Just In...Work Can Make You Sick
From the current issue of Forbes magazine:
If you're a member of corporate America, chances are you've got access to a state-of-the-art gym, a gourmet cafeteria and an array of wellness services, including health risk assessments, telephone and Web-based consultations, and weight-loss programs.
Why yes! And we have a heliport on the roof and a little immigrant man who earns minimum wage to fan our corporate farts out of the nearest window. And did I mention the swimming pool and jacuzzi with cocktail bar on the roof (you know, next to the heliport?)
Um...no, no and hell no, Mr. McFancypants.
Don't get me wrong, we have some "stuff" going on. For instance, we have yoga. You have to pay for it but it's there, on the premises should you need to meditate out your stress. We also have things like 'Weight Watchers' for those wanting to be tinier and healthy living seminars and then we have a little mini university where we can do various software classes, etc. for free.
I even did a defensive driving course a couple of years back which everyone I knew found hilarious. "Like you could be any more defensive!" they snorted. "You beat drivers' heads with a tire iron if they so much as look at you funny at the lights!"
Haters.
Anyway, I took the course which saves 10% on your car insurance for three whole years, without even involving a gecko or a caveman!
OK, so I live in Manhattan and don't have a car, big deal. But at least I know that tailgating will get you a lot more up close and personal with some dude's pick-up than nature ever intended, thank you defensive driving! And you wouldn't believe the various suspicious practices people like to get up to while driving that really, they shouldn't. Yes, I mean you.
But really what I'm saying is, my company aren't so much state-of-the-art cool as, trying really hard to go from very staid and vanilla to something more youthful and creative. I mean we have an on-site pub once a week how's that for a start? Besides face it, nothing brings out the "youthful" in a group of executives quite like free liquor.
But despite a noticeable shift toward promoting healthy workplaces, your job can still make you sick. From uncomfortable workspaces to poor air quality to depression-inducing stress, there are plenty of opportunities to come home feeling worse than when you left in the morning.
Damn straight, Einstein. Sonny, I wrote the book on the coming home feeling worse than when you left. And I usually feel pretty bad when I leave, due to the fact I've just been forced to get out of a warm comfortable bed to do expense reports. Going home feeling worse than when you arrived comes from working with giant, IQ deficient assholes all day, and while my current employer has mercifully freed me from those for the most part, my last job provided enough of them to see out the next millennium.
[Berman] says that everything from mold spores to office furniture that off-gases formaldehyde to changes in humidity can affect a worker's upper respiratory system.
Whoa! Hold up one goddamn minute here. Did you say formaldehyde? The stuff they embalm dead people with? OK I know it's used for a lot of other stuff but really. My desk/dead people - two things I don't want to see in the one sentence ever again, ok? I don't suppose I can go home because I'm "allergic to my gaseous desk"? I didn't think so.
In fact, work-related stress has a powerful impact on employees. A study in the November issue of the American Journal of Public Health demonstrated a significant relationship between work stress and depression.
That's...no. Really? Stress at work is linked to depression? Tell me you are shitting me? It usually makes me want to buy the world a Coke.
I'm not sure I can accept that someone wrote that paragraph, seriously.
