Employee gets buried in busywork when boss sees their clean desk, going forward they pretend to be busy with decoy files and folders: 'I learned my lesson'

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Brad Dickson • Managing Editor
Sep 9, 2024 10:00 AM EDT

Working in modern workplaces can be exceptionally exhausting. Constant distractions due to open-plan offices tear employees away from their work. At the same time, success is attached to social and political status with heavy reliance on the "optics" of busyness rather than employees' actual effectiveness in completing their tasks. 

The reality is that we all work differently, and forcing all staff to work to what you think is the "appearance" of hard work will result in a performative culture where that appearance is more important than actual productivity… That is what this worker faced when their boss buried them under a mountain of pointless paperwork just because the worker liked to work in a highly organized and focused way, keeping clutter from creeping in and unbalancing their process.

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  • One of the things that changed the way I look at cognitively demanding work like committing words to a page was Cal Newport's “Deep Work,” which explores the way we work in the modern workplace, with all the distractions and things vying for our attention close at hand and how these things do nothing but fragment and disrupt our focus, making it harder for us to complete the work we're trying to focus on. To perform cognitively demanding tasks at a high level, we need to be able to escape from these distractions and enter into a state of deep and unbroken focus—thus Cal Newport's term for it: “deep work."

    So, while “multi-tasking” might be an important skill—at least according to every job posting and resume in the 21st century. There are certain tasks that are disadvantageous and inadvisable to complete while “multi-tasking.” Meaning that this boss, like so many others really isn't being the leader they think they are by forcing their workers to work the way they want them to.

