I was thinking about this on Friday, but because I was so tired and had to go out, I forgot to write about it until now! Anyway, I think I've mentioned this before, but my summer job is basically stuffing envelopes. See, I work for the bank so we get contracts confirming people's share purchases of mutual funds, etc. etc. and mail them to the people with a prospectus, which is just a book that tells people about the fund or whatever they bought.
At any rate, since the amount of work that I have is dependent on the amount of shares in different companies that people buy, it's been a pretty slow summer. Not only because of the weird economic stuff that's been going on since last year, but also because it's summer, and people just aren't as interested in buying these things in the summer (or, at least, that's my theory). The only time it's really busy is month-end. We get a lot of month-end stuff that absolutely has to be sent out on the day it arrives, so we usually end up working overtime. It's pretty unbalanced. During month end people work through lunch and work late, but the rest of the time, we have to take our time and draw out the work so it lasts the entire day!
I'm totally expendable. Honestly, the only reason I'm being hired, IMO, is that if they didn't use their summer student budget, they'd lose it and never get it back, even when/if they really need a summer student in the future. SO yeah, I feel pretty useless, even though I get along really well with my coworkers and I do actually do work. Plus I feel bad for taking money from the company even though I'm not really necessary. If I wasn't around, everyone else could probably work at a normal pace instead of extending things--even with people on vacation. ^^;;
But back to the main topic ("wrongfully guilty"). We had a whole bunch of pending confirms--we had the contracts, but no prospectus--from April onward, and on Friday, after literally waiting months, we we finally got the prospectus in. Another coworker and I had this really efficient system going: I would staple the confirms to the prospectus, and she would stuff them in the envelopes. With this system we managed to finish maybe a couple hundred prospectus in fifteen minutes. Some of our other coworkers noted our exceptional speed, however, and asked us to slow down so that they could get overtime.
Well, being the non-confrontational, pushover wimp that I often am, I did slow down, even though I felt that purposely going slow to get OT was/is wrong, pretty much stealing from the company. I didn't go extremely slow, just at the pace I would normally go at if there wasn't a lot of work to do. As it turned out, they didn't stop us soon enough because when asked about working lunch, our supervisor looked at the amount we had to do and said that it wasn't necessary. I wouldn't have stayed to work during lunch anyway (I had already made plans) but I was still relieved to know that I hadn't played any part in cheating the company.
BUT, at the same time, I felt kind of guilty for not being a "team player," I guess, and for taking away their opportunity for OT. As wrong as it would have felt for me, I could kind of understand the logic, because one of the coworkers who wanted the OT has a daughter who's been in the hospital since I worked at the bank last summer, and medical bills, even with OHIP, can't be all that cheap over such a long period of time.
The whole thing of feeling guilty for not wanting to do something dishonest, however, really made me stop and think about the kind of mentality that society in general, and I in particular have started to develop. Issues that should be black and white are made grey, and ethics seem more easily pushed aside or dismissed. Plus, for me personally, it made me realize how difficult it is to speak up for what I believe is right in the face of others. And this isn't something that's confined to this particular issue either. How many times have people asked me why I don't buy pirated stuff? Even though I can write big long blogs/rants on the subject, when I'm given a chance to verbally express my views, I kind of shrug the matter off, weakly offering the explanation: "I just don't think it's right." What a watse of an opportunity to challenge people to reconsider their values, to think about what they believe is right and how it differs from their actions in such common practices as buying pirated movies, etc.
I guess I shouldn't totally beat myself up over this, because I know that I'm simply better writing things out than saying them. That's why I prefer email, forums, message boards, ICQ, etc. to the phone, or sometimes even face to face discussions; it's that not so carefully hidden anti-social streak of mine.
