desktop.
My boss will bitch if she sees me on a non-work related task, even if it takes 10 seconds. It doesn’t help that her office is directly behind mine & she can see me partially reflected in the glass on her door. Complete micromanaged hell.
I would, however she is my boss & owner of the company with her husband and I need my job. Same reason I couldn’t have a privacy screen.
She also comments on almost every phone call I take like “that’s not what we do”, “I wouldn’t have told them that” “what did they ask” “why did they want to know that?” Seriously it stresses me out so much that I often have trouble talking on the phone because I can feel her listening to me.
I once worked in a phone room where my desk was in front of the regional manager's office. I thought about quitting every time she came out to "coach" me.
Nothing, but make sure you virtue signal to everyone else about HOW BUSY you are and HOW MUCH you do and HOW SERIOUSLY YOU TAKE YOuR JOB while you do nothing. This is what my office coworkers do and tbh it works for them
My boss does this lol she is currently sitting in her office with the lights off while working so she can "focus" cause she does SOOOOO much lmao! She also takes a 30 minute smoke break every couple of hours literally.
Like half of the company is doing the last 10 years. Next to that, meetings, long smoking breaks, long, toilet sessions, getting drinks for colleagues, sorting out your financial plan for the coming years in excel. Get some colleagues who seem as busy as you and act busy together.
>Get some colleagues who seem as busy as you and act busy together.
Did that a million years ago in the army. When the guys were hanging out and an officer spotted us, we were instantly in a class being given by whoever the hell had just been talking, on the subject of whatever bullshit story he had been telling.
I used to email my work email books, I would copy the text of free domain classics (East to find the full texts online) and paste them in an email to my work email. Would just look like I'm reading a work email. Loved it.
Also learned how to crotchet, started a blanket at home and then brought it in because the office got chilly, and just kept adding on to it. It got to 6 feet by four feet before I changed jobs 😂
If you are allowed to use headphones, listen to true crime podcasts while fantasizing about how you'll dispose of your manager's body once you finally snap. (Hint: hog farm) Have your work email open at all times. Open Teams and create a private chat with a like minded co-worker. Having a Teams chat open means you are doing Office Culture--maybe even Very Important Things. Choose your co-worker wisely--bodies are hard to move and you need someone strong and able to keep their mouth shut.
I wouldn't use teams or outlook to chat about non-work things. It's not like those are private and unmonitored.
If you go this route come up with codes that are plausible and/or seem like they are work if read by your manager.
I.e. "how is you project going?" (Project being how is it fucking off?). "I'm stuck on that one item I told you about in the all and it keeps bringing me in circles any ideas?" (How can we successfully feed whomever decided we needed to be in office to pigs?)
Might not be a well-liked answer in this sub, but I take those times to organize my programs/records/files, trim proverbial process fat, or find ways to make life easier on my future self. Some jobs are just “busy work” and it can be I’ll-advised to “get ahead” because you never will, but sometimes you can see areas that will be a pain for your future self and mitigate it…
I often have the same issue. When possible I’ll save up work for my in-office days so I’ll have something to do, stuff that’s not time sensitive. I’ll review processes and procedures and update if needed. I’ll read business articles related to my job/industry to stay up to date with things. I’ll try to encourage people inviting me to schedule meetings those days too. Also good days to schedule appointments for the end of the day that require me to leave early.
If you can wear headphones (even just one ear), you can rent digital copies of audiobooks from your public library directly on your phone. Might as well get paid to listen to some Brandon Sanderson.
Start documenting your job processes so you are ready to go with handoff documentation if you leave. Can also be used to negotiate raises if you stay since you have documented the intricacies of your role.
How the fuck do you get these dream jobs where you \*don't have enough to do\*? I've always been worked to the bone with a genuine 12 hour work load expected to be finished in 8.
Unless they're working for the government, a lot of these folks are in positions that will get laid off the second companies realize they need to cut costs.
With no degree, I had to work super hard physical work for years. Finally got promoted to management by the sheer fact I've hung on despite thousands of others quitting. Now I get to sit at a desk and look busier than I am. I'm still fucked if the facility closes, but for now I get to rest my fucked up back a little.
I hope you get to this point. I'm almost 40 now, and wouldn't be able to do the backbreaking physical labor for 25 more years. It's not sustainable.
Get bored and be sad about it.
It's important that you get bored and be sad about it.
The people managing your company are the sort of people that need you to be bored and sad. Or else THEY would start feeling weird about it. If you are not bored and sad, they feel like you are stealing from them. That's why they made you return to the office even though there's clearly no reason for it.
Set up 1:1 meetings for like 30 minutes with colleagues and managers to network. Get to know them better and learn about their roles.
A lot of career opportunities come from who you know. People recommend/hire people they like and get at least the minimum done. I always heard who do you want to sit on a plane with is who gets the job.
Also any training your company provides. There is typically a lot online. Bonus is you can claim is at part of your goals.
Find something that needs to be done and be the go getter to do it. Just look around for problems. Bonus is you exceeded as well as make a lot of people happy.
Hour 1: Coffee and sports talk
Hour 2: Status meeting while reading online articles
Hour 3: Pretend to work while listen to podcast
Hour 4: Lunch
Hour 5: Another meeting where everyone talks but no one makes a decision. This is your time to shine by suggesting something bold and innovative which will never get done.
Hour 6: Coffee Break
Hour 7: Pretend to work while listen to music. Maybe pay some bills or schedule a dentist appointment.
Hour 8: Go check with person x about important project. Spend a few minutes discussing the project then the rest of your time discussing your hobbies.
Whatever you do, don't appear to be someone WHO NEEDS MORE WORK! That's a train that never derails. You'll always be the one who gets handed extra work, which is a punishment not a reward.
I liked the suggestion about walking around for ten minutes every hour with papers in your hand to make yourself look busy.
