Guest Post- Jill f*cks up.

Hey, bitches. Allow me to introduce you to my second guest poster, Jill, and her biting sense of humor. Enjoy...

There have been times in the jobs I've had when I've fucked up. It doesn't matter how it happened, really. There's the Inverted Number Sequence Catastrophe of aught three, the Wrong Address Paper Mix-Up of ninety-nine... I'm sure you've all had your own. Oh, the stories I could tell! But there's definitely a special chapter in that particular book of fables for the collective fallout of these mistakes. 

This may shock you, but as a woman, it is a big deal when I mess up at work. When a man makes a small computing error he is “only human”, for a woman mistakes are a symptom of feminine silliness. It's frankly a wonder we can get through a full day without blowing something up, right ladies? For men it's a one-time thing, for women just another in a string of airhead moves.

I can't count the number of times a male supervisor has tried to make me feel stupid over something that's as natural to humans as breathing: fucking up. I have news for you, superiority-complexed male supervisors: one wrong digit does not an idiot make. I've sat there patiently, having the simplest tasks explained to me over and over again. I've put up with your condescending tone. I've refrained from screaming “I AM WAY SMARTER THAN YOU, ASSHOLE!” But no more. 

Right now, I am outing you publicly. All you smarmy middle managers with your dull-witted cries of “you must be pregnant!” when I feel sick. All you limp-wristed, fleece-vest-wearing jokers who make lame comments about PMS when I am legitimately pissed at your incompetence. 

I am smarter than you. That's right, I said it. 

No longer will I leave the house feeling crisp and in control, only to return eight hours later feeling  bedraggled. I have your number, middle manager man. 

I  demand you take me seriously from now on. I will not laugh at your PMS jokes. I will look at you like you have six heads when you suggest I am pregnant. 

Most of all, when you explain something simple to me for the three-hundredth time, because you just can't get over that one time I got it wrong, I will say: “Thank you, but I figured that out already. If you'll excuse me, I have work to do.”

I can't stop making mistakes. I have faith that I will find new and challenging ways to fuck up in the future. But you know what? So will men! 

YUPB readers, don't be trapped by the middle manager man. He's an idiot. You just keep on walkin' in your fab, fab shoes.  

Guest Post from LilMissFemmeFatale

Hey Everyone, Shabs here. As I am away in Vegas this week, one of my fellow YUPBs has generously offered to post in my absence. Enjoy, or don't- but let's hear what you think of her POV! 

Nature Vs. Nurture: Professional Edition

It’s a strange world we women live in nowadays. Our biological nature tells us to “be nice, especially to your fellow woman” and “help people” and “think of yourself last” and all that shit. Meanwhile, feminism and the women in the work-world that are a product of feminism are telling us “do what you have to do to get ahead” and “you deserve to succeed” and “think of your professional future first” and all that shit. Seriously, what’s a girl to do?! Working women are having an identity crisis, and we don’t even know it. 

I like to think that I’m a nice person. I want to have good relationships with other people, especially other women. Women these days have to deal with far too much other crap to turn on each other: rape, sexual, physical and mental abuse, prejudice, racism, the list goes on. (And that list doesn’t even include the less mentally-, physically- and emotionally-damaging crap, like pregnancy, cellulite and trucks with testicles hanging off them.) If we want violence against women to end we have to fight against it as a united front, both in and out of the workplace. Especially when violence and prejudice against women in the workplace is still, after all these years, a problem.

(Sorry, mini-rant there. My “pet” cause is violence against women. But I’m sure you picked up on that.)

However, while I do want women to cultivate good relationships with each other and be united and all that, I really do want to get ahead in my professional career. I’m a competitive person, and my professional life is no different. Between 9 and 5 I will work my ass off to be better than her, whoever “her” may be. Be a better writer, be more creative, be more charming, get more clients, get more money, get more promotions, get more recognition, more, more, more. And because I want to be nice, I won’t be upfront about it. I’m sure most people don’t realize how competitive I actually am, because all this is going on in my head. I’m constantly secretly working out how to do better than you. If you ask me for help I’ll purposefully give you just enough to make you think I’m helping…but not enough to help you succeed, because I don’t want you to. Isn’t that bitchy? But I don’t apologize. My identity means that I’m nice until we’re in a boardroom together. It’s easy for me to separate how I feel about you personally to how I feel about working with you.

So yes, I love my female relationships. But if you get in my way in the job setting, I will take you down. And I’ll smile sweetly while I do it.

- LilMissFemmeFatale