Janitors provide a valuable service : memes

[-] medgremlin@lemmy.sdf.org 116 points 9 months ago

I once worked at a hospital in the ER where the department director was a union-busting bastard, but the CEO was pretty reasonable. After I left, one of the other ER techs went to the CEO about our pay being messed up and got everyone $5-6/hour raises to actual market rate. Also, there were a few weeks when we were really understaffed that the hospital encouraged admin folks to volunteer as "candystripers" in the ER to do stuff like help clean/turn over rooms, and answer patient call lights for water, blankets, etc. And the CEO was down in the ER for a couple hours every evening helping out most of that time period. It was encouraging to see the CEO of the hospital putting on some gloves and helping us with basic stuff like cleaning and stocking.

[-] problematicPanther@lemmy.world 78 points 9 months ago

to me, just the thought of having a CEO for a hospital is enough to put a bad taste in my mouth though.

[-] medgremlin@lemmy.sdf.org 45 points 9 months ago

It was a legitimately nonprofit hospital and he probably was overpaid, but at least he was a practicing physician at one point and did seem to give a damn about his staff.

[-] EmergMemeHologram@startrek.website 8 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Hospitals still need an executive for decision making. Could be a president or ceo. It’s “for profit” that’s going to reverse the incentives and run the whole thing.

[-] LemmyKnowsBest@lemmy.world 7 points 9 months ago

Good point. He earns exponentially more than anyone else in the hospital yet he can do whatever he wants. If he feels like being a candy-striper today for a few minutes, great. Then he can do whatever he wants after that. He's not stuck doing one repetitive job day in and day out. He can do whatever he wants and earn exponential amount of money. How did he even get in that position?

[-] A_Toasty_Strudel@lemmy.world 9 points 9 months ago

Family connections most commonly.

[-] Encode1307@lemm.ee 3 points 9 months ago

Is lemmy made up of 15 year olds? You think a hospital can run itself with no one in charge? The comments on this thread are amazing.

[-] problematicPanther@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago

Ceo implies it's a for profit institution. Director, director general, overseer, those are titles appropriately here. CEO is a title of a corporation.

[-] Encode1307@lemm.ee 2 points 9 months ago

Nope, nonprofits have CEOs too. Especially nonprofit hospitals.

[-] ghost_of_faso2@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Why do you think a company without a CEO would be without anyone in charge? Can you only imagine something running if a single person has executive control of an org?

[-] paddirn@lemmy.world 73 points 9 months ago

Janitor ain’t gonna fire 1000s/10,000s of employees while getting a $20 million bonus or run the company into the ground and get rewarded with a generous golden parachute on his way out. If anything, the janitor usually toils in relative obscurity, only seen in passing or called upon when people need help cleaning their shit.

[-] MissJinx@lemmy.world 18 points 9 months ago

If the CEO stops going to work for a month nobody cares if the janitor doesn't go to work for 2 days it's mayhem. 5 days in and we will be in Lord of the Flies.

[-] Filthmontane@lemmy.world 47 points 9 months ago

I'll be far too full after eating the rich to also eat the janitor.

[-] JusticeForPorygon@lemmy.world 36 points 9 months ago

Share the platter w/ the janitor. Then you can eat twice the rich

[-] Filthmontane@lemmy.world 18 points 9 months ago

That's solidarity right there

[-] pugsly@lemmy.l0l.city 41 points 9 months ago

If all janitors disappeared, you'd notice the dirty facility.

If all CEOs disappeared you'd get paid better.

[+] milicent_bystandr@lemm.ee -10 points 9 months ago

Alas, if all CEOs disappeared, the company would fall into ruin and you'd need another job. CEOs are important people too, even if they're overpaid and over-respected and overalls (wait, that should be the janitor? Or the Germans?)

[-] repungnant_canary@lemmy.world 20 points 9 months ago

There are actually examples of quite big companies without CEO at all.

But it really depends on what type of company we're talking about. In small and medium companies usually (not always unfortunately) CEOs do a terrific job and, depending on the company's financial condition, might even earn less then some of their employees while bearing a huge responsibility (financial and moral).

Even in small companies it is sometimes a case that managers do all the work and the CEO is eating profits - there are stories where employees actually prefer the boss to not show up in the office because they only mess everything up.

Yet if we're talking about big and huge companies then CEO existence is much harder to defend. If CEO disappeared then by pure inertia the company would work for at least months. Then there's the Peter Principle and numerous studies how MBAs are actually rather bad boses, in which case if the company keeps existing or even growing then someone else is doing all the management.

And then, you can't convince me that someone like Musk, who spends days on posting hateful tweets and attending meetings promoting reproduction, does a meaningful job at all.

What companies actually need is some decision making body. And that body doesn't have to be a rich white asshole, but can be for example board representing (proportionally) all the groups in the company, which then can use deliberative democracy to make decisions. Virtually any other solution is better than old rich white sexists CEO.