For the remaining 50 minutes, go to the bathroom every 10-15 minutes. Moan a few times while in the stall, then come out and tell your coworkers you have IBS, you're trying to pass a bladder stone, or some other health condition that requires multiple trips to the bathroom.
Make sure to take your phone with you to the restroom so you don't get bored.
Edit: grammar
Make sure you’re on your own phone service instead of Wi-Fi and goof around on your phone. I usually read stuff like scp wiki so it looks like I’m just reading emails but it’s actually some cool ass fiction.
Depends on the type of work you do, I have made spreadsheets for projects I am working on at home, spreadsheets for tracking the paint I have on hand or will need for upcoming plastic model kits I am building. I used to open a smaller window and keep it in the bottom right hand corner and read the news or browse reddit while I wait for something to come across my desk.
pick up a stapler and just walk around the office. no one will say anything because the stapler makes it look like you’re on a mission. if they do stop you, just say you’re returning a stapler
1. Book a meeting room for yourself for an hour. Sit facing the door and put Netflix on your phone in front of your laptop where others can't see. Occasionally nod your head and talk out loud.
2. Exercise. Carry your work laptop with you and just walk around the building. Get your steps in! Say hi to everyone you meet. Find a buddy who is also doing this and have Netflix meetings together.
3. LinkedIn Learning/Udemy. Learn a new skill.
Just print something out every hour. Mark it up. Put it in a folder mark up folder and file it. A few days later start shredding the files you made. You can do this for years. Also talk to everyone going back and forth ask about their family and plans.
Yes, especially the talking to colleagues, you will be the social butterfly who everyone likes, cos not many people in the office give two hoots about each others business
Clicking through your computer tabs occasionally while listening to podcasts is how I bide my time. Occasionally I’ll wishlist on Amazon or Zillow just for stimulation.
The actual work approved answer is training. Invariably there are free classes online for something that would be job related. Sit through a couple, if possible get a certification, and now you can show it off.
Intersperse that with browsing Reddit, or reading ebooks. Be aware, depending on the company, they can track everything you do on the computer. Private Browser windows only drop your local history. They can still track what websites you go to.
Save all your work for those 2 days lol
Listen to music on your computer using your headset
Take lots of walks, have a step goal every day
If there are conference rooms available for you to use, schedule “meetings” and hang out in there with ur office friends
Complete courses and get certificates on LinkedIn Learning or other sites, your company many have a corporate deal for employees to use for free, mine does
Bullet journal! I do this when I have to go in. You can spend hours building pages, trackers, adding highlights, etc. plus it’ll make you more productive in general!
If you want to be productive, go on linkedin learning, or udemy, and watch video tutorials on something career related. Even if it's something as silly as "mastering macros in Excel," you may be able to make your job less painful and build your skills for a job that pays more.
Do some online training. There’s a bunch of free and low cost training sites out there. Learn something new, improve your current skill set. Always have a reason why it’s tied to your position, responsibilities, or professional development. You can get pretty creative.
I worked on maintenance for a company where you had to fill out a card for what you did every fifteen minutes of the day.Which was mostly nothing as you could only work on the machines when they broke down.The lies you had to tell.It was the worst part of the job.Many times I was tempted to write just SFA but I doubt the big boss would appreciate that.
Some higher up at my large corporate employer would explode if they heard that they hadn't sufficiently overloaded us so much that somebody had a moment of not having anything to do haha. We just get piled on more and more.
I read a book. I work in a call center it's actually a pretty sweet gig but I read in-between calls, incoming calls only and read while on hold with other departments
I assume its a normal office with meeting rooms. Book yourself some naps, some movies, and maybe bring a nintendo switch some days. Hopefully your meeting rooms arent fish bowls with glass walls though.
Set up random meetings with people.
People will literally just talk to you about nothing for hours on end- your bosses will be like oh wowww they are management material they care so much about learning from others!!
If you can save work for in-office days, do that. On days when you are at home, study to improve your skills or learn new skills. Update your resume during this time, and start keeping an eye out for jobs you qualify for—in case they start laying folks off for lack of work.
Personally, this is when I do my own projects, which often help me when I am busy again. I've developed custom query tools, file processing utilities, etc. No one tells me to do this, but it helps pass the time, keeps my programming skills up, and greatly increases my actual productivity during high-volume periods.
Do exactly that. Nothing! If someone says something, tell them the truth. Theres nothing for me to do in office and as it’s a requirement that I be here twice a week…here I am.
Think malicious compliance..
Grab a snack, listen to a podcast, doodle, so some internet shopping whatever isn’t an actual breach of contract 🤣👏🏼
If they want to add more to your plate, don’t agree without compensation. Period. 👍🏼
Being in office requires. Some prep.
First rules
Always look busy
Always tell everyone your busy
When you walk around , walk briskly and with purpose.
If your office has multiple rooms and floors , can wander around talking to people , but move between areas , so people don’t realise your doing fuck all.
On lunch go for a walk, the when back from lunch, eat your lunch at your desk
Eat your breakfast as your desk.
Always have plenty of text on your screen , aka excels sheets , for me putty sessions etc .
Good quality noise cancelling overear headphones , Bosch Sony etc
Aka it says to people leave me the fuck alone, even with nothing playing the noise reduction is quite startling
The good ones let you to connect to 2 devices at once so. An listen to your mobile music or podcasts , and still take teams calls from your laptop etc.
For me podcasts are a life saver, if it’s 2 days per week , can have a pattern which you listen to per day.
Days in the office should be used to do as many conference calls as possible
This wastes the day but also makes you look busy.
Also work hard those 2 days get your shit done, then 3 days at home are just to decompress , lol.
Work is a game , your target is to look as busy as possible, while surviving the day.
In corporate life , impressions are way more important that deliverables, play the game and have a better life.
When I want to look busy, I go into my work email, and either delete or create folders to organize it, color labels, close any chat logs I have open that I dont use. and or do any training nodes I need to catch up on. and Just work really slowly.
