The Corporate Tramp

The Corporate Tramp

Scott Adams makes a living satirizing the idiocy of people in the corporate world with his writings and his popular Dilbert cartoon strip. I have been living life as a cubicle creature for a greater part of my working life and I must say I've had my high and low points.

I admire people would could adapt to the system well and sees the positive aspects of working for a large corporation. They are very motivated and upwardly mobile. The do all the right things to ensure their visibility in the company. They are the ultimate yuppies and corporate animals. Maybe every company needs people like that.

I myself certainly do not have such an aptitude. Certain actions that I've done in the past could even be deemed as career-limiting. My reward has never been promotion or better pay. In fact couple of times in my life, I have chosen to take jobs that doesn't pay as well. My reward comes from helping friends and colleagues and from producing good work. Perhaps it's a little bit too idealistic. But that's what I am.

I have been lucky that I've been able to work for companies that allow me a great deal of freedom to do things in whatever way I choose, as long as I deliver the goods. I am comfortable in such an environment and I try to find ways to inject creativity into everything I do.

As an expatriate working for a multinational operation here in Jakarta, I am not considered part of the organizational hierarchy. Visitors often ask me what my responsibilities are. Well, I always tell them that I do the stuff that nobody else wants to do. Which is quite true, as my skills (if I have any at all) are most applicable in areas which do not fall under any neat categorization.

In one of his writings, Albert Einstein wrote that he sometimes feels like a "tramp among the sciences"--referring to his work which does not belong specifically to any branch or discipline of science such as cosmology, quantum mechanics or mathematical physics.

Even though many people think that as an expatriate I am very well-paid compared to the locals, I consider myself a "corporate tramp". I don't exactly belong to the organization here and I have no stake in the future of this company. I don't even see myself as having a long-term future in the multi-national corporation of which the present operation belongs to.

Someday--and it could be soon--I'll have to move on. And hopefully, there are other places that are as accomodating as Jakarta has been, to tramps like me.