Re: not neccessarily very good at brown-nosing...
I've known people who've had great ambitions, not to be "manager" or anything like that but to be the best they can at their job and after-job life
When I started as a trainee programmer at a large utility in the 80s, they were reorganising with union blessing to make as all multiskilled so that we would derive more satisfaction a. Most of us just went along, except for one legend in the mail room who derailed everything. He had been at the top of the scale for clerk grade 1 for 30 years (a trainee programmer was equivalent to a clerk grade 3, an Analyst Programmer was Grade 5, Systems Analyst a grade 6 & then you went onto management scales). The way it worked was each grade had 5 steps, through which one progressed automatically, but you had to apply to move up a level eg grade 1 to grade 2.
He flat out refused to be 'mutiskilled', and refused an offer to jump to where his seniority should have put him (as a 6-5) . Management 'counselled' him, the union 'heavied' him and it was only a direct appeal to the Minister that allowed him to retain his job....
It seems he was debt free, owned his own home & car, had a small independent income form inheritances, and most importantly he was the carer for his wife and several of his children, all of whom had some form of disability/illness - IIRC his wife had MS. As a lowly clerk 1-5, he did not have to think, and could do his job literally on auto-pilot. Outside of work he was on the State Council of the Returned Services League, and President of his local Bowling Club. He literally only went to work to keep himself occupied during the day.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