[-] dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 9 months ago

CEOs aren't the genius level visionary you're making them out to be. They're a legal requirement of having a corporation. Doubly so if the company is publicly traded and has a Board of Directors. Fact is, without a CEO at the helm, there are tons of SVPs and VPs at most companies that know exactly the strategy to increase sales or decrease costs (the root of a CEO's responsibility). So while executive leadership is important, it's not thousands of times more important than any given worker at the company. Not by a long shot.

[-] psycho_driver@lemmy.world 36 points 9 months ago

Janitors put in an honest day's work.

[-] Jerb322@lemmy.world 23 points 9 months ago

"I am the eyes and ears of this institution, my friends. By the way, that clock is twenty minutes fast. "

[-] DoctorWhookah@sh.itjust.works 5 points 9 months ago

I didn’t know your dad worked here.

[-] Kjatten@lemmy.world 8 points 9 months ago

Always gonna respect the person with a real job

[-] HopFlop@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 9 months ago

This can be interpreted in both ways

[-] OpenStars@startrek.website 8 points 9 months ago

^This, but the best I'll do is upvote and comment, I'm not reblogging shit for nobody!:-P

[-] Tarkcanis@lemmy.world 8 points 9 months ago

Did more than the principal back in hs, most of us did.

[-] son_named_bort@lemmy.world 3 points 9 months ago

You treat the CEO with the same respect as Rodney Dangerfield.

[-] dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 9 months ago

What am I, his wife?

[-] RizzRustbolt@lemmy.world 1 points 9 months ago

I respect folks that take the time to learn my. And part of that respect is learning their names as well.

Thanks for all your hard work, Peeta!

[+] UnfortunateShort@lemmy.world -9 points 9 months ago

Tbf there are plenty CEOs who care for their company and their employees. It just so happens that investors don't appreciate that

[-] ComradePorkRoll@lemmy.world 8 points 9 months ago

"We were just thinking of the shareholders." You can't just pass the blame to shareholders. Why do shareholders exist? To create the illusion that everyone can be an "owner" so that the owning class can continue to fuck us all.

[-] FuckingQuintana@lemmy.world -5 points 9 months ago

I don't understand the inherent hatred for all CEOs here and on Reddit. It's just groupthink and ignorance really.

[-] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 7 points 9 months ago

Lemmy tends to have inherent hatred for CEOs because Lemmy is a leftist platform, in structure and userbase. Leftists tend to hate Capitalists.

[-] UnfortunateShort@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago

You can be a CEO even in a communism. It's literally just a job.

[-] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 2 points 9 months ago

Yes, but most are referring to Capitalist CEOs, rather than Proletarian CEOs, of which there are incredibly few.

[-] UnfortunateShort@lemmy.world 1 points 9 months ago

That's not true, think of all the small to medium businesses there are. All of them got "CEOs" or whatever you want to call them and in many cases they do regular work besides leading the company.

I know a quite a few people who are very happy in their respective companies. Heck, I'm employed in the perfect template of a bureaucratic, capitalist megacorp and our CEOs shield us from a lot of bullshit of the group we belong to.

I think "CEOs = bad" is oversimplifying a lot. We just don't hear about the good ones, because ragebait sells and capitalist media is something actually fucked up at this point

[-] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 2 points 9 months ago

It's 100% true. Just because I may be using terms you may not be quite familiar with doesn't make me incorrect.

CEO is a job. It's a managerial position. Usually, it is tied to some form of ownership, but not always. Choosing to take an active role in managing the company as a business owner does not mean your power does not come from ownership, nor does it mean you must take an active role.

Capitalists are necessarily exploitative and entirely unnecessary for running a company. You can have a CEO that owns a company just as much as the Janitor does, which entirely changes the source of the power and removes the ability to exploit the laborers. As an individual owner, a CEO can act in some manners that help workers, but will nevertheless be ruthlessly exploiting them in other manners.

I think reading theory might help you a lot.

[-] Encode1307@lemm.ee 0 points 9 months ago

Wtf is a capitalist or proletarian CEO? A CEO is a CEO. The person running the organization is the chief executive officer.

[-] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 1 points 9 months ago

If the CEO owns the business, then that's a Capitalist CEO. If the CEO earns a salary paid by the owner of the business, then he can be considered Proletarian, though the wage is likely high enough to be closer to petite bourgeoisie. The power dynamic changes entirely.

In Communism, there could not be a Capitalist CEO, for example.

[-] Encode1307@lemm.ee 1 points 9 months ago

It's like everyone on this platform is a 15 year old. Someone above just said a hospital shouldn't have a CEO. They're children that think CEO means "evil person".

[+] johannesvanderwhales@lemmy.world -14 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

What with the display order on these screenshots anyway? Can we pick one chronological sort order and stick with it?

[-] emptiestplace@lemmy.ml 20 points 9 months ago

This one isn't confusing, though. Top to bottom.

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