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    It doesn't look like you have enough to do M Got my first career job in a local government, keeping tabs on it's real estate and the legal documents relating to said real estate. I'm wet behind the ears, my first 40 hour per week career job. This was a time when "multitasking" was a huge buzz word in business and it seemed every single job I applied for required someone with good
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    "multi-tasking skills". I thought it was I worked best when • only working on one task at a time and managing my work-load via a daily time allotment schedule. That is, I'd schedule my work in 15 minute lumps when I got in in the morning and work on those tasks. That way, I never missed a deadline, or had a project fall between the cracks. For example, some tasks got slotted 2 hours. Some whole days. Some just 15 minutes.
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    I loved to keep my desk clean. All tasks that appeared in my physical inbox were sorted and prioritized. The paper work was then filed, and the task scheduled, for later that day, or later in the week depending on how urgent it was. Consequently, my desk was always empty, save one folder, and a few maps related to the folder. Once one task was done, that folder and it's maps were filed, a new folder and it's maps were retrieved.
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    One afternoon my direct boss walks in, looks at my desk with it's one folder and two maps, looks at my clean topped filing cabinets, looks at my empty in- box (physical one you actually put paper/folders in). Grunts. Walks out.
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    20 minutes later, my boss strides back into my office, drops 18 inches of folders and papers onto my inbox. States proudly and firmly, "<Worker>, it doesn't look like you have enough to do. THIS should keep you busy." He smiled and strutted back to his cluttered office.
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    It was busy work. 3 weeks of mind numbing, paper work. Nothing outside of my work description. Just more like duplicate files, old contracts, unorganized paperwork, and/or outdated maps.
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    In dealing with the Dump's aftermath, I learned my lesson. While doing my actual job was important, it was equally important that hard work appear to be happening, so I could do my actual job. I started saving old files, old maps, and old legal documents. I rebound up papers, that normally would have been recycled, into legitimate looking folders. I transformed my office. into a duplicate of my boss'
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    chaotic, file & paper, hellscape. My inbox always had papers and folders in it. Height and number would vary, daily. Never empty. I had folders piled on top of the file cabinets, folders in stacks on the floor. 24 of those white office boxes packed with with 'files' towering around my work area. I even had a map rack with old maps rolled up in it. My office looked utterly cluttered. I even
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    took to walking everywhere with a steno pad, a file folder, and sometimes a map under my arm. Didn't matter where. Getting coffee? Pad and file. Pooping? Pad and file. Pointless meeting? Pad. Two files. Actual necessary and productive meeting. Pad, relevant file, relevant map.
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    Every morning, right after scheduling my real work, I would shuffle the fake folders and paper around my desk and work area. Move the boxes about every two weeks. But in all that visual chaos I kept one area of my desk clean, where the real work happened.
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    One day, my boss peeked into my office, the door bumping into a stack of 3 full, white boxes placed behind it preventing it from fully opening. A single file fell off the top spilling its guts all over the floor. He looked around, paused at the mess he just made, then, "Uh, sorry 'bout that. What you working on?" I rattled off 3 of the highest priority property's on the current weeks schedule and the tasks for each. "Alright, um, I'll give this to someone else" and walked on down the hall. I'd a
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    . Quiver-NULL ⚫ 4h ago I ALWAYS make myself look busier than I really am. Otherwise I get to do other people's jobs too.
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    cbelt3 4h ago I had a boss like that early on in my career. Ever since my workspace has been a mess.
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    Outrageous_Lett... • 4h ago Multitasking is a myth. Neurologically speaking, the concept of "switch cost" refers to the research- backed fact that frequent switching between tasks results in more errors and lower quality work. The "value" of this approach to work and life is a steaming pile of garbage that has been foisted on the world by bean counters and vapid corporatespeak managers.
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    Responsible-End 7... . 4h ago Regarding multitasking what needs to be stressed is that for a good multitasker you can get 30% of normal productivity each for 2 tasks, 15% each for 3, 10% each for 4, etc.
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    Basically the worker who is multitasking is actually singletasking but changing focus frequently and has to devote a lot of time to catching back up/organizing the multiple tasks in their head/watching for the mistakes caused by the frequent change in focus. Bosses who think a multitasking worker does. twice as much work are 140% wrong (200% vs 60%).
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    • zy... . 3h ago Edited 2h ago You have learned well, young grasshopper. If you ever have a really frustrating day, when you don't feel like doing anything, then grab a pen and a clipboard, and start walking around the facility. Stop every once in a while to look at something with a concerned look on your face, make a notation on the clipboard, and then walk off.
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    There is great power in this technique. I learned it at Hughlitt Backwards, many years ago. I guess today you might use a tablet instead of a clipboard, but it still works.
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    freebase1ca 3h ago You adapted quickly to the way employers work :-) Similar story for me. First permanent government job. We were horribly understaffed and over worked. Kind of scenarios where I couldn't get to the work I had planned for the day because of the emergency standing in the doorway and both my cell and land line ringing.
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    I felt I was a hero putting out fires and working extra hours. I get "adequate - could do better" on my next performance appraisal. I realised my manager was never around and didn't have much to base his ? opinion on. I realised I was a young, energetic and happy person at all times - handled stress well and didn't let little things get to me. He saw that as someone being lazy.
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    I too learned to walk everywhere with a sheet of paper in my hand. I did the added move of whenever I saw him approaching or I was going past his office, I would just wilt or sag a little. Maybe even let out a little sigh. My next performance appraisal was stellar. I hadn't changed anything else :-/
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    hOzR • 3h ago . Take a tip from HR - ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS make sure to tell EVERYONE how busy you are AND how little time you have while doing absolutely nothing. The APPEARANCE of work is more important then the work itself.
