I had a boss that constantly changed how things should be done. I would do it how he instructed, then get called out because he didn't like it that way.
So I started "taking notes" at every meeting, and at the end of the meeting would have him sign it to confirm that he agreed to all I had written down.
Only did it twice before he got caught in his own mistake. All the sudden we didn't need to have meetings anymore and I was free to just "use my own judgement".
Most times a simple CYA email will do the trick just as well as a signature.
"Hi, boss. Just confirming that, going forward, you want me to cease doing X and start doing Y, per the instructions you just gave me in our weekly meeting. Unless I hear differently, that's the path that I'm going to take based upon your verbal instructions."
Bosses rarely fully understand (the time required to do) the work they ask of their employees.
"You said no clarifications, no proofreading, no formatting. Just "faster". This is what that looks like. You, I, & the team may understand what all that means, however, if you would like for anyone else to understand that mess, it takes a bit of time to make it 'pretty'."
A co-worker and good friend once shared the pre- and post-tidyup versions of an important report on a meeting where he was the note-taker.
I've long since forgotten most of it but one phrase still sticks in my memory. "A general shouting match ensued," which magically transformed into: "After a free and frank discussion..."
Honestly people who receive reports but don’t generate them often have no clue about the kind of work that goes into generating and then publishing a report
I just want a good story. I don't care how it was written. For me, the annoying part is these self-appointed Redditor police, junking up the comments with their tedious anti-AI crusading. They usually can't actually tell the difference between AI and human writing anyway, despite being oh so confident that they can.
In that case you can have an easier time than waiting for a story here by just asking chatgpt to write you as many stories as your heart wishes, why even be in this sub if a story that can't even be described as creative writing is good enough?
If the account is less than 2 weeks old, has tons of karma, and has posts in completely unrelated subs people assume it is a bot. Because most of those are.
Still odd that someone creates a Reddit account, posts one comment each in four different subreddits, and then decides that their very first Reddit post will be in yet another subreddit, all within one week.
Have you ever seen the meme that goes "I like pancakes" and someone goes "Oh so you hate waffles??"
This is exactly how our interaction went.
I said this post has repeated patterns that AI uses. I never said no real person has ever used them. I didn't even say they were unique to AI! Hell, I didn't even say that was proof alone it was AI! This is actually a little funny to me, because the earlier draft of the original post had me going "oblitatory yes people can write like this too" but I deleted because I didnt think anyone would actually think I was saying "Only AI uses rules of three!!!"
I said that was evidence 1 and coupled with evidence 2 (perfect grammar) and evidence 3 (switching from writing with erroneous grammar to suddenly perfect grammar) is what leads me to believe it's AI. [ Technically I didnt mention number 3 but it's what the original comment was about]
This is without mentioning the fact the account is new and has barely any posts before this. Which is evidence 4 and 5.
You can't just zero in any particular evidence and say "but real people have new accounts too!!!". You have to put it in full context: A new account with barely any engagement that suddenly switches their behavior by posting a story with perfect grammar riddled with writing patterns that AI are KNOWN for.
If after all of that you really think this person didn't use AI to write this story, let me tell you about this quick money scheme that can quadruple whatever money you send me in paypal.
People who set their bot-threshold very high might completely miss the sheer quantity of clues that expose some posts as AI generated and thus be susceptible to influencing from the many external actors who are using AI to steer perceptions.
It's a balance. You may as well try to do it now because in a few years an AI post may actually become fully indistinguishable.
I agree with that. It's the collateral information that also goes into the decision in this environment though - age of account, behaviour of account, that sort of thing.
Bots have a purpose and that makes their behaviour different to that of most users.
Your boss is manipulative and doesn't mind lying to place himself as the mentor and you the apprentice despite him being clearly unfit and unqualified for the job, which is exactly why he lies and manipulates people to keep up appearances.
Your only love is to find a different job. Or hope he gets hit by a bus, but there's a 66% chance the new guy will have exactly the same qualities.
I've gotten thrown under this bus before and it always ends up falling back onto the manager who delegated the ask.
I'm also dealing with another form of this as we speak. I'm gonna love hearing about how we missed XY and Z because they want me to spend less time scrubbing data.
I understand your approach and don’t disagree with it. But when someone ask for something stupid like this, I always assume the best intentions, so in this case I would’ve sent a copy of exactly what that report is going to look like, and explained to them that this is going to cause more questions that will spend and heat up way more time than the little bit of time that you spend to make the report more usable. Doing things quickly that have shit results his way worse. And then I would’ve confirmed with them having that example in hand that they really wanted me to send that out without any changes.
Here's how I'm imagining it, as one possibility. Say the raw data produced by their software is "sales by state", but they actually want sales by sales region. So California needs to be renamed "Alice's Region - California", the Dakotas need to be added to together and the new line labeled "Bob's Region - Dakotas", New York needs to have NYC split off as Charlie's region while the rest is Dennis's, etc. Something vaguely like that.
Hi u/Illuminatus-Prime (copying their post as they regularly delete their comments)
Evidence, please?