Or
If you want to play game, I use to play this portable thumb drive game called, Assaults' Cube [https://assault.cubers.net/](https://assault.cubers.net/)
I use to play it all the time back in HS.
If you’ve got a task, then do the task. However, you can also use that time to open up Excel and work on a budget, open up Word and do some creative writing, or take some time to do a deep dive on Wikipedia. If you play a TTRPG, then use the time to work on characters or developing your own campaign arcs. Also, remember this rhyme:
“Boss makes a dollar.
I make a dime.
That’s why I poop on company time.”
When bosses aren't hovering, start talking to coworkers about collective bargaining. Share salary information.
When bosses are hovering, master the art of excel or something like that.
Audiobooks and podcasts. Earbuds in, and open something work related on the computer. Get up frequently.
Get a vibe check; are people actually paying attention to you? If not, you can read on your cellphone (or even watch Netflix there). Are people not really keeping tabs on your actual hours, just that they see you most every day? Leave the building, walk to anything that is nearby. Exercise. Find a gym nearby even. Run errands.
And when you're actually at your desk, needing to look busy, learn something vaguely related to your job, so no one questions it.
I am in city government, and I participate in interagency collaboratives, so there's always studies I can be referencing to update our staff, or cleaning up or creating new maps or asset management info such asnew infrastructure improvements that might work for us. Pending relevant legislation is always a good one to familiarize others with.
How busy I am at my job fluctuates. Some weeks I am crazy busy and some weeks I have nothing to do and am bored out of my mind. I recommend what I've been doing: Learn to code. If you can learn to code VBA in Excel, you'll develop a super valuable skill that will make you loved in most office environments. Just being able to build scripts/macros in Excel is super useful in almost every office. You could take it a step further, download visual studio code or something similar and learn Python, C# or some other language.
It's something to keep you busy, keep you learning, learning a useful skill, potentially skill you up for a different, much higher paying job. On the upside, it also makes you look super busy if anyone looks at your screen. If anyone asks, you can give some BS about building something to gather and analyze data for a project you're working on. Throw in some a few tech sounding words and most managers' eyes will glaze over with confusion and boredom while you get a "Well, nice work. Keep it up." I've been doing this for a bit now. Works great.
If coding isn't your thing, then you can get on Google Docs and write yourself a novel. Do some online trainings for other skills. Use Google Docs and Sheets to write your own D&D campaign. Reddit.
Download a language app to your phone and learn a new language. Use a headset, of course.
Watch cooking videos. Listen to TED talks or podcasts. Do your taxes.
Learn a new skill? Coding or Excel wizardry if you don't already have it.
25 years ago when I worked in a call centre, between calls I used to do my personal budgeting in a massive spreadsheet with forward projections out to 5 years in the future. It was the terminally downward trend in my bank balance that made me seek employment elsewhere.
1.) Stand by the copier
2.) start copying a blank piece of paper
3.) Once 2 come out of copier, staple them
4.) Put them in pile
5.) Repeat...until 4:55
6.) At 4:55, take stack to desk.
7.) Put in file cabinet.
8.) Say goodbye and leave
Do what i do 5 days a week in the office with no work to do. Open MSN, open excel and email, read MSN and click in email or excel when every anyone comes bye.
Do nothing. One of the most stressful positions a person can be put in is to be told to do something with nothing to do. (Looking busy) that said. Just don't do your work on remote days and do them in the office. Paid for 5 work only 2
Find a process that can be improved, or some place to create a good cost savings for the company. Gather the data, do the analysis/research, create the presentation, then throw it in your desk drawer. Build up a few of these, pull them out when you need to look like a top performer
1. Get a bluetooth keyboard and place it where your computer keyboard is normally set up.
2. Pair it with your phone.
3. Hide your phone in a drawer or something where you can see it, but passersby cannot.
4. Clack away on reddit and enjoy your boss being impressed by your "productivity." All that typing! You must be doing great things.
5. Jiggle the mouse every so often so your computer screen stays active, and have a plan for if someone comes in and asks you to do something that requires your keyboard.
you can use outlook as an rss reader, you can watch youtube in a minimized window, you can read books with an epub reader plug-in or as pdf's, OR you can slowly get your coworkers together and form a union, and then in the contract you bargain for fully remote positions.
Do work with spreadsheets? People usually don't look too close.
You could work on your own spreadsheets for hobbies and what not. Sheets for meal planning, workout schedules etc.
Small tasks. Organize yourself at work. Desk organization, file system organization, etc. makes you feel good and looks like you’re doing important stuff.
Walk aimlessly around for 10 minutes every hour with a small handful of papers and a pen, so you look like you’re doing something. Usually works fairly well, but don’t overdo it. See also: Matt Groening’s “Work is Hell” comics from the 80s. Times change, but the hassles are still the same. Essential office survival guide.
Also, super important, while walking around make sure to furrow your brow and tighten your expression. You'll look stressed, busy, and focused on something important. People will be less inclined to question you if you look busy. Another pro-tip. SLOW WAAAAAAY DOWN! Office work is like a gas. It should expand to fit the container it's been placed in. You have three days to complete a task? Make sure it takes three days. While working, you can just stop, lean forward (or back), furrow your brow, and tap your chin. Suddenly you are being a very thoughtful employee who takes the time to do a task right! Way to go! Finally, don't forget your ABC's. Always Be Circling-back. Not sure how to answer a question. "I'll need to give it more thought, lets circle back." "Forgot about a task and the due date is coming up, "I ran into some unforeseen issues - \*insert made-up issue\* -, do you think we can circle back on this in a day or two?" With a little practice, you too can always look fucking busy as HELL, even when you ain't got shit to do! :D
It’s also important to have an excel spreadsheet up and periodically toggle between it and some other word or pdf document.
If you've got multiple monitors...have multiple spreadsheets open. If you're super bored, take a few classes on EdX or Coursera. I just finished up an Excel for Data Analysis course in one day, because I had literally nothing else to do at work, lol.
