Recently, a report in "People" magazine titled "Toilet Dilemma of Internet Companies" brought the "hidden pain" of "freedom to toilet" into people's sight again. As early as three months ago, the incident of a male employee of Pinduoduo who shit in the urinal due to insufficient toilet pits was on the hot search and sparked heated discussions. In the report of "People", the company where employees are unable to go to the toilet freely is far more than just fighting too much, and the conditions for restricting toileting are also far more than the lack of pits, as well as monitoring the toilet time by second, installing signal barriers in the toilet, and using Toilets that are not ergonomic ‧ ‧ ‧ ‧
These discussions about Internet companies' toilet issues may be excessively "demonized", but there are more issues that deserve more attention. The freedom to go to the toilet may be the most reasonable and insignificant of all freedoms. Because of its particularity, it is even more difficult to talk about. However, when Internet companies provide their employees with an annual salary of hundreds of thousands or even millions, the hidden price in exchange is all their time and energy, including the freedom to go to the toilet.
Is "paid shit" a legitimate right of employees? Is the toilet really the enemy of efficiency? Why is the freedom to go to the toilet so important to "beating workers"? Article by
丨 Xiao Shuyan
01
The deprived freedom of toilet
The "microeconomic theory" of "paid shit" was first proposed by Japanese netizens: 10 minutes of shit every day at work, 40 hours in a year can be accumulated The shit time, rounded up is equivalent to 5 days of paid annual leave, you can make money by squatting. This theory quickly became popular on the Internet, and was regarded as a standard by many “workers”: when meetings and overtime were constantly squeezing personal space, staying in the toilet as busy as possible for a while became the biggest resistance to capital oppression.
But the employees of major Internet companies soon discovered that "paid shit" was not as easy as imagined.
The first thing that lies in front of you is the hardware problem of too many people and fewer people. Although Internet companies with strong financial resources basically have their own factories or office buildings, the leased office facilities are not too bad. For example, Pinduoduo's headquarters is located in Shanghai Jinhongqiao International Center, and 8 of the world's top 500 companies have offices in this building. However, even the best supporting facilities cannot keep up with the rapid expansion of Internet companies. When it entered the Golden Hongqiao International Center in 2017, Pinduoduo had about 1,000 employees, but in just three years, its number of employees had increased six times to 6,000, but the number of restrooms could not be expanded at the same time. As a result, the average number of people needing services in the same pit has increased by six times.
At the same time, with the prevalence of the Internet overtime culture, employees’ office hours in the company have also been extended from the standard 8 hours to 12 hours or even 16 hours, and the number of times they need to use the bathroom has also doubled.
worked long overtime, and some things that could only be done in private space had to be transferred to the toilet cubicle. The toilet has been upgraded to a special place where you can touch up makeup, let go, play games, and cry. When you are holding back and intending to line up outside the toilet, you can vaguely hear the whispering or unscrupulous game effect sound from the cubicle at the end of the line, and you are afraid that there are mixed flavors and countless grass and mud horses running past.
According to the statistics of the World Toilet Organization, each person needs to go to the toilet 6-8 times a day on average. Excluding sleep time, this means that you have to go to the bathroom 3-5 times a day in a long line of 3-5 times. "Toilet Freedom" collapses 3-5 times. "Where to squat" small program developed by
360. Z1z
Internet company managers who advocate efficiency have certainly noticed this. In order to effectively shorten the length of the team at the bathroom entrance and reduce the time for employees to go to the toilet (to increase the working hours of employees as much as possible), the major Internet companies also show their magic: the top of the toilet cubicle of Kuaishou is equipped with a timer, and the screen directly displays The user’s toileting time is accurate to the second; the byte-beating toilet is equipped with a signal blocker to prevent employees from using their mobile phones while going to the toilet; 360 and Sohu have developed special small programs or apps that can check each floor at any time Toilet usage and expected waiting time in line; a British company even invented a toilet, which has an inclination angle of 11-13° compared to ordinary toilets, which makes people uncomfortable and difficult to sit for a long time... Related discussions circulating on the Internet There may be a tendency to "demonize", but the questions behind itThe topic is worthy of our deep consideration.
"Hello! A new schedule of factory work in the office! What you write in pencil, your habit of putting files together, when you go to the bathroom, or whether you actually go to the bathroom, how often you stay in the drinking room And the minutes you’ve wasted will be recorded by the man holding the stopwatch!” Nigel Saval described the office routine in 1920 in the book "Compartment: The Evolution of the Office". This year, 100 years later, it is still It was staged as scheduled, and by means of technology, it showed a more precise and terrifying side.
makes the most normal physiological needs become a race against time. All this may be attributed to (or attributed to) Frederick Taylor, the father of modern scientific management. He participated in the creation of Ford Motor's first assembly line. His "Principles of Scientific Management" is a masterpiece of modern production. In order to ensure that all employees can work with the highest efficiency and the fastest, he decomposes each work into the smallest process, and uses a stopwatch to time each process, and calculates the "standard speed" for each process, which serves as the employee's work criterion. Of course, the time spent in the toilet is also included. In this way, work no longer depends on people, but people, becoming part of a huge operating system.
