Should I be fired or promoted?

Bored ramblings. I'm at work. Doing what I usually do. Which is sitting in a closet and staring into my phone while on the clock. My method of work is so effective I spend at least half the day doing nothing while everyone else is still running around. If the management had any idea how I spend my day they'd probably write me up. But I feel like my talent is being wasted. So, underappreciated potential or lazy employee?

You're being paid to a job which you admit you do not do. Instead, you goof-off on your phone all day, and others have to pick up your slack.

Fucking lazy, if you ask me. Even moos do more at work than you.

There is no lack of appreciation unless you are putting that time to productive use which management doesn't appreciate. If you want to be promoted, try putting that time into going beyond what's asked of you.

Promoted? Please don't make me laugh... If you worked with me, I'd be pissed off.

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Why live in a fishbowl, when you could be swimming in the ocean?

"She, and all other rabid breeders, are like crabs in a bucket headed to Red Lobster. When they see a smarter crab escaping, they try to pull it back in." - Miss Hannigan

"Yeah, that's what family is about - guilt tripping people into cleaning up someone else's mess." - mrs. chinaski

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If I was your manager, I'd fire your ass for trying to get out of work every day.

If you feel your talent is being wasted why don't you try to do something about it? Talk to your manager about taking on more or different projects, or transferring to another department. If management refuses to listen or the job is mindless by nature then look for another job.
I know managers can be huge assholes but this is not the right way to handle it.

Quote
ondinette
If you feel your talent is being wasted why don't you try to do something about it? Talk to your manager about taking on more or different projects, or transferring to another department. If management refuses to listen or the job is mindless by nature then look for another job.
I know managers can be huge assholes but this is not the right way to handle it.

Yup. This is why I vote bad employee.

There are two types of (office*) jobs: those that require thinking and those which do not. If the job is mindless, initiative is not appreciated because people who have ideas tend to leave when they get better offers. People who think they are too smart for the position do not make good employees. That is why people are often considered overqualified for menial work, no matter how desperate they are to get a position. Note it is about how smart people think they are, not how smart they actually are - I know intelligent, creative people who prefer to work menial jobs because they want to disconnect at work and use their intellect on their personal projects, but they do that because it makes them happy. They recognize in this situation that the job is giving them what they want, so they try to do it well.

If the job is not mindless, the person who finishes work and then slacks around is not a good employee. That person is worse than the person who takes all their time to finish the work, because that person is idle and bored and is not directing this excess capacity toward the organization. People who do the bare minimum and aren't self-motivated are not the sort of people you want in knowledge jobs, because they are treating it as if it were a mindless job rather than bringing their brain, which is why they were hired in the first place.

Sometimes you do have to do a brainless job because of circumstances. For instance many people have to take this kind of work when studying. In that case, you suck it up and do your work.

And sometimes you encounter companies that claim they want knowledge workers, but then care about face time rather than outputs. These kind of jobs are not worth it and tend to attract low-talent people because people who are good can find better working environments.

* For non-office work face time might be important even if it is knowledge work, for instance a doctor should be at the hospital a certain number of hours.

Quote
ondinette
If you feel your talent is being wasted why don't you try to do something about it? Talk to your manager about taking on more or different projects, or transferring to another department. If management refuses to listen or the job is mindless by nature then look for another job.
I know managers can be huge assholes but this is not the right way to handle it.

Thats sort of the point. I worked very hard the first many months I worked here. Then people suggested I ask to switch to a better position when they were filling them. So I did. And after two weeks doing a different position to get ready for it they conveniently filled all the spots. And it wasn't because I wasn't working hard enough. The manager asked me if I wanted to continue the different position because she liked my work. Now I see a bunch of people so lazy they don't even take out their own trash getting chances I was never offered. Btw, my job is to make sure other employees have what they need to do their jobs, and they say I do it better than the others.
I get done sooner than everyone else because I developed a better system that saves a ton of time. And you'd know I'm doing a poor job because I get called on the radio when I'm needed.