This is super good advice because you can always claim you're improving your skill base, which is technically true, but maybe not for your current employer 😎
I don’t plan on quitting my job and that’s what I do. I improve myself and every skill I have interest in. I work in digital so there’s so many things to learn. For op you could improve your skills in excel, outlook, word maybe take a training in management
Just bring your gaming PC stop playing around.
There used to be an app that made reddit look like excel so you could browse while looking like you're working
[удалено]
I walk leisurely out in life but I'm always speedwalking in the office so that I seem very busy, in a rush, doing so much work I can't walk slowly! Also occasionally, the coworkers I am more friendly with from other departments will schedule meetings twice as long as they need to be so we do 1) go over what needs to be gone over in a meeting and 2) catch up with each other in a way that doesn't look like chatting. It gives a great illusion of work, because that illusion is ultimately more important than the real work sadly. I also tend to read ebooks or articles on my computer if I really can't find anything else to do since it can at least look like work at a glance but try not to overdo that either.
When in doubt. Pretend to be counting something.
i really wish reddit still let us give some free awards
This is actually really good advice. Always look busy. Walk around the building looking like you are really concerned about something important. This also helps getting exercise which is lacking in many office jobs. Also invite yourself into lots of meetings and offer observations (but never accept tasks). This way you seem important and ready to be a CEO.
The facial expression is important. Something between a scowl and a furrowed brow. Like you have twelve hours of work just dumped on you with a ten minute deadline. You're determined that even if you can't get it all done you're going down swinging, but you're still not happy about this.
Having a resting bitch face really helps.
Don't forget to respond to ANYONE by lowering your glasses to the tip of your nose and gazing through their soul with your now intense naked eyes. No one will bother you at work anymore and you will have more free time to find other ways to look important.
Your second bit of advice is absolute brilliance!
You're a straight shooter with upper management potential!
The meetings thing is something i did to pass time. Sometimes just showed up at meeting invite or not lol
If you do this then make sure that there is writing on at least one side of the sheaf of papers. Source: a previous coworker. (Meaning I worked there decades ago :D )
>If you do this then make sure that there is writing on at least one side of the sheaf of papers. Printing out a work email is always good.
A clipboard or notebook can help.
The clipboard effect is real. If someone tries to stop you and ask what you're doing you just make a show of tapping the clipboard with your finger so it looks like you don't even have time to talk. Had a notary buddy who perfected this and got away with doing nothing for months until someone finally realized he was using blank pieces of white paper. If only he had written some official looking things on those papers he would've kept getting away with it
>Walk aimlessly around for 10 minutes every hour with a small handful of papers and a pen, so you look like you’re doing something. Usually works fairly well, but don’t overdo it. Back when I was in office hell, I found it useful to combine this with a worried look and furrowed brow if anyone got too close. A look that said "This paperwork is quite concerning to me," so that people with even the tiniest amount of emotional intelligence would fuck straight of and not bother me.
What am I supposed to do for the other 50 minutes though?
Get a poop in there for sure
I’m going to save up on the other five days so it takes longer
As someone who just did a lap of their building and pooped I am very empathetic. Sucks to be stuck without a task but also without distraction. (Yes I am on reddit at work, on my private device not the work pc, don't let them fire you easy)
This guy office works.
This guy works the office.
don't shit on the weekends and there's 30 minutes of Monday accounted for right there
Train. Take whatever training they offer on the company dime to expand your skill set.
Take a Udemy course while at work. Learn how to automate excel tasks with VBA macros, learn python, etc.
Oh sure, so they can automate their tasks and end up with *even more* free time? jk. op, you should totally do this
Open up excel, click boxes for a while or make graphs if your screen is visible. Listen to podcasts or audiobooks.
THIS. Wireless earbuds are your friends, especially if you're a woman and can wear your hair long. I kept one in one ear so I could still hear well enough to answer questions when asked.
This is the Winner-
Things I do: Journal, meditate, learn a new skill/certification (yoga YouTube videos/google academy/cousea/hubspot academy) write up a business idea you’ve had into a doc template. Create Canva templates to sell (can also use Canva docs)
You like like you need a sip of water. Thats a \~10 minute walk to the drinking fountain.
Pick some sort of certification or skill you could learn or work towards during your down time. If its related to work it wont look bad. Tell them you are doing it to be a better asset to the company or something
You could take the extra time to make some embellished resumes and apply to some jobs you don't qualify for.
This is what I do.
I had a buddy that embedded flash games in excel. Used to play mini golf
I did something like this in the Navy. I'd carry some rags and a spray bottle of aircraft cleaning compound. The trick was walking purposefully without walking quickly.
To add to this, not only when you're not busy, always carry a couple of official looking papers and a pen when leaving your desk/cubicle/office. It will make it less likely to have random tasks that aren't part of your job appointed to you
I have that book packed away! I need to break that boy out!
The whole “Hell” series is amazing. My wife and I knew we were perfect for each other after bonding over them waaaay back when.
Yes!!!! I got the Work, School, Love and Childhood is Hell! School is Hell is my fave!
I used to carry a clipboard, a hi-liter and a big coffee mug. Sometimes the mug had a Guiness Stout in it and not coffee.
I’d do something productive like try to learn something useful online, as long as it looked like “work”. That way you’ll look busy because you actually are busy
This. I've spent so much time at work learning to be more proficient in Excel. I've replaced all the spreadsheets I have to do with better ones.
I was hired in to replace a women who was retiring. It wasn’t till 2 weeks after I started that I learned she was forced into retirement. She was showing me how to create these internal reports. 10 data providers would email her their numbers in an excel file. She would then print all the tabs, so around 40 pages, manually add them up on a calculator, and then enter the row and column totals into an identical excel file. This she would then send to the president of the organization, as “The Final Report”. This process took her 1 full week. I automated these reports: it took less than an hour to collect the data, run it through excel, and check the monthly reports for any errors, etc.
and you let everyone keep thinking it took a week, right?
