Your boss wants you to make coffee

[rareboy]

Cellular, wow, you have a way over-inflated idea of your value to an organization. You're not there to write the new corporate strategic plan, you are also there to observe and learn about the general work environment. A lot of times, we employers give juniors little tasks to fulfill to test their attitude and resourcefulness, all while paying them to just be around. I'm sure after having you around for afew months they likely ending up wishing they'd just hired someone to make them coffee.

I've actually commented on students' attitude about willingness to take on any task in their work term reports and have told a number of them in their exit interviews that while they thought themselves too accomplished to perform certain tasks, they really only demonstrated ill founded arrogance. We actually have dismissed students early for thinking that tasks like this were beneath them, because it was indicative of how they approached all their work.

I helped make the coffee as a junior, and fetched stuff for the partners and the staff...... and was a senior consultant in line for partnership five years later when I was graduating from University. I never have found doing favours I'm requested to do and getting paid for degrading. You'd better be pretty damned clever given your attitude.

 

[nijuusei]

If your boss ask you to make coffee, would you? BTW, you are not the office coffee boy, you are a professional/trainee in the workplace.
The reason i ask is that i have done some work before in firms during my university holiday, and some of the guys just wanted me to pour them coffee or photocopy stuff. I think im more then that, i went to university to learn skills to use in the firm, but i always find myself pouring coffee for my superiors.
On one hand, i dont mind, given that they are still going to pay me. On the other, its kindof degrading that you are fulfilling the role of office coffee boy.
You thoughts.

hey hey! you make it sound like it's a bad thing
coffee is really important yu know
just think about it! ...what would the world be without a strong cup of coffee in the morning
anyway...it's a Very important task;
yu should not take it lightly^.-

 

[digitaldude5]

Well i did work all those years in order to get to where im at. I have studied and got to a point where im confident in my skills. At least they should use my skills to their full ability. They are just losing a skilled worker by making me their coffee boy.
Anyone can make coffee, but can everyone do what i have studied for years to do?

Just because you've studied how to do something doesn't mean you can actually do it. Sure, I know the criteria for most psychological disorders, but I can't walk into an office and start handing out diagnoses and treatments... It's people like you that give our generation a bad name as the brats who were born to expect a corner office as soon as they walk out of the doors of the university.

 

[hermanding]

sure i'd make it - which is something i dont know how to do - i never touch the stove. as you say you're getting paid. factor in how much debt you might be in, what the job market is like, etc. if not wanting to make it
ding

 

[GL]

My boss doesn't actually drink coffee, but I still make it for myself and my co-workers. I don't mind at all.

 

[Soilwork]

My Boss would NEVER ask me to make coffee.

He only drinks Starbucks.

But If he did, I'd have no problem doing it. I make about 3 pots of tea every day, so why not coffee too?

My boss treats me with respect and a reverance I've never had from anyone else.

So if he wants coffee, I'll make him coffee.

Hey, when we're on shoots, I'll make him lunch so he can keep shooting and not have to stop for crappy food that will make him feel slow.

 

[secondmonkey]

ANYTHING the boss asks you to do is your JOB. That's why they call him "boss".

 

[JayHawk]

We have a standing rule you show up first and drink it then you make it. For the next pot if you kill it you fill it......

Of course we all have a good idea what we are doing. There are so many more things I need to know to make a decision on this. Like were they headed to a meeting? id they have a important call to make?

I don't care how well educated you are you can't instantly know all details about a issue. If it becomes a habit then you complain but initially the wise man watches and learns.

 

[Lawnmowerman]

Well, if they ever asked me to make it, I would, but seeing as I have never made it and don't drink it, it would be the last time they'd ask me to make it. And I have no problems doing anything "outside" my job description. As many things as I have repaired and straightened out since I started there in November, they now know who to come to when something goes wrong. I'm still learning my new job, and I in turn teach them things. What more could you ask?

