Top Ten Things That Indicate You are Working For the Government

TOP TEN THINGS THAT TELL YOU ARE WORKING FOR THE GOVERNMENT

After working in a small start up for the last 5 years, working for the government is an incredibly different experience.

1. You need to fill two sets of forms justifying the need to buy a few blank CDs
2. At 5pm, I close my computer , get out of office and do NOT have to think about work till the next day morning at 8:30am
3. If you respond to some request after two weeks of getting it, you will still get a grateful email thanking you for your prompt reply. And it is not meant to be sarcastic.
4. Colleagues encourage you not to answer your phone calls when they ring “ What is the use of the voice message box, they ask”.
5. It takes about 3 months to get a blackberry. Or business cards. Or anything.
6. At 2pm on a Friday before a long weekend, the entire floor is empty.
7. “ I don’t know” is a perfectly valid response and it works for anything
8. The language of communications is acronyms and form numbers. Sample : OLAW wants a XY541 filled to get GSA approval for STRAP.  Else you need to fill YT5623 and fax it to NIDDK. Yeah right. It’s a good thing there are no deadlines for anything— only guidelines!.
9. Lunch breaks are a minimum of 45 minutes, about an hour on the average.
10. Even after 5 years at the job, you can say that you are new here and nobody will bat an eyelid.

I have only been here for a  month but will add to this…