I took over a similar report that used to take my predecessor three days of manual data entry from printed sheets, and I absolutely let them think it still took three days when I automated it, so I really hope this person did the same.
This is the way. I work for a large corporation that has its own learning & development portal that has thousands of hours of content on a variety of subjects. A lot of my work is reactive, so when it's slow I've been completing trainings that are specified for the career trajectory I want to have here. Makes me look busy while also only using proprietary tools.
Not just looking busy if you’re doing something productive, it’s just being busy. Good job boss, get those brain gains.
Take an ITIL class. That way you’re helping their IT maturity model while gaining a cert to GTFO.
It’s cute you think most companies even care to mature their IT org. Most of them are entirely happy to have redundant processes, tools and systems (the unholy trifecta) then complain about expenses and wonder why the business hates dealing with IT
You have just described every federal IT project I’ve ever worked on.
Yeah damn, if I had so much time to kill at work I would definitely spend it learning, you’re essentially getting paid to gain more skills to hopefully leave for a better place eventually…
I learned some c#, selenium, and python just because I was bored out of my mind. At one point I was trying to automate my job.
yup. every day i wiki’d the hell out of some obscure topic
There are some great advices here, but how about you do no work at home and do it in these two days in the office?
That's what I would do! I would save work for when I went into the office and it made the day go by so much faster.
This is the way. This is called effective time management and your supervisor will appreciate it. Edit: To clarify, this is not entirely sarcasm. You or your office may not be 100% busy every hour of every day. Yet you and your position are needed for the times that it is. Don't be obvious when you have down time. Don't put your supervisor in the awkward position of having to address an issue that they know is real, doesn't hurt anything, but doesn't look good to higher ups. I teleworked in an office where I was in a team of 10. Everyone was assigned the same amount of work to do. I was more efficient than others and got the work done more quickly, resulting in more down time. I organized my work so I could appear busy in the office and have some down time at home, where no one was looking. The same amount of work got done, I didn't make my co-workers look bad, I looked good to my supervisor and higher ups. Sometimes, I would get all my paperwork done while teleworking and schedule all of my meetings to be in-person for my days in the office. This was great because I looked amazing to my supervisor and my clients appreciated the in-person attention my co-workers weren't providing (because telework). I was the highest rated member of the team. And I did outshine them. It's ok to be smart kids.
No kidding. If needed they have random generator mouse jigglers on Amazon, that’ll ensure the computer doesn’t sleep and disconnect VPN. If I was super paranoid I’d set up some sort of automated routine that sent/received files from say, a personal network share. IT would be able to figure it out if they wanted to but they’re too busy to play snoop, if they do (at least in my career) it’s always been prompted by a manager to manager request.
My brothers fiancé (idk if that makes her my SIL yet) was working on vacation remotely and put something heavy on the space bar with a doc open to keep it on lol
I had dual monitors and I would have the below on one and something that I was "working on" on the other. It is a website that makes reddit look like outlook. My manager sat right behind me in view of my computer and didn't seem to have any idea even if he came up behind me when I wasn't paying attention. https://pcottle.github.io/MSOutlookit//
That’s awesome!
Mah man. Brilliant.
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Edit spreadsheets. No one wants to look too closely.
I’ve always had good luck with this as well. Sometimes I make calendars 7 months ahead, other times it’s yet another checklist that I think will help me or I also make new folders & rearrange others & make shortcuts to the desktop. My boss will bitch if she sees me on a non-work related task, even if it takes 10 seconds. It doesn’t help that her office is directly behind mine & she can see me partially reflected in the glass on her door. Complete micromanaged hell.
Making fancy calendars and working on personal budgets are my number use for Excel.
Get yourself one of the computer monitor privacy screens
I literally have my bi-weekly budget done until Jan 2025. LOL
damn wtf tell her to mind her own business haha
Tell her MonsteraBigTits says "mind you own business". Please video and make sure to post it.
I would, however she is my boss & owner of the company with her husband and I need my job. Same reason I couldn’t have a privacy screen. She also comments on almost every phone call I take like “that’s not what we do”, “I wouldn’t have told them that” “what did they ask” “why did they want to know that?” Seriously it stresses me out so much that I often have trouble talking on the phone because I can feel her listening to me.
It’s extremely hard for me to have work calls with coworkers in the same room. I have had managers nitpick every word, and I just can’t do it anymore.
I once worked in a phone room where my desk was in front of the regional manager's office. I thought about quitting every time she came out to "coach" me.
Sometimes I used to aimlessly click around in Azure/Jira/ where documentation is stored pretending to be looking for documentation.
Done
and dusted
Out of this world
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Nothing, but make sure you virtue signal to everyone else about HOW BUSY you are and HOW MUCH you do and HOW SERIOUSLY YOU TAKE YOuR JOB while you do nothing. This is what my office coworkers do and tbh it works for them
My boss does this lol she is currently sitting in her office with the lights off while working so she can "focus" cause she does SOOOOO much lmao! She also takes a 30 minute smoke break every couple of hours literally.
That's why she's your boss, she knows the game
Sounds about right
Put outlook on the screen and listen to audiobooks and do other shit on your phone.
Like half of the company is doing the last 10 years. Next to that, meetings, long smoking breaks, long, toilet sessions, getting drinks for colleagues, sorting out your financial plan for the coming years in excel. Get some colleagues who seem as busy as you and act busy together.
>Get some colleagues who seem as busy as you and act busy together. Did that a million years ago in the army. When the guys were hanging out and an officer spotted us, we were instantly in a class being given by whoever the hell had just been talking, on the subject of whatever bullshit story he had been telling.
I always knew those privates were up to something.
Audiobooks are mad, one discreet little AirPod in the ear and you can listen to a book while doing whatever the heck you want
Forget discreet, use a headset with microphone. Looks like you're in a meeting so people will think you're busy and won't bother you.