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    SnooRegrets 1386 • 4h ago Or you work with people that spin their wheels looking busy, but as I've paid attention, they spend all their time trying to not work. Keeping busy makes the day go faster. If only the boss. could recognize
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    Paul_Michaels73 • 3h ago Congratulations, you learned the first rule of employment. If you are a good worker who is quick, efficient and keeps up with your workload, you will be punished with more work.
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    Hyperion1144 • 4h ago The reward for being good at your work is more work! What gets measured, gets done. Your boss sucked as a manager.
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    myatoz • 3h ago Manglement at it's finest.
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    litsalmon 4h ago . I keep my desk just messy enough to not invite this type of comment from my bosses. Works like a charm.
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    Bob-son-of-Bob • 4h ago "No" is a full sentence. Also to your boss. If I get all my assigned work done on time and with minimal error, I don't need your smug ass to give me busy work. right off. Having my own business works quite well for me.
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    NavyShooter_NS 4h ago Clipboard + angry look = never stopped on a worksite. Around the office? Test equipment (Calipers) + sample stock items + cal reports + ruler + stamps + etc...never a clean desk, but never out of order. Also. Have a folder clearly marked "RESUME" with a reasonably current resume handy and only slightly hidden under an 'important' folder on your desk. In case you need to make someone nervous about you having an exit strategy.
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    GrimmReapperrr . 3h ago Im like the old you> I cannot function if my desk is a mess. So first thing I do is sorting all the files into categories of similar types or piles of related documents. Depending on the deadline or urgency I start completing them in order, usually I do the easiest one first and move onto the complex ones. You
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    dont want to burn out on the complex ones and then have to deal with the easy ones. Once a task is complete it gets filed immediately. My peers has years of experience over me but I see them struggling, probably because of cluttered workspaces. So now everyone approaches me to
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    solve problems and I am considered the senior, although its not the case. Downside to it? I get to solve everybody's problems and work load
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    Jeffreymoo I had about 6 years work experience as a chemical engineer when I started a new job in an oil refinery. This was the days before we each had a desktop computer, so paper was the work tool.
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    During my first week, I was doing an engineering design. My desk had text books, equipment data sheets, design documents, process and instrumentation diagrams and an assortment of reference material relevant to the task spread out, all being used. An "older" guy (maybe mid 50s ?) who I had not met yet
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    looked in and said "an organized person shouldn't need to have more than one piece of paper on their desk at any time". I briefly seriously wondered whether I was doing it wrong. Whether I was being shown a mysterious truth from someone far more wise and experienced than I was. I
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    asked my new boss ( a fellow chemical engineer) who was that guy? Was he an engineer? Should I take note of what he said? Turns out he was not tertiary qualified in any way (so had never done an engineering design) and had previously been the manager at an oil
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    terminal (not refinery) operated by the same. company and had been sidelined when a whole lot of product had been stolen under his unsuspecting nose. I was in fact a couple of job grades above him. He did some minor admin-type role to see him out to retirement.
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    Conclusion- he was a deluded idiot who didn't know what he was talking. about. I spent another 28 years working in oil refineries and never had only one piece of paper on my desk, although on my last day, it had no paper.
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    Sea_Researcher7... . 2h ago Had the same thing happen yesterday. My Boss sees me standing still (I work in a mill planing rough boards into finished planks) and tells me to sweep up around the sawdust collector. Only then does he notice the full unit (1200 board feet) waiting to be planed. Tells me to do the planing first. No Sherlock! I was waiting for my partner to finish putting. away the last unit so we could start the next.
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    Windk86 3h ago • yup, I really hate the performative act you have to do in some offices. they don't care if you are meeting your goals they care that you 'look' busy
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    Drone314 2h ago Brother, welcome to government work! Look busy and you'll never be bothered ever again. I use the same system of props in my work area to mask the massive amount of goofing off I do to the outside - would I look really occupied.
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    Sunlit53 2h ago • Always have work in progress on display. First rule of office work is look busy. Especially when you aren't. We have a very uneven flow of projects so we shelve the low priority stuff for the quiet weeks. And temporarily revert all the little efficiencies I've come up with over the years to manual SOP.
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    ShadowDragon86... 2h ago "What's more important, boss? That I get my work done, or that I look busy? Because I can do either, but not both."
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    Vividly Dissociating 1h ago i love multi-tasking. i thrive. in it and i always get compliments by customers and other workers who witness the chaos i gracefully maneuver.
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    but there are certain tasks i do not ever multi-task while doing. such as handling money. when i process. incoming check payments, for example, i have an allotted time for this and make sure my desk is organized and clear before i start.
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    anything that involves a lot of phsycial documents gets a cleared desk as well. i do not like files getting mixed up. i spend enough time undoing everyone else's clerical fuckups. i dont need to send myself into another ridiculous investigation as well.
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    ive experienced managers walk by and make comments about how my desk is too clean and it looks like i dont have enough work. and not in a joking tone. ive straight up told them "it may look like i dont have enough work but thats not reality. im not about to cause avoidable confusion by having over my desk." all
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    but.. when i want to be left alone and just enjoy a slow day. I'll purge files and sit there are the same file for like an hr, putting papers to be shredded on a stack that looks like pending tasks also furrowing your brow and looking perplexed or irritated at some papers is a good way to make ppl leave you tf alone.
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    Prof1959 14m ago . Some idiot bosses need you desk to look busy. Other idiot bosses like your workplace to be neat as a pin. I just tell them to look at the results.
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