Dichotomy

The dichotomy of work-oriented attitudes between my old job and my current one are striking. At my last position, the company's mentality was one of outright asking each employee if they were "a fit", which, when you get right down to it, meant "is the employee's brain 'washable' enough to get them to believe that the company is an intrinsic part of their life comparable to, nay greater than, family?"

In short, this meant that it was frowned upon to do only what you were told or work only the minimum number of hours asked. It was socially unacceptable to openly say anything disparaging about your feelings toward unrelenting expectations of going above and beyond the norm, such as "at least I'm making good money" or "I'm in it for the overtime".

These things were always implicitly known to be true, and silently understood, but never enunciated.

In my current job, people are as open as they want to be. "Just think about the paycheck" has been mentioned at least once, along with a spate of others. The people with whom I work all understand that this is a job. We show up every day and make the world a safer place because it is expected that the company will reimburse us for our investment of time and both sides will walk away happy. It feels a lot less manipulative, which makes me happy.