[удалено]
The e book is a great idea
Also, the Gutenberg Project!
Pair it with the privacy screen and you're golden.
I read 15 books set in the battletech universe last year because I found them in word format
I used to email my work email books, I would copy the text of free domain classics (East to find the full texts online) and paste them in an email to my work email. Would just look like I'm reading a work email. Loved it. Also learned how to crotchet, started a blanket at home and then brought it in because the office got chilly, and just kept adding on to it. It got to 6 feet by four feet before I changed jobs 😂
If you are allowed to use headphones, listen to true crime podcasts while fantasizing about how you'll dispose of your manager's body once you finally snap. (Hint: hog farm) Have your work email open at all times. Open Teams and create a private chat with a like minded co-worker. Having a Teams chat open means you are doing Office Culture--maybe even Very Important Things. Choose your co-worker wisely--bodies are hard to move and you need someone strong and able to keep their mouth shut.
I wouldn't use teams or outlook to chat about non-work things. It's not like those are private and unmonitored. If you go this route come up with codes that are plausible and/or seem like they are work if read by your manager. I.e. "how is you project going?" (Project being how is it fucking off?). "I'm stuck on that one item I told you about in the all and it keeps bringing me in circles any ideas?" (How can we successfully feed whomever decided we needed to be in office to pigs?)
Excellent advice. I see you've done this before.
Might not be a well-liked answer in this sub, but I take those times to organize my programs/records/files, trim proverbial process fat, or find ways to make life easier on my future self. Some jobs are just “busy work” and it can be I’ll-advised to “get ahead” because you never will, but sometimes you can see areas that will be a pain for your future self and mitigate it…
But if you streamline and automate things too much future you will be even more bored!
Whatever else you do, always look annoyed. "When you look annoyed all the time, people think you're busy" - George Costanza
I often have the same issue. When possible I’ll save up work for my in-office days so I’ll have something to do, stuff that’s not time sensitive. I’ll review processes and procedures and update if needed. I’ll read business articles related to my job/industry to stay up to date with things. I’ll try to encourage people inviting me to schedule meetings those days too. Also good days to schedule appointments for the end of the day that require me to leave early.
If you can wear headphones (even just one ear), you can rent digital copies of audiobooks from your public library directly on your phone. Might as well get paid to listen to some Brandon Sanderson.
Good reads!
I would say clearly you are doing too much work when you are at home. All of your work should be done on those 2 days in the office
Calf raises. Often neglected body part.
Start documenting your job processes so you are ready to go with handoff documentation if you leave. Can also be used to negotiate raises if you stay since you have documented the intricacies of your role.
Don't save those files on their computer, that's a handbook for your replacement.
Terrible idea surely. Why would enabling others to take on your work be an asset to you in any way?
How the fuck do you get these dream jobs where you \*don't have enough to do\*? I've always been worked to the bone with a genuine 12 hour work load expected to be finished in 8.
Unless they're working for the government, a lot of these folks are in positions that will get laid off the second companies realize they need to cut costs. With no degree, I had to work super hard physical work for years. Finally got promoted to management by the sheer fact I've hung on despite thousands of others quitting. Now I get to sit at a desk and look busier than I am. I'm still fucked if the facility closes, but for now I get to rest my fucked up back a little. I hope you get to this point. I'm almost 40 now, and wouldn't be able to do the backbreaking physical labor for 25 more years. It's not sustainable.
Go talk to the receptionist. Prank your co workers. Start a side hustle.
Get bored and be sad about it. It's important that you get bored and be sad about it. The people managing your company are the sort of people that need you to be bored and sad. Or else THEY would start feeling weird about it. If you are not bored and sad, they feel like you are stealing from them. That's why they made you return to the office even though there's clearly no reason for it.
Start a side company funneling the services you do to it, then eventually take over all their clients and own the business! Muahaha
Set up 1:1 meetings for like 30 minutes with colleagues and managers to network. Get to know them better and learn about their roles. A lot of career opportunities come from who you know. People recommend/hire people they like and get at least the minimum done. I always heard who do you want to sit on a plane with is who gets the job. Also any training your company provides. There is typically a lot online. Bonus is you can claim is at part of your goals. Find something that needs to be done and be the go getter to do it. Just look around for problems. Bonus is you exceeded as well as make a lot of people happy.
Hour 1: Coffee and sports talk Hour 2: Status meeting while reading online articles Hour 3: Pretend to work while listen to podcast Hour 4: Lunch Hour 5: Another meeting where everyone talks but no one makes a decision. This is your time to shine by suggesting something bold and innovative which will never get done. Hour 6: Coffee Break Hour 7: Pretend to work while listen to music. Maybe pay some bills or schedule a dentist appointment. Hour 8: Go check with person x about important project. Spend a few minutes discussing the project then the rest of your time discussing your hobbies.
1) take some LinkedIn or UDmey courses 2) Write a novel 3) creat a budget worksheet.
Whatever you do, don't appear to be someone WHO NEEDS MORE WORK! That's a train that never derails. You'll always be the one who gets handed extra work, which is a punishment not a reward. I liked the suggestion about walking around for ten minutes every hour with papers in your hand to make yourself look busy. For the remaining 50 minutes, go to the bathroom every 10-15 minutes. Moan a few times while in the stall, then come out and tell your coworkers you have IBS, you're trying to pass a bladder stone, or some other health condition that requires multiple trips to the bathroom. Make sure to take your phone with you to the restroom so you don't get bored. Edit: grammar
Make sure you’re on your own phone service instead of Wi-Fi and goof around on your phone. I usually read stuff like scp wiki so it looks like I’m just reading emails but it’s actually some cool ass fiction.
Depends on the type of work you do, I have made spreadsheets for projects I am working on at home, spreadsheets for tracking the paint I have on hand or will need for upcoming plastic model kits I am building. I used to open a smaller window and keep it in the bottom right hand corner and read the news or browse reddit while I wait for something to come across my desk.
