It’s true that it’s not always about the money, but it’s probably never about a ping pong table
Capitalism indoctrination in progress.
Submitted 1 year ago by STRIKINGdebate2@lemmy.world to mildlyinfuriating@lemmy.world
https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/4ba4a02b-6e18-4c10-b090-c5f914426497.jpeg
Comments
OneLemmyMan@lemmy.world 1 year ago
pain_is_life_is_pain@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
Well, hypothetical speaking, if there were two completely absolutely identical jobs, but the one had a ping pong table. I might choose the one without and ask them to get a Foosball table, since I’m no good at ping pong.
Carighan@lemmy.world 1 year ago
It also depends on whether it’s about a pingpong table in the office, or whether I get one for at home and we’re talking a fully remote job.
Getting a free pingpong table isn’t a bad bonus!
intensely_human@lemm.ee 1 year ago
If they put in any kind of clackball table, I’m demanding noise canceling headphones and my own office.
Knightfall@lemmy.ca 1 year ago
I’m all about the air hockey table.
IanM32@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Most places that have HR like this work their employees too hard for them to have time to use a ping pong table anyway, so it’s really just a hollow gesture.
cmbabul@lemmy.world 1 year ago
A company I used to work for had a fucking arcade of all sorts of video games, I NEVER saw anyone playing them
Kichae@kbin.social 1 year ago
Indeed.
It's telling that "basic dignity" or "managers who aren't dicks" didn't make the list.
MajorHavoc@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Yeah. In my experience, “A manager who doesn’t suck” is most of the list.
Source: I’ve been the manager who did suck, and the one who doesn’t. I have some data points.
Psaldorn@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Ping pong tables are loud as fuck and disrupt the whole office. If they invest in a soundproof room to put it in, sure. Otherwise it just makes you feel like a massive douche.
Gork@lemm.ee 1 year ago
Especially if your coworkers play like pros.
Thwack
thwack thwack
Thwack
Mrkawfee@feddit.uk 1 year ago
I wanted a foosball table dammit!
pain_is_life_is_pain@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
Dammit, you beat me to it!
LrdThndr@lemmy.world 1 year ago
My last job had a pingpong table. We’d even use it occasionally. That is, until people started getting pissy when they’d see us playing pingpong. Then management started bitching that we were playing pingpong instead of working. Eventually, nobody was allowed to use the pingpong table - it just sat there, in the middle of the room, with brand new paddles and packs of balls that we weren’t allowed to use.
The money was okay - not great, but not terrible. After some management fuckery, I left for a $10000/yr raise and 100% work from home. I’ve gone up $20K since then, been promoted to senior, still have upward trajectory, and still work 100% from home. I have a desk in Memphis somewhere, but I’ve never actually seen it.
vegai@suppo.fi 1 year ago
I would quit if my employer got a ping pong table.
fluxion@lemmy.world 1 year ago
It is if you’re managing an Olympic ping pong team
jj4211@lemmy.world 1 year ago
My employer really covered their bases. We have ping-pong, pool, and foosball. That guarantees that everyone has something that will keep them from quitting.
Grandwolf319@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
It’s always about autonomy, one way or another. People want to be able to control how they work and what they can get out of it. For some that does mean more money, for some it would mean less stress, for others it could means less meetings.
It’s pretty easy for management to address all of it by just giving people more power over what their work lives are like, but that could mean less control over their workforce. No “owner” wants them, to them, they own their employees’ time/work life.
Tandybaum@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I was at my last job for 10 years.
If I had been well paid and treated well I would not have ever started that job search. Further even just having one of those two thing might have kept me from looking.
At that job I hit the tipping point of both. It’s was getting shittier everyday and the pay wasn’t budging year after year. Finally mid-Covid the power flipped to the employee and jobs were much easier to get. I started looking and jumped shipped.
Vub@lemmy.world 1 year ago
It’s not ever not about the many around 0% of the times.
