“Happy Friday”
Why is this still a thing?
As a teenager, on those mornings in which my father would drive me to school, I had a routine. I would hop in his truck, grab that day’s copy of the Miami Herald, and flip over to my favorite section, the Comics. I would spend that drive to school quietly chuckling to myself as I read through them all, even those I didn’t find particularly funny, like Cathy, Doonesbury, or Dilbert. Garfield was always hit-or-miss — I never really understood why he hated Mondays so much (he was a cat — isn’t every day the same to him?).
At the time, I didn’t realize that many of these comics were satirizing the absurdities of the workplace that millions of adults have to deal with every day. I didn’t realize that the folks writing these stories were providing commentary, in their own unique way, of the daily slog that many of them likely experienced at some point in their lives before becoming syndicated artists.
In those morning drives with my father, I never really considered what his daily routine was. I never thought about how every day he would drive 30–45 minutes to and from work, and in between, spend hours in front of a computer and on a phone, doing something he was never passionate about. I never fathomed that I would end up in a similar situation, grinding 8 hours a day, five days a week at a job I didn’t like and then having the two days of freedom be the only thing to look forward to before doing it all over again. Most of you reading this can probably empathize. The traditional office environment sucks.
In his debut album Illmatic, Nas has a song called Life’s A Bitch, with the chorus as follows:
Life’s a bitch and then you die; that’s why we get high
Cause you never know when you’re gonna go
Life’s a bitch and then you die; that’s why we puff lye
Cause you never know when you’re gonna go
Now, while he was referring to the struggles and coping mechanisms of life as a young black man on the streets of New York, I think it’s fair to say we can all relate to that particular refrain in some way, shape, or form. For many of us, life’s a bitch because we spend too much of it doing work that is unfulfilling and accepting that this is simply the way things are. Many have resigned themselves to a false narrative that has been perpetuated by popular culture — that work sucks and you just have to deal with it. From this sort of thinking has arisen a slew of phrases and practices which often seem to serve as our own coping mechanisms.
On Wednesdays we greet each other with the phrase “Happy Hump Day!” in order to remind ourselves that we’ve successfully made it to the halfway point of our journey to the weekend.
We created the concept of “Casual Friday” as something to look forward to during this journey— a reward that consists of us being allowed to dress the way we would normally prefer to, but are not allowed to because it’s not “professional” (whatever that means).
When Friday finally comes, we declare “TGIF!” — giving thanks to an omnipotent being for ensuring that we were able to survive through this oh-so-horrible period of soul-crushing mundanity. Now we get to look forward to a couple of days of enjoyment before doing it all over again.
Why do we persist in a work culture that is so abhorrent that we have invented a greeting celebrating the arrival of the weekend?
Are we all so desperate to escape the repressiveness of the office environment that we feel the need to celebrate the end of it every single week? Why do we accept that things have to be this way? Why can’t we look forward to every day as a day in which we get to practice a craft that we find fulfilling? Why do we believe that only the lucky few get to do work that they truly enjoy?
Ever since I can remember, I knew that I would never settle for the sort of hellish environments that I had witnessed in movies like Office Space. I could not fathom why anyone would ever want to work in that way. As I mentioned in my previous post, I have found myself in this sort of environment. And while things have improved, I refuse to settle for work I don’t love. I have made it my mission to become an organization designer and hopefully help companies create work environments in which employees are engaged and get to practice work that is meaningful and fulfilling.
As I continue on my own journey to bring forth the “Future of Work”, I hope you will consider doing the same. Challenge the status quo at your own workplace — question what your company is doing that is causing 70% of its employees to be disengaged at work. Hopefully we can eventually do away with the mentality of “working for the weekend”. Maybe one day we’ll live in a society where the only time we ever mention “TGIF” is when we’re looking for a place to get some cheap eats and drinks.