"Compartment: A History of Office Evolution", [America] Nigel Saval, translated by Lu Yujun, Guangxi Normal University Press, May 2018
Under Taylor's leadership, in 1900, a group of people keen on efficient management People grasped the essence of the times and founded a magazine called "system". In the section of "systems make great achievements", every issue of the magazine quotes the remarks of successful executives from major careers. Confirm the importance and necessity of "systems" in business organizations.
is not only a takeaway rider, whether you are an elegant white-collar worker in or out of a high-end cocktail party or a super geek with an annual salary of one million, all are trapped under this system and cannot escape. ("System" magazine was renamed "Business Weekly" in 1930, and is now one of the most famous financial corporate magazines in the United States.)
02
Toilet: The last privacy and resistance of "beating workers" There are policies on
, and countermeasures. Although managers have thought of various ways to shorten the time employees use the toilet, people can still find pits with weak signals through all technological means, or simply take advantage of the company's toilet to queue for too long to empty the nearby mall.
Why is the toilet so important to "beating workers"?
because this is the only privacy space left for "strike workers".
At the beginning of the 19th century office, every employee has the right to have his own independent room, at least there is a certain distance between the workstations. However, as the number of white-collar workers continues to increase, the area of independent offices is also getting smaller and smaller. The cramped space makes people depressed and reduces the efficiency of work handover. So a designer slapped his head and removed all the partitions between the small grids, bringing white-collar workers into the era of "open office areas". The vision of the employees broadens, and the relationship between colleagues becomes close. There are no longer thick walls or heavy doors between each other, only a thin partition or a few pots of green plants.
But the problem of "open office" followed. Without the protection of an independent office, the employees' every move is exposed to the eyes of their colleagues. Coupled with the huge glass floor-to-ceiling windows, people's privacy disappears. A sudden call to the phone or the tapping of high heels when entering the door can attract the attention of the entire office.
In the office, do people have the right to retain certain privacy? Even during working hours, there are times when you don’t want colleagues to see what you like to eat for lunch, when you lose control of emotions because of difficult customers, and when you want to take a break because of physical discomfort, and female employees who take maternity leave need one more. Private space to solve physiological problems. But the open office space deprived these individuals of their last little rights. The only independent compartment left in the
office building is the restroom. So the toilet takes on the functions that do not belong to it. It is a dressing room, a dressing room, a game hall, and a nursing room for mothers and babies. It allows people to escape the noise of the office and calm down and think, and it can also make people really take off their guard and cry. When the cruel workplace requires every employee to be an "emotionally stable adult", only the toilet can accept their negative emotions that they have nowhere to put. The
toilet is not only a treatment plant for human physiological waste, but also people’s emotions.Garbage bin for waste.
Byte beats the sticker in the toilet.
In addition, hiding in the toilet is also the last resistance of professionals in the face of the increasingly prevalent overtime culture. Although the 8-hour work system has become an express national regulation, "996 is a kind of blessing" is the unspoken rule of the workplace.
"People" mentioned in the report that an employee of Pinduoduo "has only 280 hours of work throughout the month, ranking the bottom of the whole group. For this reason, he was specifically asked to talk and received a meal and approval." Don't dare to get off work for the first time, and ensure that your monthly working hours are not less than 300 hours. 300 hours means that even if there are no holidays all month, you have to work 10 hours a day, and according to the national standard working hours, only 160 hours a month.
Long overtime does not necessarily mean high work efficiency and many tasks completed, but (in the eyes of managers) it at least means high loyalty to the company and strong dedication to work. No one "has the guts" to get off work first, which directly leads to everyone staying in the office to "fishing" even after completing their scheduled work. The private time occupied by vicious invalid overtime can only be made up by hiding in the toilet.
03
On the legitimacy of "paid shit"
When everyone applauds for "paid shit", no one realizes that the so-called "paid shit" is based on the fact that every minute of the employee belongs to work. , Is above the company’s default premise-the boss bought all my time with a salary, or simply bought the person "me", so I spent one minute drinking water and three minutes during this time Going to the bathroom or doing anything for yourself is a profit.
As George Orwell’s book "The Hope of Freedom", the protagonist Mr. Paulin said with emotion, "I got the job... and the job got me..."
But in fact, even millions of people The annual salary can only buy the output of a person's work, and it is far from enough to buy this person as a person. However, as "workers", they have no courage to say "no" to the occupation of life by work. What freelancers really envy is that they only sell their work, but not themselves.
From this point of view, as a normal and legitimate physical need to go to the toilet, it should be included in the work, "paid shit" is not to pick up cheap, but to exercise a legitimate right.
Ali’s men’s and women’s toilets are respectively named "Watching Waterfall Pavilion" and "Ting Yuxuan".
From the perspective of business managers, toilets may not be the natural enemy of efficiency. Perhaps it is possible for Internet companies to give it a try and allow employees to take time off when they "pay shit", which provides space for the birth of inspiration.
Valuable ideas may not be born on the workstation. Employees who are deprived of their freedom to go to the toilet and trapped in the system not only lose their legitimate rights but also lose their creativity. How is it different from a screw?