Neve8028@lemm.ee 1 year ago
Eh. Toxic work culture can drive people away regardless of the pay. Obviously some people suck it up but not everyone. Ultimately the goal is to treat employees well all around. Good pay, benefits, and work culture will keep people happy.
Kefass@lemmy.world 1 year ago
This
saltesc@lemmy.world 1 year ago
As a professional in this field, top reasons would be…
- Pay
- Career progression
- Dissatisfaction with environment/culture
- Dissatisfaction with management
- Work-life balance
- Poor job design/expectations of role
- Poor taining quality/knowledge management
- Inadequate tools/systems
Asafum@feddit.nl 1 year ago
I don’t see pizza party or ping pong table on that list so you’re obviously not a professional.
A real professional knows employees want pizza parties instead of higher pay and they want more responsibilities with the same pay!
:P
CarolineJohnson@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
My top reasons for leaving a job:
- Too little pay
- Too many responsibilities
- The possibility of career progression
The three Big Nos. My optimal work-life balance is 0.1-99.9
Pechente@feddit.de 1 year ago
Almost all of these applied to the last job I left, so I guess it’s pretty spot on.
Pandantic@lemmy.world 1 year ago
So ping pong table falls under the third point right? More ping pong = more fun = better culture? Right? /s just for clarity
chaorace@lemmy.sdf.org 1 year ago
Very correct. You can solve bad culture by throwing more money at the problem. Preferably all at once with zero maintenance budget or governance so that the amenities in question can become non-functional monuments to your superior culture. Future generations will find these and marvel at your ingenuity from the safety of the water cooler.
alertsleeper@lemmy.world 1 year ago
you really a pro, I’m looking for other jobs precisely because of 1 and 2, even though the rest are all great at my current job
Steeve@lemmy.ca 1 year ago
Obviously right? I mean this post is definitely a joke
Debo@lemmy.world 1 year ago
There’s some new research that shows raising pay is not great for retention. Studies say it’s better to take that money and put it into a long-term benefit line a pension, profit sharing, while life insurance with a cash out value, etc.
Raises and bonuses had about a 3-month effect.
MajorHavoc@lemmy.world 1 year ago
That seems highly suspect.
Was this research sponsored by the association for research into golden parachuting out of a pillaged company?
crossal@lemmy.world 1 year ago
What field?
saltesc@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Strategic Workforce Planning. It’s a bit different to HR in that there’s a lot of data analysis. Typically we would use data to identify retention issues (reasons, areas, seasonality, etc) and figure out how to improve it. We’d then hand that over to HR to
implementfuck up.
peto@lemm.ee 1 year ago
There is a bit of truth here. Toxic culture and out of touch management will make people walk as well.
Thing is, there might just be a wad of cash big enough to make me put up with that against my health interests.
Fuck ping pong tables though. No one left a company because they didn’t have enough fucking table sports. If you think they are then you are the problem. Exit interview your own fucking arse.
dabadee@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Around 2012 I had a interview with a recruiter, he asked me what kind of company you’re looking for, and I replied, one without a ping pong table, he laughed at me, I am an immigrant, left home when I was 19, so around 2008, went around in my country and EU, and already understood that whenever a company had a ping pong table it had a shitty culture
11 years after, I wish I could speak with that recruiter to see if he understood that ping pong tables are low efforts solutions adopted by shitty-environment companies and if he would laugh at me again
Malfeasant@lemm.ee 1 year ago
He had to laugh at you, otherwise he would have cried because he knew you were right.
ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Lol he probably just thought you sucked at ping pong.
Hasherm0n@lemmy.world 1 year ago
One of the best bosses I ever had once told me that people will stay for the culture but leave for money. His philosophy was to try and ensure that money was not a factor in people’s decision, then build as good a culture as he could.
And to be clear, by making money not a factor, I mean he paid well.
ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I had a meeting years ago with my company’s CTO about my salary. He kicked off the meeting by saying “you care a lot more about what you make than I do” which prompted me to ask for 50% than I had been planning to ask for. He agreed to it without argument. TBF he was a coke addict married to the daughter of the company’s owner and within six months he’d been divorced and fired, but I got to keep my salary.