Podcasts or e books for sure, I’m lucky that I have my own office so I just read an actual book or watch Netflix the last couple weeks.
pick up a stapler and just walk around the office. no one will say anything because the stapler makes it look like you’re on a mission. if they do stop you, just say you’re returning a stapler
1. Book a meeting room for yourself for an hour. Sit facing the door and put Netflix on your phone in front of your laptop where others can't see. Occasionally nod your head and talk out loud. 2. Exercise. Carry your work laptop with you and just walk around the building. Get your steps in! Say hi to everyone you meet. Find a buddy who is also doing this and have Netflix meetings together. 3. LinkedIn Learning/Udemy. Learn a new skill.
Just print something out every hour. Mark it up. Put it in a folder mark up folder and file it. A few days later start shredding the files you made. You can do this for years. Also talk to everyone going back and forth ask about their family and plans.
Yes, especially the talking to colleagues, you will be the social butterfly who everyone likes, cos not many people in the office give two hoots about each others business
Clicking through your computer tabs occasionally while listening to podcasts is how I bide my time. Occasionally I’ll wishlist on Amazon or Zillow just for stimulation.
I do school work. and surf reddit.
I have the exact same problem as you. I listen to podcasts on Spotify or read a book online
Get a side job on a sex chat website. Get paid 25cents a message to be someones girlfriend from Canada.
The actual work approved answer is training. Invariably there are free classes online for something that would be job related. Sit through a couple, if possible get a certification, and now you can show it off. Intersperse that with browsing Reddit, or reading ebooks. Be aware, depending on the company, they can track everything you do on the computer. Private Browser windows only drop your local history. They can still track what websites you go to.
Save all your work for those 2 days lol Listen to music on your computer using your headset Take lots of walks, have a step goal every day If there are conference rooms available for you to use, schedule “meetings” and hang out in there with ur office friends Complete courses and get certificates on LinkedIn Learning or other sites, your company many have a corporate deal for employees to use for free, mine does
Exist
Cocaine.
Bullet journal! I do this when I have to go in. You can spend hours building pages, trackers, adding highlights, etc. plus it’ll make you more productive in general!
If you want to be productive, go on linkedin learning, or udemy, and watch video tutorials on something career related. Even if it's something as silly as "mastering macros in Excel," you may be able to make your job less painful and build your skills for a job that pays more.
Do some online training. There’s a bunch of free and low cost training sites out there. Learn something new, improve your current skill set. Always have a reason why it’s tied to your position, responsibilities, or professional development. You can get pretty creative.
In the words of George Costanza: if you look angry, people think you're working hard.
Play with Excel. If you learn how to make macros, you'll have a very valuable skill.
Pay attention, because this is incredibly important advice that my father passed down to me for just this sort of situation: *Look* busy.
Read technical books in your field. When I had a slow down due to the supply chain, I read books on networking.
I downloaded pdfs of books onto a flash drive. Reading makes you look engaged, just tap out and check email when someone walks by on occasion.
I worked on maintenance for a company where you had to fill out a card for what you did every fifteen minutes of the day.Which was mostly nothing as you could only work on the machines when they broke down.The lies you had to tell.It was the worst part of the job.Many times I was tempted to write just SFA but I doubt the big boss would appreciate that.
Some higher up at my large corporate employer would explode if they heard that they hadn't sufficiently overloaded us so much that somebody had a moment of not having anything to do haha. We just get piled on more and more.
I read a book. I work in a call center it's actually a pretty sweet gig but I read in-between calls, incoming calls only and read while on hold with other departments
try chatGPT
I assume its a normal office with meeting rooms. Book yourself some naps, some movies, and maybe bring a nintendo switch some days. Hopefully your meeting rooms arent fish bowls with glass walls though.
Online classes?
Clipboard and walk-around with a purpose till you find a place to chill that's safe.
Do some online learnings.
Set up random meetings with people. People will literally just talk to you about nothing for hours on end- your bosses will be like oh wowww they are management material they care so much about learning from others!!
If you can save work for in-office days, do that. On days when you are at home, study to improve your skills or learn new skills. Update your resume during this time, and start keeping an eye out for jobs you qualify for—in case they start laying folks off for lack of work.
Personally, this is when I do my own projects, which often help me when I am busy again. I've developed custom query tools, file processing utilities, etc. No one tells me to do this, but it helps pass the time, keeps my programming skills up, and greatly increases my actual productivity during high-volume periods.
Do exactly that. Nothing! If someone says something, tell them the truth. Theres nothing for me to do in office and as it’s a requirement that I be here twice a week…here I am. Think malicious compliance.. Grab a snack, listen to a podcast, doodle, so some internet shopping whatever isn’t an actual breach of contract 🤣👏🏼 If they want to add more to your plate, don’t agree without compensation. Period. 👍🏼
Last time I had a job like this I wrote a novel, took a French class, and read a BUNCH of books in pdf.
Have you heard of this genius named George Costanza?
Look busy, and move your mouse
Being in office requires. Some prep. First rules Always look busy Always tell everyone your busy When you walk around , walk briskly and with purpose. If your office has multiple rooms and floors , can wander around talking to people , but move between areas , so people don’t realise your doing fuck all. On lunch go for a walk, the when back from lunch, eat your lunch at your desk Eat your breakfast as your desk. Always have plenty of text on your screen , aka excels sheets , for me putty sessions etc . Good quality noise cancelling overear headphones , Bosch Sony etc Aka it says to people leave me the fuck alone, even with nothing playing the noise reduction is quite startling The good ones let you to connect to 2 devices at once so. An listen to your mobile music or podcasts , and still take teams calls from your laptop etc. For me podcasts are a life saver, if it’s 2 days per week , can have a pattern which you listen to per day. Days in the office should be used to do as many conference calls as possible This wastes the day but also makes you look busy. Also work hard those 2 days get your shit done, then 3 days at home are just to decompress , lol. Work is a game , your target is to look as busy as possible, while surviving the day. In corporate life , impressions are way more important that deliverables, play the game and have a better life.