 

[skibby]

Hell yeah! My boss never asks, but I often offer to get her coffee or keep people away from her so that she can take a little walk and get her own. She's extremely busy, always has time for anyone who comes by her office, and never takes more than about 15 minutes for lunch. She trusts me and treats me with respect, so I do whatever I can for her. God I sound like a suck.

 

[trydegrau]

Meh, considering I'm not a student right now and paid pretty low for jobs like dish-washing and store clerk, I don't do anything outside my job description. Minimum wage ~= minimum amount of work.

 

[Swellegant]

I have done so in the past and not thought a thing of it. The boss I have right now has a couple of times asked me to run and get her a Diet Coke from the canteen, and when the canteen was closed I took it upon myself to walk an extra two blocks to a convenient-mart. If my boss is busy and needs something, I go get it, no big deal. I've always been in a service position, food-service before college and admin assistant after, and now I'm temping... so I'm used to doing whatever needs to be done.

On the other hand, some people will do that just to get one up on you, to "show you who's boss." I would still get the coffee, but I wouldn't be working there very long... I have highly valuable skills, and though I don't get to use them on all my assignments (several of which a trained monkey could do, and here I am with my magna cum laude flapping in the wind), I do have the freedom to walk out of anyplace I consider a toxic situation. And a boss who is always trying to lord it over me is definitely toxic.

You have to take these things on a case-by-case basis. I don't consider any task too lowly for my dignity, coffee, catering, hanging pictures, changing lightbulbs, cleaning a closet, whatever; but I do draw the line at attempted humiliations, however casual or institutionalized they might be.

 

[sebastian-k]

well if my boss asks me for coffee i would send the new guy to get some at starbucks or local coffee shop.

hierarchy is a bless!

 

[phoenix72]

yep. i have had to do that in the past...not recently though.

 

[Leidian]

On University holiday? So it was just like an internship? If it's an internship then you're lucky they trusted you with the coffee. Everyone starts at the bottom, even if we're better than that.

If it's your for real job then you have to find that line you won't let them cross. You won't move up if they think you're only good for coffee. Make the "I have dignity" speech and hope you keep your job.

 

[winterknight]

The coffee in our office gets made by whoever hasn't got anything more interesting to do at 9:45 and 2:45

 

[cellular]

Im not being arrogant. Nor am i beneath making coffee. I just want to use the skills i have more efficiently to everyones benefit, and i dont mean the coffee brewing kind.
Yes its great for the boss to notice you because you make an excellent cup of coffee as someone said, but is that all you want him to notice? Your coffee making skills?
And no I dont expect a corner office on my first day. What i expect is a little respect and trust in the work that i do, that i can also get experience, which is the reason im here.

 

[gabriel1]

Good Lord. It's just making coffee whoop dee doo. I make coffee every day and my staff drinks it. If you think it is degrading or something along those lines, just tell them you think it is beneath you to be their servant, or wait a few years. Once you get a bit older you tend to realize it's not what you thought it was, but that you thought you were.

 

[NickCole]

Im not being arrogant. Nor am i beneath making coffee. I just want to use the skills i have more efficiently to everyones benefit, and i dont mean the coffee brewing kind.

It takes a minute or two to get the coffee pot going. There's plenty of time left for you to use your other skills.

Yes its great for the boss to notice you because you make an excellent cup of coffee as someone said, but is that all you want him to notice? Your coffee making skills?

Nope. I want him to notice my work ethic and ability to get a job --any job-- done successfully and without complaint.

It's pretty easy to figure out what a boss notices and rewards.

I wouldn't think twice about getting someone --anyone-- coffee, but I wouldn't work a minute longer than I had to for a lousy boss who didn't reward work ethic and performance.

And no I dont expect a corner office on my first day. What i expect is a little respect and trust in the work that i do, that i can also get experience, which is the reason im here.

You're getting experience.

Every moment in life is experience.

The value of experience isn't what others hand you, it's what you do with it.

 

[trydegrau]

I had no idea coffee was so philosophical.