HellAwaits@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I’ve seen companies install an whole-ass arcade room with skee ball machines and tout them like crazy. I was too naive at the time to think they were just masking a HORRIBLE company culture that makes people feel like absolute garbage.
PainInTheAES@lemmy.world 1 year ago
- Buy arcade room
- Passively aggressively mention whenever someone uses the arcade room
- ???
- Profit.
HawlSera@lemm.ee 1 year ago
Notice how they’re always empty when they show them to you?
They don’t even give employees time to play them…
TommySalami@lemmy.world 1 year ago
“Man, my job pays horribly and the benefits barely cover anything, but they have a ping-pong table so it’s honestly a tough call.”
I struggle to understand how someone could seriously write something like that question without a lack of self-awareness so dire that a walk to the kitchen would come with a near-death experience. It just can’t be real.
Texas_Hangover@lemm.ee 1 year ago
That was beautifully put.
TurboFool@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I think the truth is that it assuming it’s the latter may not be enough. But the first two are even less likely. Additional responsibilities WITHOUT a raise is very, very unlikely to be what anyone was waiting for to stick around.
EverStar289@citizensgaming.com 1 year ago
This is what I came to say. Good management will make people stay for a long time with less pay.
But obviously HR doesn’t get that lmao.
jj4211@lemmy.world 1 year ago
yeah, the "not necessarily pay is accurate, but the “right” answer being ping-pong table pivots things from “ok, they have some understanding” to “incredibly tone deaf”.
Azal@lemmy.world 1 year ago
This is it right here!
Last time a job tried to hire me from my current position, it was all about the money, my company was willing to compete. I stayed with the company.
This time where I’m throwing applications like campaign pamphlets, I’m willing to take a cut in pay.
It is shocking how a year can have a company go to the shitter.
barsoap@lemm.ee 1 year ago
The flip side is if you can’t be bothered to set aside some money for a ping pong table, as well have the sense to first ask around whether people would rather have foosball, or a proper pizza oven, or whatever the fuck, your company culture probably also sucks. A place for recreation means that you respect recreation and extend enough trust to have employees self-manage their need for it.
…of course, setting up that place only to have it be a hunting ground for micromanagers preying on unsuspecting workers is not what I’m talking about. If noone ever uses those areas, worry.
azvasKvklenko@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
I mean not enough ping-pong tables could be reason to leave for a PE teacher or something
dipshit@lemmy.world 1 year ago
It’s true, most people don’t care about money.
They care about what money can help them buy, like another day of survival.
It was never about the money. It was about maslovs heirarchy of needs; which, at the very bottom, is a foosball table.
PeckerBrown@lemmy.world 1 year ago
There’s only been two reasons for me to quit a job: shitty pay and shitty people in charge.
Sounds like this company has both.
Hawk@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 year ago
None of these answers is correct, it’s simply not a multiple choice question.
For some the pay is important, others need a bit of distraction like a ping pong table.
Everybody has their own needs, the biggest HR loser is the one that fits all employees in the same square.
eleefece@kbin.social 1 year ago
A ping pong table? What for? So HR can punish you when you use it?
foggy@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Yeah, the main reason Ive changed jobs is money. Nobody gives raises like new bosses.
jj4211@lemmy.world 1 year ago
A company offered me a million dollars to work for them, but then I remembered the ping pong table at my current employer and said no way. Totally worth it.
plumbercraic@lemmy.sdf.org 1 year ago
I had this argument with a boomer HR consultant and she just doubled down, even though I explained that neither I nor my colleagues, give two hoots about fussball or team building. Our position is a resounding “fuck you pay me” but oh no - boomer knows best.
Justdaveisfine@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I once worked at a place with a ping pong table. I got a lot of ugly stares from managers if I actually tried to use it, so it was mostly left alone.
Now whenever I see jobs that list something like that as a perk, I usually see it as a negative.
azvasKvklenko@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
Yeah, often when an employee leaves it’s about the lack of ping-pong table.
