Seeing navy uniforms all over the city, got me thinking about the interplay between of identity and the workplace, especially in the context of dress. Because the uniform codes of modern office culture is far more subtle, the Navy whites as well as, combat fatigues make a much more definitive statement. That leads me to want to conclude that wearing these clothes (as a civilian) is a political act, however, my instincts reach too far.

The wearing of camouflage clothing (either actual or inspired by) has come in and out of fashion since the 60s. The roots of civilians wearing of camouflage was partially because due to the fact that it was cheap and durable, and partially as an ironic political statement. After the invasion of Iraq, I wondered if it would affect its popularity. That is, is fashion considered a political act? In my estimation, the war had little direct impact on camouflage, and we’ve seen its evolution produce everything from flip-flops to pet-wear.

New York Times reportor, Lisa Belkin, tries to justify “wasted time” at work in her Life’s Work column.

She cites a study by Microsoft on productivity in the workplace. Microsoft found that out of the average 45 hour work week, 16 of those hours were “wasted.” The biggest culprit was useless meetings, with respondents saying that they spend more then 5 hours a week in meetings and 71% of them are “not productive.”

I love the quote from “personal development expert” Steve Pavlina who says, “the average full-time worker doesn’t even start doing real work until 11:00 a.m., and begins to wind down around 3:30 p.m.” He also goes on to mention that employees work an average of 1.5 hours a day.

Being unproductive today is much easier than past working generations. Here we see true signs of technical progress. How did people waste time at the office before web surfing, IM,  email, mobile phones and desktop computers? How unproductive can really by making personal calls and talking by the water cooler?

Our plenitude of slacking options may not end up being something celebrated or cherished forever. In that, Belkin closes by citing a growing trend of ROWE, or Results Only Work Environment. The oft cited example is Best Buy’s move to allow corporate employees to set their own schedules. As long as work get done and goal are met, mid-day movies and downtown brunches are all fine. She notes that “output and job satisfaction have jumped wherever ROWE is tried.”

ROWE is definitely a trend to track; however, I’m not convinced it’s the savior for worker. If it does spread, it will accelerate our distributed work lives, where work life and personal life blend into one. With ROWE, will we be freed from our artbitary office hours, or will we be checking work at 1 am? Will ROWE be liberate us from the office, or permanmently force us to take our office wherever we go?

Learning how to get along.

Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal had an article entitled, “ Working on your Marriage — at work. It describes how a growing number companies offer marriage training (which apperently is different from counseling) because they believe that marriage problems cause losses of productivity.

It’s strange too see the movement back to Henry Ford’s ideas of welfare capitalism that an employers have a responsibility with their workers maintain a “healthy” home life. Some companies have adapted healthy policies which include anti-smoking initiatives which actually test for smoking in their employees. No one argues that encouraging healthy relationships are good. Quitting smoking is a good thing as well. Of course, privacy alarm bells should be ringing with this shift. The article also notes, that many companies want to avoid potential discrimination of unmarried employees.

However, the bigger, more fundamental question that is posed, is why are more social responsibilities being moved to the jurisdiction of the workplace? We can clearly see that having health insurance tied to one’s job has proven to be flawed. Everyone from the unemployed to the aspiring entrepreneur who cannot leave her day job to the US auto industry which cannot afford to pay for their retirees’ health care sees the limitations to the current status quo.

Why then, should we be moving towards a systems where more social / health programs tied to a job? Why should the motivation for these kinds of programs be more productivity for their employer?