Is there a job which is NOT needed?

[Jux]

I mean, does anyone know of an actual existing post in any firm, company, organisation, where the employers' believe that they don't need to pay someone to do that work, but it's just nice to have someone there and to pay them for the privilege? That they could sack that person, not fill the vacancy adn there would be no effect on anything except their payroll is a bit less?

HR at our place spend some much time organising staff socials that only a handful go to - the same handful that socialise together outside of work without hr input. The rest of us end up making excuses why we don’t attend or actively roster ourselves at work when we are expected to be socialising So not really any need for her! She’s a lovely lady but no one would miss her role.

How do they reduce losses when they are only at the entrance and not at the exit? As for increasing sales - not for us, now we just turn around and use a store we don’t get bothered in. The only time we have had cause to ask to be directed to a certain item, (wanted a phone which could do a specific action) they didn’t know and had to call ‘Dave the salesman’ over. ‘Dave’ wasn’t anymore knowledgeable either.

There is one in my wider team that I would gladly get rid of. Meant to be an advisor - all they do is signpost to services we already know about.

I had a job that had zero purpose, rarely given anything to do, spent most of my day browsing my phone, whenever I asked about work (repeatidly) nothing ever came, when it did I'd finish it quickly and be left twiddling my thumbs again, manager knew I was doing nothing but didn't seem to care 🤷‍♀️ it sounds like a dream, I'd laugh about it with friends and say I'd found the dream job paid to do nothing, but in reality it was so soul crushing, sapped my confidence, I got out and felt so much better.
To this day I have no idea why they hired me, they put up an advert after I'd left too, when I'd said I was leaving because there was never any work, bizarre!

My work has a lead project manager who....manages the other project managers, most of whom do nothing useful whatsoever, as far as I can tell. I was asked if I needed help on a project, said yes, listed what I need help with and was told the tasks are "too administrative" and "insufficiently linked to broader organisational transformation."

I think they meant they would prefer to be messing about changing things that worked perfectly well in the first place and irritating people who are doing the actual work!

Was just about to say that’s a Douglas adams reference

I’ve done this job in the past; without good internal comms there’s a real ‘left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing’ issue. The elected leadership of the council want the frontline staff to know what they’re doing, and often you have to communicate very tough messages (service restructures, funding cuts).

People notice very quickly when internal comms isn’t there, believe me!

I’m now in a different role, still communications, but not local government. You couldn’t pay me enough to return, frankly.

Yes you've won 🥇

One of the women in Finance at my old job. She comes in late, has an extended breakfast in the canteen, does a round of the office chatting with her friends, goes off for a long canteen lunch and then stares at her emails for an hour before it's time for a tea break. She does no work whatsoever and hasn't done for about a decade.

However, she's 80-something, has no family since her husband died some years ago and has nothing else to get her out of the house. If she didn't go to work she'd just sit down and die. I have a soft spot for my old place, partly because they keep paying her just to turn up.

@MeghanThyStallion that's so lovely.

I have moved roles recently.

Reckon that I could make 5/40 of the team redundant and barely impact the rest of the team. Could probably cut another four as well before it began to hurt. As for further up, as far as I can see there are layers of people to prepare for meetings which are set by other layers of people where they all talk about the work done by the 30 people who actually do something.

I’ve worked in governance (second the pp about the importance of good minutes, done well it’s a really important job) but this is bureaucracy for pen pushers sake.

My boss 🙄

I had a job once which wasn't needed. A company wanted to get to a standard (ISO9000) for marketing purposes but as it turned out, didn't actually want to put any effort into it. The complete lack of interest from management meant the staff quite correctly realised the management didn't really care. As a contractor with no authority it was a totally pointless exercise me being there.
They went bust / were bought out a few months later.

Valet parking .

I can park my own flipping car!

Old job had someone who spent an awful lot of time organising voluntary team building days. Honestly.

They spent an equal amount of time cancelling the bloody things because no one signed up. They were monthly ffs.

Oh, we had that outside my dcs old primary school. The lollipop man had a key where he could manipulate the lights settings, oh the power he had in his head! He would get really irate, too! One day to the point he hit someone's car with his stick and afterwards had his lollipop taken away! So he ended up a lollipop man with no lollipop! 😁

Diversity managers in the NHS

I'm sure you're right about the problem but having worked in numerous large organisations I can confirm that the newsletter doesn't help much as the top bits are generally some kind of pointless puff piece about something and so it goes straight in the bin.

Messages are usually communicated from bosses who have all met each other, or gossip.

Loved this from a PP As for further up, as far as I can see there are layers of people to prepare for meetings which are set by other layers of people where they all talk about the work done by the 30 people who actually do something this is so very accurate. The layers of meetings are - as far as I can see - to come up with initiatives that are then imposed on the 30 people who do something, usually end up with no change as completely impractical as none of the 30 were at the 10 months of meetings that decided the initiative.

In general I tend to assume that anything that's providing employment and an income for someone is usually a good thing. I mean yes we could all think of jobs which from the outside look as if they're superfluous, but in reality, each of those jobs is helping someone to pay their rent, pay their bills, have a purpose etc.

Footballers.

Yes! Lollipop ladies at crossing with green men.

A lot of the examples given here are not about a job that is unnecessary but about the person who is crap at that job tbh.

@Idratherbepaddleboarding I agree with you there!

I only clicked to see if anyone had mentioned telephone sanitisers. I wasn't disappointed! 😆

Is that a job with just that role though?
I would have thought it was just part of an office cleaner role.
I mean, if you think it is pointless, you can always do it yourself... and empty your own bin, hoover the office, clean the kitchen, clean the loos, the staircases and hallways etc.

My company employees a woman whose job is purely to organise internal social events and staff parties. On the one hand, they could let her go and nothing bad would happen; on the other, she organises great events and parties for us all which make us all happy and working in the sort of fab culture where the CEO thinks an employee who organises great staff parties is important is one of the reasons people like the company and stay.