Commiunism@lemmy.wtf 1 year ago
Questions like these make me wonder if large capitalists actually live in an alternate universe but through some time and space shenanigans they are still here. There’s just no way they can make this type of shit up (assuming it’s a real question) without being delusional or sadistic.
m3t00@lemmy.world 1 year ago
synapse1278@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Ping Pong table ? Are they serious ?!? We had a PS5 in the meeting room for ~4 month an no one ever touched it. I don’t go to work to have a fun time, I go to do my job, then leave and have a fun somewhere else. More correct answers for retaining employees:
- give them tasks they are interested in
- give them perspective for developement (promotions, raise, mobility, etc)
- value their contributions and support them moraly (you want to know your managers and colleages got your back)
- of course more money ! Or alternatively more freetime !
frazw@lemmy.world 1 year ago
It is pretty simple. Respect your employees and they will respect you. Respect starts with calling the employee’s contributions by paying them a fair wage. It continues with treating them well. A post of treating them well might be a point ping table, but that comes on top of a fair wage, not instead of.
A good manager might recognise a hard working team needs a way to relax and gets a pool table or something. The employees are happy and tell their friends they’ve got a pool table at work, everyone is jealous. It seems like the pool table is the reason but it is just a symptom of them being generally treated well.
Bluefalcon@discuss.tchncs.de 1 year ago
Never quit a job over lack of ping pong tables.
HawlSera@lemm.ee 1 year ago
This is true but still not the right answer… it’s not always about the money
IT’S ABOUT THE METS BABY, LET’S GO METS, GONNA GET A HOMERUN, LOVE THE METS! LET’S GO METS!
BrianTheeBiscuiteer@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I’ve never left a company because of money. I have left because the bullshit they put me through wasn’t worth the money. That’s not just being funny either. I’m okay with being under-compensated if the environment is positive, managers are friendly and flexible, and it actually feels like our sister teams have similar goals and we’re not working against each other.
dusky@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Ah yes because I have the time to play ping pong :)
golamas1999@lemmy.world 1 year ago
This reminds me of the Simpson episode where they are negotiating a new contract. It’s the same as the old one expect the they replace the dental plan with a keg of beer.
Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca 1 year ago
How many of these companies think employees are going to say it’s about the money during an exit interview? Usually if you agree to an exit interview it’s to be diplomatic and not burn your bridges. You’re not going to tell the truth, you’re going to say what they want to hear.
rikudou@lemmings.world 1 year ago
Yeah, we’re the fucking generation that can’t afford our own living, but have you tried giving us a ping-pong table?
bappity@lemmy.world 1 year ago
the correct answer to this entire questionnaire is to close it and never look back
lipilee@feddit.nl 1 year ago
perfectly maps to startups selling working at a startup as “we’re a family”, “you’re a googler”, etc. give them a ping pong table and free beer on fridays and you can pay considerably less.
zarmanto@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Of course, nobody with two brain cells to rub together who reads that answer is sitting there thinking to themselves, “Huh… I guess I’ve had it wrong all this time, focusing so much on money.” Rather, they’re instinctively blurting out, “Yeah right – I call bull!”
But I’ll give them partial credit; frequently it’s about money. Sometimes, it’s just about a work environment that used to be great going to crap. And sometimes, it’s about the employee coming to an epiphany, and realizing that their work environment was actually crap all along.
That said, it may be true that not every job that I’ve ditched was entirely because of money… but it should go without saying that it’s always a factor in where I went for the next job. Also, it’s never the only factor – but it’s certainly one of the more significant ones.
nxfsi@lemmy.world 1 year ago
They said employee, not wage slave
snek@lemmy.world 1 year ago
“Usually, in our narrow and sad description of what an employee wants, it’s not money. Clearly it’s more related to the lack of ping-pong tables and extra responsibilities.” 🤡
These people have absolutely forgotten what it means to be an employee.
decapitae@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
This is a jackwagon CEO (Oligarch in training.) trolling the masses. Don’t fall for the rage bait. Just form a Union and strike. Better yet, boycott the company until they disolve. 🤷