And by "Evidence", I mean something that is unique to A.I.; something that no human has ever used.
Are you at it again? Tell me, why do you dive into these posts and then delete all your comments (usually after the post has been delete / the account banned for being AI).
Illuminatus-Prime doesn't want evidence. This is one of his bots. If anything, he wants lessons on how to detect that this is AI so he can mask it better in the future.
That account seems to love jumping into comments to say it isn't AI (they may even be right some of the time, though certainly not most), only to delete all their comments when the AI posts get removed. It's a really weird pattern.
That's all Illuminatus-Prime does - irrationally defend and celebrate obvious AI posts, and gets upsets whenever anyone calls them out. He's clearly making money off of these (seriously), because why else would anyone care so much?
This is why you need to get those instructions in writing.
It's the first rule of malicious compliance
Then when they say it's a learning experience you can throw their own words back in their face
Always cover your ass with a well documented paper trail.
I had a boss that constantly changed how things should be done. I would do it how he instructed, then get called out because he didn't like it that way.
So I started "taking notes" at every meeting, and at the end of the meeting would have him sign it to confirm that he agreed to all I had written down.
Only did it twice before he got caught in his own mistake. All the sudden we didn't need to have meetings anymore and I was free to just "use my own judgement".
“Yes it was a valuable learning experience for you.”
"Sure thing, boss . Can you send that to me in an email just so I have it for my records?"
If the boss is too dumb to realize what you're saying, he deserves all the fallout.
"hey manager, did ya learn yet?"
Or when his manager calls it a learning experience, he can somehow work into the conversation that the manager learned during this experience.
Most times a simple CYA email will do the trick just as well as a signature.
"Hi, boss. Just confirming that, going forward, you want me to cease doing X and start doing Y, per the instructions you just gave me in our weekly meeting. Unless I hear differently, that's the path that I'm going to take based upon your verbal instructions."
There's the lesson
It was a learning experience for your manager. Hopefully the people above him took note
Exactly this. Retired now after 27 years. Saved my ass numerous times because I had the email.
That's not a report. It's a dataset.
It’s written by a bot on a one week old account.
Funny how managers constantly try to fix things that aren't broken in order to justify their existence.
🚩Obviously he doesn't make mistakes so it must've been a grand experiment.🚩
Bosses rarely fully understand (the time required to do) the work they ask of their employees.
"You said no clarifications, no proofreading, no formatting. Just "faster". This is what that looks like. You, I, & the team may understand what all that means, however, if you would like for anyone else to understand that mess, it takes a bit of time to make it 'pretty'."
It would seem to be a learning experience for your manager.
A co-worker and good friend once shared the pre- and post-tidyup versions of an important report on a meeting where he was the note-taker.
I've long since forgotten most of it but one phrase still sticks in my memory. "A general shouting match ensued," which magically transformed into: "After a free and frank discussion..."
Still makes me smile.
Honestly people who receive reports but don’t generate them often have no clue about the kind of work that goes into generating and then publishing a report
[removed]
Reddit? You hear that?
There is more interest in if shit is AI created than the content.
This site is dying. Bots are killing it.
I just want a good story. I don't care how it was written. For me, the annoying part is these self-appointed Redditor police, junking up the comments with their tedious anti-AI crusading. They usually can't actually tell the difference between AI and human writing anyway, despite being oh so confident that they can.
Bot comments too. A new twist.
I am not a bot, and anyone who says different can bite my shiny metal ass.
In that case you can have an easier time than waiting for a story here by just asking chatgpt to write you as many stories as your heart wishes, why even be in this sub if a story that can't even be described as creative writing is good enough?
then why are you on Reddit instead of talking to chatGPT yourself?
Sometimes I take breaks.
If the account is less than 2 weeks old, has tons of karma, and has posts in completely unrelated subs people assume it is a bot. Because most of those are.
Sounds like something a clanker would say.
Or maybe they ran it through grammar and spell check in Microsoft Word. Maybe AI corrected the worst punctuation but it's far from perfect.
Still odd that someone creates a Reddit account, posts one comment each in four different subreddits, and then decides that their very first Reddit post will be in yet another subreddit, all within one week.
That's not all that odd for someone who is new to reddit. They're probably lurking around in a lot of different subreddits
They seem to be lurking here as well; at any rate, they haven't responded to a single comment.
Maybe they don't know how notifications work yet
There are many many MANY AI-isms that jump out when you read this post.
What a coincidence that on the ONE post OP has perfect grammar, he also has sooo many AI-isms.
Im on a phone so quoting them would be a hassle but look for rules of threes and "Not X, Not Z, but/just Y". Both jumped out to me
If you think the grammar in the post is perfect, I have some bad news for you.
[deleted]
Have you ever seen the meme that goes "I like pancakes" and someone goes "Oh so you hate waffles??"
This is exactly how our interaction went.
