I've Stepped Away From My Desk

How many times have you heard it? I'm referring to the goof-off's favorite phone recorded euphemism that means he or she doesn't want to take your phone call, talk to you or do the work listed in the employee job description. Yes, the dreaded "I have stepped away from my desk" and am not going to answer your call is becoming way too common. Some employees, particularly those who work for the federal or state government, seemingly never answer their phones. The "stepped away from my desk" is on their phone every day, every hour, every time you or I call the office for the information we need. I am certain those employees can't have diseased prostates or bladders that weak. So why are they away so much?

Supposedly, the "I stepped away from my desk" message on the office phone is for the rare times the employee is in a meeting, at lunch or busy with some activity that takes them away from answering their phone. But as government has become bigger and more useless jobs created so politicians can gain votes by filling them, more and more of those employees are away from their desks. I wonder what they are doing while away and why, when I hear that message and leave my number in reply to their recording that I "please leave your name and number and I will return your call as soon as possible" (the second most dreaded employee goof-off message), they either never return my call or do it days later when I no longer need their help.

I have thought about leaving the "stepped away from my desk" message on my own phone for those times when I expect those always missing employees to return my call. But Alas! I am afraid they might leave another even more frustrating message for me in reply and never call back at all, something like, "Because you have stepped away from your desk we assume you know longer need to speak with us and will never dial your number again".

In 1930 in the United States there were about 600,000 employees who worked for the federal government. Of that total almost half were postal workers who had no desks to step away from. Today's more than 3 million federal workers (of which very few are postal workers) have plenty of company in their offices to do about the same amount of work, something equivalent to the six guys fixing a pothole on a city street....one working and five watching them work. So why isn't someone answering the ---- phone!

I am aware that in 1930 there were no answering machines to help the workers to goof-off (no wonder I hate modern technology so much) and avoid answering phones like they do today. But shouldn't someone be responsible for answering phone calls to a government offices? You and I both know the "stepped away from my desk" is a ruse, a scam, a fraud of the worst sort. If necessary to stop the constant stepping away, I say chain them to their desks like the 19th century factory owners used to chain their workers to their work machines.

I myself might even be willing to come out of retirement to answer those ringing phones if the government every decides to respect the callers enough to make sure their phone calls are attended to properly. But I can't promise you I won't step away from my desk from time to time.