A Page from the Hustlers Bible, By Gayton McKenzie

A post from twitter, a preview of “The Hustlers Bible”…! By Gayton McKenzie

Just because you guys asked so nicely – here’s another page from The Hustler’s Bible – book available after February only.
It’s about the job, not about your colleagues

I have met dozens of people who want to resign or take a transfer – not because they hate their job but because they hate someone they’re working with. They dread coming to work because of this particular person. They spend their time at home complaining about this person. It’s not long before the whole family and all his or her friends know all about this dreaded individual.

Not only is this person giving them shit at work but they have given this person control over their time away from work. They thus fall neatly into the trap this colleague has laid for them. By wanting to resign, they have given the bully exactly what he or she wanted all along. Of course office bullies want you to resign. They’d love nothing more. If you are being treated like shit it’s normally because someone feels deeply threatened by your presence – whether they realise it consciously or not.

They just don’t want you there. They’ll do their best to make you feel useless, even if they barely do any work themselves. They’ll make up endless stories about you behind your back, they’ll blame their own failings on you when you’re not around and do their best to paint you every shade of black. If you do have a corporate bully like that in your workplace (and, unfortunately, most people do) just remember the following story.

When I started at Chubb a lot of people were not happy. They got increasingly less happy the longer I stayed, and the better I performed.

No one was angrier than one guy in particular, Andre. He not only hated black people but he despised the fact that I had previously committed crimes against white people. He made his feelings known to me in my presence whenever he could.

I simply didn’t have the luxury of paying him any heed. At that stage, there wasn’t anywhere else I could hope to go for another job, and I had just been given a raise. I could now feed and clothe my family. I could do some of the stuff I used to pray about and used to talk about endlessly – but before this job at Chubb those things were all just dreams. Had I chosen to resign over Andre and the many others like him, I’m sure they would have had a little celebration to dance on my bones. Everyone brings joy to someone in some way, right? Some when they arrive, some when they depart.

But if I’d played into that game, it wouldn’t have just meant me leaving – I would have been abandoning all further prospects of career and personal growth.

I will never be able to give any person so much power over me and my achievements. I will only ever leave if the choice to do so benefits me.

If I join your company and you don’t like me, you will have to kill me to get rid of me – unless you can find a better job for me somewhere else.

When I was hired, I was promised a job, nothing more. I was certainly not guaranteed great treatment from fellow workers. A job, like everything in life, comes with arseholes. Unfortunately, some of them just happen to be sitting right next to you every day at your desk or, god forbid, are your boss.

But that’s just something we all have to live with. A hustler does not concern himself with being everyone’s friend. A hustler knows you can please some of the people some of the time, but you sure as hell won’t please all the people all the time. And an arsehole can never be pleased, unless someone falls in an open manhole and dies. Then he’ll spend the rest of the day chuckling about it and laughing uproariously with all his arsehole friends about how you got swept away in the drain and out to sea.

Console yourself with the thought that the arseholes are probably even less happy to see you every day than you are them. And the friendlier you are to them, in turn, the more you are actually turning the knife in their guts. So kill them every day with the sweetest of smiles that says: “I really could not give a fuck what your opinion might be.”