I said this post has repeated patterns that AI uses. I never said no real person has ever used them. I didn't even say they were unique to AI! Hell, I didn't even say that was proof alone it was AI! This is actually a little funny to me, because the earlier draft of the original post had me going "oblitatory yes people can write like this too" but I deleted because I didnt think anyone would actually think I was saying "Only AI uses rules of three!!!"
I said that was evidence 1 and coupled with evidence 2 (perfect grammar) and evidence 3 (switching from writing with erroneous grammar to suddenly perfect grammar) is what leads me to believe it's AI. [ Technically I didnt mention number 3 but it's what the original comment was about]
This is without mentioning the fact the account is new and has barely any posts before this. Which is evidence 4 and 5.
You can't just zero in any particular evidence and say "but real people have new accounts too!!!". You have to put it in full context: A new account with barely any engagement that suddenly switches their behavior by posting a story with perfect grammar riddled with writing patterns that AI are KNOWN for.
If after all of that you really think this person didn't use AI to write this story, let me tell you about this quick money scheme that can quadruple whatever money you send me in paypal.
[deleted]
People who set their bot-threshold very high might completely miss the sheer quantity of clues that expose some posts as AI generated and thus be susceptible to influencing from the many external actors who are using AI to steer perceptions.
It's a balance. You may as well try to do it now because in a few years an AI post may actually become fully indistinguishable.
[deleted]
I agree with that. It's the collateral information that also goes into the decision in this environment though - age of account, behaviour of account, that sort of thing.
Bots have a purpose and that makes their behaviour different to that of most users.
That was in line with his managers updated instructions
Yup bot/karma-farm.
The word usage sounds a lot like the lab report posts that were nearly identical
Did you put a cover sheet on those reports?
It was a learning experience. For your manager.
If you don’t get an email send one on your own. Just to recap our conversation the new process is:…….
Yes manager, this is a learning experience. For you.
Your boss is manipulative and doesn't mind lying to place himself as the mentor and you the apprentice despite him being clearly unfit and unqualified for the job, which is exactly why he lies and manipulates people to keep up appearances.
Your only love is to find a different job. Or hope he gets hit by a bus, but there's a 66% chance the new guy will have exactly the same qualities.
To answer your question at the end, why can't it be both?
Both. Petty and acting as requested. Too bad your boss didn't acknowledge that it was all his fault.
I've gotten thrown under this bus before and it always ends up falling back onto the manager who delegated the ask.
I'm also dealing with another form of this as we speak. I'm gonna love hearing about how we missed XY and Z because they want me to spend less time scrubbing data.
please keep us informed! I'm glad the boss gets the fallout.
Will do.
It was a learning experience. For your manager.
I know they learned that the report needs cleanup prior to sending it out. They MIGHT have learned to listen when you ask if they are sure.
Always keep those and any instructions from managers in a special email file.
Cc everyone who asks ‘why’ with the original instructions. As per…..
First rule of being IT or in a data field, cya. Always ask for bad instructions in writing.
Make sure you get something like that in writing.
I understand your approach and don’t disagree with it. But when someone ask for something stupid like this, I always assume the best intentions, so in this case I would’ve sent a copy of exactly what that report is going to look like, and explained to them that this is going to cause more questions that will spend and heat up way more time than the little bit of time that you spend to make the report more usable. Doing things quickly that have shit results his way worse. And then I would’ve confirmed with them having that example in hand that they really wanted me to send that out without any changes.
It is a learning experience for your manager to leave things alone
It's a learning experience for him and no one else. 😐🤯🔢
Why would “raw data” have “half finished tables” or “half named sections”? None of this makes any sense.
Here's how I'm imagining it, as one possibility. Say the raw data produced by their software is "sales by state", but they actually want sales by sales region. So California needs to be renamed "Alice's Region - California", the Dakotas need to be added to together and the new line labeled "Bob's Region - Dakotas", New York needs to have NYC split off as Charlie's region while the rest is Dennis's, etc. Something vaguely like that.
It's cause the post was written by ChatGPT
[deleted]
Hi u/Illuminatus-Prime (copying their post as they regularly delete their comments)
Are you at it again? Tell me, why do you dive into these posts and then delete all your comments (usually after the post has been delete / the account banned for being AI).
Illuminatus-Prime doesn't want evidence. This is one of his bots. If anything, he wants lessons on how to detect that this is AI so he can mask it better in the future.
But yes everyone, this is clearly AI.
Lol they blocked me after getting called out multiple times. Also sort of wild to have a 1y old account with more than 100k+ karma...
Didn’t I Read This Last Year?
Sung to the tune of Bob Rivers: Didn’t I Get This Last Year?
[deleted]
My memory says I did, but I bow to your superior knowledge
That account seems to love jumping into comments to say it isn't AI (they may even be right some of the time, though certainly not most), only to delete all their comments when the AI posts get removed. It's a really weird pattern.
That's all Illuminatus-Prime does - irrationally defend and celebrate obvious AI posts, and gets upsets whenever anyone calls them out. He's clearly making money off of these (seriously), because why else would anyone care so much?
Agree... And seems to be the only posts here regularly deletes?
10 days old account
AI slop