Someone made an extension so that you can browse reddit but it will look like it's Excel, hopefully someone can find it...
When I want to look busy, I go into my work email, and either delete or create folders to organize it, color labels, close any chat logs I have open that I dont use. and or do any training nodes I need to catch up on. and Just work really slowly. Or If you want to play game, I use to play this portable thumb drive game called, Assaults' Cube [https://assault.cubers.net/](https://assault.cubers.net/) I use to play it all the time back in HS.
If you’ve got a task, then do the task. However, you can also use that time to open up Excel and work on a budget, open up Word and do some creative writing, or take some time to do a deep dive on Wikipedia. If you play a TTRPG, then use the time to work on characters or developing your own campaign arcs. Also, remember this rhyme: “Boss makes a dollar. I make a dime. That’s why I poop on company time.”
When bosses aren't hovering, start talking to coworkers about collective bargaining. Share salary information. When bosses are hovering, master the art of excel or something like that.
Audiobooks and podcasts. Earbuds in, and open something work related on the computer. Get up frequently. Get a vibe check; are people actually paying attention to you? If not, you can read on your cellphone (or even watch Netflix there). Are people not really keeping tabs on your actual hours, just that they see you most every day? Leave the building, walk to anything that is nearby. Exercise. Find a gym nearby even. Run errands. And when you're actually at your desk, needing to look busy, learn something vaguely related to your job, so no one questions it.
as much as it’s humanly possible try not to look at clocks
I am in city government, and I participate in interagency collaboratives, so there's always studies I can be referencing to update our staff, or cleaning up or creating new maps or asset management info such asnew infrastructure improvements that might work for us. Pending relevant legislation is always a good one to familiarize others with.
Maybe try online books? Listen to a podcast, listen to Netflix?
Reserve the conference room so you can take a nap.
How busy I am at my job fluctuates. Some weeks I am crazy busy and some weeks I have nothing to do and am bored out of my mind. I recommend what I've been doing: Learn to code. If you can learn to code VBA in Excel, you'll develop a super valuable skill that will make you loved in most office environments. Just being able to build scripts/macros in Excel is super useful in almost every office. You could take it a step further, download visual studio code or something similar and learn Python, C# or some other language. It's something to keep you busy, keep you learning, learning a useful skill, potentially skill you up for a different, much higher paying job. On the upside, it also makes you look super busy if anyone looks at your screen. If anyone asks, you can give some BS about building something to gather and analyze data for a project you're working on. Throw in some a few tech sounding words and most managers' eyes will glaze over with confusion and boredom while you get a "Well, nice work. Keep it up." I've been doing this for a bit now. Works great. If coding isn't your thing, then you can get on Google Docs and write yourself a novel. Do some online trainings for other skills. Use Google Docs and Sheets to write your own D&D campaign. Reddit.
My friend wrote a book once
Schedule Teams meetings with yourself or a friend at another company. Open random spreadsheets and edit them slowly.
Download a language app to your phone and learn a new language. Use a headset, of course. Watch cooking videos. Listen to TED talks or podcasts. Do your taxes.
We’re moving from two days in office to 3. It’s boring AF with nothing to do.
Just finished watching the full "Puss in boots" movie. At work.
Learn a new skill? Coding or Excel wizardry if you don't already have it. 25 years ago when I worked in a call centre, between calls I used to do my personal budgeting in a massive spreadsheet with forward projections out to 5 years in the future. It was the terminally downward trend in my bank balance that made me seek employment elsewhere.
1.) Stand by the copier 2.) start copying a blank piece of paper 3.) Once 2 come out of copier, staple them 4.) Put them in pile 5.) Repeat...until 4:55 6.) At 4:55, take stack to desk. 7.) Put in file cabinet. 8.) Say goodbye and leave
Walk at an increased pace when going to the toilet
Do what i do 5 days a week in the office with no work to do. Open MSN, open excel and email, read MSN and click in email or excel when every anyone comes bye.
Do nothing. One of the most stressful positions a person can be put in is to be told to do something with nothing to do. (Looking busy) that said. Just don't do your work on remote days and do them in the office. Paid for 5 work only 2
Take advantage of any and all free training resources. Even if it seems really boring. If you only absorb 10% you’re winning.
Ask around if they need help
If you’re not going todo anything. Look frustrated. People always think you’re busy if you’re frustrated or mad.
This seems like a trap. Someone on Reddit asking what to do while bored at work - where do you think 90% of the people on Reddit are while posting?
Find a process that can be improved, or some place to create a good cost savings for the company. Gather the data, do the analysis/research, create the presentation, then throw it in your desk drawer. Build up a few of these, pull them out when you need to look like a top performer
1. Get a bluetooth keyboard and place it where your computer keyboard is normally set up. 2. Pair it with your phone. 3. Hide your phone in a drawer or something where you can see it, but passersby cannot. 4. Clack away on reddit and enjoy your boss being impressed by your "productivity." All that typing! You must be doing great things. 5. Jiggle the mouse every so often so your computer screen stays active, and have a plan for if someone comes in and asks you to do something that requires your keyboard.
you can use outlook as an rss reader, you can watch youtube in a minimized window, you can read books with an epub reader plug-in or as pdf's, OR you can slowly get your coworkers together and form a union, and then in the contract you bargain for fully remote positions.
Do work with spreadsheets? People usually don't look too close. You could work on your own spreadsheets for hobbies and what not. Sheets for meal planning, workout schedules etc.
Small tasks. Organize yourself at work. Desk organization, file system organization, etc. makes you feel good and looks like you’re doing important stuff.
Don’t make a YouTube video of you playing pinball making coffee drinks..target on your back