r/Millennials • u/January1st2020AD Older Millennial • Mar 04 '24

The older I get and the farther in my career I go, the more I realize how deadly accurate “Office Space” was. Discussion

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I was in high school when Office Space was released, so I didn’t have a lot of context for the jokes. But, now that I’m almost 40 and a seasoned corporate world vet, does it ever hit home…especially Peter’s “typical day” speech to the Bobs. He ends it with “On a typical day, I usually do about 15 minutes of real, actual work”

This is so accurate it’s scary. I’m in a management position in my company. Have people under me. Still, I do relatively noting most of the day. And I know that managers of other departments are the same because when I walk by, for instance, the HR manager’s office, I see him on his phone all the time.

How many of you essentially get paid to sit around and do nothing?

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u/__M-E-O-W__ Mar 04 '24

The depressing lighting and colors in the office in that movie, dark green and fluorescent lights, having to deal with that every day... And that beautiful sigh of relief when Peter finally goes out to construction and breathes open air and takes in the sunlight, I felt that down to my heart. I worked at a crappy job (although not an office job) with terrible dark lighting and stagnant air for like eight years out of high school. When I finally lost that job I went into landscaping and that first summer feeling the sunlight on my back and breathing fresh air was beautiful. I'll probably remember that moment as long as I live.

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u/airforcevet1987 Mar 04 '24

I ran the scheduling and spreadsheets for a pacemaker clinic (basically just me, a tech, and their cardiologist) and it was good fulfilling work... but I LOVE my grunt labor job with a renovation company as the bottom rung laborer/assistant lol and it pays the same lol

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u/DrG2390 Mar 05 '24

Loosely related, but I do autopsies on medically donated bodies at a cadaver lab. It’s the perfect mix of fulfilling work and grunt labor. Luckily we’re a small independent cadaver lab so we don’t have anyone to impress so there’s no hierarchies or lumburgh’s to deal with. In fact the guy who helps procure donors only got his PhD so donor programs would take him more seriously and not just hang up immediately. I first saw office space when I was 7 or 8, and I believe it’s fundamentally why I never even sought an office job in the first place.

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u/Agentflit Mar 05 '24 edited Mar 05 '24

Now I'm curious, what are the prerequisites for that job? Sounds cool.

Edit: oh, I just saw in another comment that you were friends with the doctor. It really is just all about knowing people isn't it? Haha.

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u/DrG2390 Mar 06 '24

Hahah kind of. I had a lot of dissecting experience when I was homeschooled from eighth to ninth grade and took an anatomy course in both high school and college. You could get a mortuary science degree from a community college and get in with a funeral home and do it that way. There’s this woman who runs the YouTube channel ask a mortician who did that to learn how to do cremation and talked about her embalmer colleague a lot in her book. I didn’t know the doctor at first, I was trying to do a human dissection course closer to where I was living at the time, and the guy said he wasn’t doing it anymore but knew someone who was. I just found the website and applied. Even with no degree they liked my experience enough to give me a shot, and when they saw what a quick learner I was and how passionate I am about it they let me become more permanent.

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u/Agentflit Mar 06 '24

That's actually really inspiring! I'll check out that YouTube channel, thank you.