Unless you have a job where it's your responsibility to basically be a babysitter for material being checked in and out, I would really suggest you find stuff to do besides being on your phone. I say that as I'm at work waiting for material to be delivered and for another to be checked back in. On normal days when I'm not sitting on wait to go (and in the middle of a HUGE transfer of material) I type in training rosters so my boss doesn't have to worry about finding someone who can squeeze it in along with everything else they do. Instead of shirking responsibility go help someone with their work if you want management to recognize you.

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"It is better not to look like what you are; it is better to look like a bourgeois woman because then all the doors are open for you and then you can just go and make hell." - Marjane Satrapi

I kind of understand. My first job was at a call center and it was fucking mind-numbing. By no means did I feel too smart or too good for such a shitty job, but the work was boring as fuck. Maybe the felons with room-temperature IQs in the office (which was about 80 percent of the staff) found it challenging, but since I have more than one brain cell, I could very easily multi-task and still do just fine. I reached a point where I could recite my script verbatim without looking at it. Only bad thing was I got in trouble any time I tried to do anything to keep my mind from stagnating, even if what I was doing in no way impacted the quality of my work (because I still made sales just fuckin' fine). I was told to basically shut up and stare at my screen all day. I went stir-crazy - you could train a retarded monkey to do that job, so I basically started finding ways of amusing myself that could slip under the radar, like practicing writing with my non-dominant hand and seeing how long it took me to fill an empty water bottle with shredded paper. My boss was also a control freak and I'd be lying if I said I didn't almost punch her in her bitch mouth on several occasions. The way I see it, if I'm doing my job, why the hell should anybody care what else I'm doing while I do that job? If I'm not breaking any rules and I'm doing what I'm supposed to do, then fuck the fuck off and let me work. If I can work more productively and finish shit quicker than everyone else, then give me more stuff to do or let me go find other stuff to do. If there's nothing else for me to do, then GO AWAY. But that would actually make sense, and if there's anything I've learned, it's that there is no room for sense and logic in management.

A friend of mine is in a similar position - he works IT in a hospital, and there are some days when he does absolutely nothing but mess around online all day long - not because he's a slacker, but because there is nothing to do or he gets things done fast. He's also usually at odds with management because the people he works for are wildly incompetent and do everything wrong or in the least productive way, and he gets in trouble when he calls them out on it. My friend is also brutally honest, which can be a serious personality flaw in the workplace, especially when your supervisors are total retards.

I also heard about it at my last job (library assistant) for basically being too productive. I was supposed to leave books on the return cart for the asshole student helpers to put away. Mind you, I could get a full cart reshelved before their bratty asses even got to the library, but noooope. Gotta leave shit for them to do, which resulted in even more work for me later on because the helpers were lazy fucks that just stuck books wherever they felt like it, meaning I had to reshelve them properly if I happened to find them (and having to try and explain to the younger students that the book they want is available, but it's not where it should be).

If I was your boss, I'd be wondering how you get your work done so much faster than everyone else (assuming the quality of your work is good). Perhaps your method is something you could share with management. They might like to know how to increase productivity because then everybody could get more done in a day. You could also ask to do more stuff, but odds are they wouldn't pay you more because employers are tight-fisted brats - most would rather hire a bunch of unpaid interns to do something than put one more person on the payroll. I'd like to suggest finding another job if you feel as though your talents are being wasted, but I feel like a person should be grateful for any job they have these days because even the shittiest minimum wage jobs are so hard to come by. I'd love a job that challenges me, but I know it's unrealistic to hope for one, so I just have to take whatever I can get and be "challenged" by things like incompetent/controlling supervisors, ridiculous rules, asshole coworkers and then getting fired after a month for "not being a good fit."

Proverbs 6:6-Go to the ants, you sluggard; and consider her ways.

Even when I worked on the sales floor, when I got all my work done in my department, I would find something to do like such as straighten up the clearance aisle, straighten up different departments, stock items that are waiting to be stocked for different departments, help with the frozen truck, help cashier as long as possible, etc.

Sometimes I will stand around because nothing needs to be done (yet), and I have no customers to help. I'm suppose to make myself visible and available. I do all of my cleaning and sweeping in the evening,refill the candy and snakes, and look at expiration dates. Even in the last half an hour I would either cashier, help in customer service, or take out the trash and recycling.

Everyday I have certain tasks that I do when I come in and close for the night.

TL;DR there's always something to do at work.