Most pointless job you've ever been given

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Tomorrow we're having a big important corporate visit. Not just the district manager stopping by for a surprise ball-busting, but various Presidents and Vice Presidents and Regional Managers and other Vaguely Important People.

So, in anticipation of their visit, management has gone into a frenzy of cleaning, smearing and shining.

For example, today after we finished the truck, I got sent outside to sweep around the receiving docks, around the trash compactor, and by the fence. All these areas are home to various kinds of free-range trash. It rained almost all week last week and it hasn't completely dried up yet, so all that shit was a big, sodden mess. After a while I just said "fuck it" and went back inside and got a shovel to scoop up all that crap.

And then when I was done with that, I got to clean out the insides of garbage cans while my other co-workers got to break things and chuck them into the dumpster. This is all stuff we'd never think to do, but we have to do it because of this big visit.

Luckily, I will not be greeting the delegation. I have tomorrow off.

So what's the most pointless job you've ever been given?

[Kogarashi]

Hands down, being pulled from Toys to rearrange wrapping paper in the Garden Center for five hours the week after Christmas. ::flops over:: All by myself. During the season where the Seasonal Manager ordered 2.5 times the amount of wrapping paper we actually needed.

[Department stores *sigh*]

Week 1

Manager: Hey guys we gotta move this aisle to the other side of the store.

Week3

Manager: Hey guys we gotta move it back.

Week 5

Manager: Hey guys we gotta move it to a new location.

me: *thinking* You got this job how??

[powerboy]

Lets see, the pointless job ever given to me.

Uninstalling World of Warcraft out of the computers at my last job. The owners daughter in law installed, for when she went on break. But she would stay the whole time in there playing that game.

At another job, I had to help sweep around the building and lot.

[draftermatt]

Go outside and sweep up the cigarette butts, in October, when it's windy

[Geek King]

Get called up front from the warehouse to go out and get carts when I was working for Big Lots during a lay-off period. I go out and get the two carts in the lot and bring them back. CSM doesn't believe me, and goes out to check.

[Norton]

There have been times when my boss' father asked me to come in on a Saturday to help him with some project. He would ask me to be at the office by 10 am.

Usually, I would arrive at 10 am, then sit here and surf the 'net until noon, at which time the boss' father comes wandering in. He would spend 15-30 minutes rifling through stacks of paper, then hand me some and have me make copies and put them in order - it took me 10 minutes at the most. As I did that, he would disappear for lunch. An hour and a half later, he would come back and say "Oh, you're done? Thanks, I'll see you Monday".

Total time at the office: 4 hours
Money earned: $40
Time actually spent working: 5-10 minutes.

[sarahj]

On Saturday mornings at work there's always 1-2 extra cashiers. If people have called out and couldn't be replaced, the cashiers go on registers. If not, we clean around the store. Just small jobs, like cleaning the glass around the service desk and dusting the tops of things around the register area.

Once I was asked to clean the glass around the desk. So I grab the cleaner and a cloth and start spraying & wiping. A co-worker walks past, commenting, "oh, I just did that." Thank you for nothing, supervisors. I abandoned the task and told them I'd done it, what was next? And then I checked with the other girl. Yeah, they asked me to do things she'd done like 10 mins before. So I did other things (still working, but actually getting something done). Insane.

[crazylegs]

I would tell you about the paper work I have to do, but you wouldn't believe me (think TPS reports, but multiplied)

[Finance Gopher]

I am still right in the middle of my most pointless job--downloading back statements for our clients. You see, corporate, in its wisdom, made several years of monthly statements available for download. So, my boss decided we needed every single statement for every single client. We have 150+ distinct groups, with over 20 statements per group. I need to download, rename and sort over 3000 individual files. Did I mention that they are all pdfs of over 300k each, and that the program drops at least 7% of downloads. And that they are all instantly available to show the client if you just do it NOT through the batch-download program.

Sigh.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Greeter.

In Kinko's.

I'm so glad corporate has such a great handle on how things work down where the rubber meets the road. Dumbfucks.

I reluctantly humored my manager when he asked me to do this for a grand total of about 3 minutes. Then I walked to register #2, logged in, and started taking care of the huge crowd that had gathered at the registers (since, you know, only one register was open while I stood near the door like an idiot with my thumb up my ass), much to the vast relief of the cashier. Come on, you know? The line was out the freaking door.

Boss: What are you doing?
Me: What does it look like I'm doing?
Boss: You're supposed to be greeting.
Me: Yeah....I'm not doing that.
Boss: Are you saying you're refusing to be a greeter?
Me: Yeah, that's pretty much what I'm saying.

Fire me, peckerhead. I mean, really. I'm not doing that. If I am, I'm walking out and finding a new job. I didn't say that, but I was sure thinking it. And I think the boss realized that.

He didn't fire me. But he did screw me at raise time, and cited this incident. And when he left shortly thereafter, his replacement proceeded to give me an unheard of pay increase to make up for said screwing, so guess who ended up smelling like a rose when it was all said and done.

[Mr. Rager!]

One of the most pointless jobs I've ever been given was rearranging the laptops.

That consisted of moving a majority of what as on the floor into the back, and adding more from the back onto the floor. I had to each case by brand and as many as each model number as I could fit. I got it done, it took the better part of my shift to do it.

It took two days for it to be completely ass-backwards.

[Sheldonrs]

Clearing the front sidewalk of a movie theatre in New Jersey...during a snow storm where the snow was a foot deep already and nobody was going to the movies...by myself...with a fucking BROOM because god forbid they buy a shovel

[unclejampuff]

My current job feels pretty pointless. We're cleaning and reorganizing the warehouse to make room for a new product line. It's so exasperating because after I clean up an area, some asshat comes in and tries to reorganize the place. Yes, I'm sure the pallets are in SUCH better order this way... just like every day for the past 3 weeks. It feels like I'm shoveling the sidewalk in the middle of a blizzard.
The owner keeps coming by and wanting to know why the area still looks messy. My immediate manager knows I have to find so many working MP3 players for a charity drive by noon tomorrow. I wish the owner would decide on some frickin priorities.

[draftermatt]

Just thought of this one.

Copying our productions sheets for 3 different jobs (same contractor) so I can write a letter saying "everything was made per specs" then have my engineer write the same letter and sign it.

We had to do it on 3 because the idiot contractor on 1 job wanted it, so they had me do it for all their jobs.