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[Robot Parade Leader]

I once worked for a guy who wanted me to do my job and somehow be responsible for signing people up for credit cards. I was stocking things in a big box type store. People hate being asked to sign up for credit cards, but management demands we ask, and only gives hours to store employees who sign up people. It sucks and we hate it more than the customers did. Like, imagine trying to check out at a wal marty place (but not wal mart itself) and the cashier pestering you for signing up for a credit card, because they won't get hours to work next week if they don't. It's either impossible or close enough to it that it just sucks. I don't work there anymore, thank God, but yeah.

How to deal?

[Truean]

Recognize circumstances; apply method; seek improvement.

You must work to survive; you must do this task to work. So, do the task, unless it is immoral, illegal, or unethical. While unpleasant and likely unsuccessful, this (foolishly designed) task is none of these three. Do what you must while seeking other income. Incredibly unfortunate and unfair but the only real choice you have. Your other options, complaining, refusing, quitting will not end as well for you. Avoid emotional reactions, as they will not lead to better results. Mentally walk yourself through what you think would happen if you complain, refuse, or quit; not good, huh? Do the task most likely to end up better for you: do the task, and seek other employment.

I know; it's a sucky choice. As the military says, "Embrace the suck." Again, unfair, unwise, but unavoidable.

When embracing the suck, apply the physical tasks you must, but don't forget the mental ones either. All the things we talked about with perception, understanding and re-framing. Work up the chain in your mind. Know that you are not bad for not being a superstar at this ... not so well thought out ... task. Your boss is probably being pressured himself (or herself) by corporate just as, if not more unreasonably.  Corporate is probably being pressured by executives, who are being pressured by stockholders / owners. It's all a stupid chain of command with crap rolling downhill, and doesn't reflect upon you personally.

This is authority thinking it knows what the hell it is doing. It doesn't. There is not a thing to be done about it either. The tailors / con artists tell the emperor his new set of clothes can only be seen by the truly intelligent, except there actually are no clothes. The emperor, not wanting to think of himself as anything but truly intelligent, says he sees the clothes (which aren't there at all). He then parades through the streets buck naked, while acting as though he has the best clothes ever.... The guards, seeing this as a problem, tell the peasants about the whole "you can only see the clothes if you're truly intelligent thing...." So, either the peasants, like their emperor, pretend to see the clothes rather than "admit they're stupid" or know better but still won't say anything because the emperor can have them killed or imprisoned.... It's a lose lose situation.

The only one who manages to tell the emperor he has no clothes is a very small child, not because the kid is honest, but because even the emperor won't execute a toddler for that. Anybody else would be justifiably terrified. After all, this is a ruler so nuts he's parading naked in the streets while pretending to be fully clothed.... Do you wanna risk your life on the assumption he's sane and reasonable? I sure don't and won't. I might start looking for a new kingdom to live in or something though, because who knows what's next with this guy running the show? Yeah, that's why you keep quiet and look elsewhere. Don't blame the guards or anyone else, or wonder why. That won't help.

Mentally, remember you're not the moron who thinks they're wearing clothes despite feeling a draft from nudity. Ain't crap you can do about it.

Does that help? I hope so. Try this, refer back to some of the things I've said here and see if you can plug the circumstances you've listed, into some of the processes I've outlined. These are some examples, and include but do not complete the picture:

http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=157225.15
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=157225.30

Consider it an exercise or homework. I'll help you through it if you wanna. Come on class, who has an apple buffalo chicken tenders for me?

Read; review; reapply; rise.

[Robot Parade Leader]

It's rough seeing it from my boss' point of view, but I guess somebody's riding his ass for results too. Same deal with the customer complaining when there's shit I can do about it.

Can you go into some detail on how to keep focused on a script while kinda imagining you're somewhere else please? You probably know, but it's a pain trying to do that while you're getting screamed at.

I'm trying to come up with like a "happy place" or whatever you call it. You mention like a marble place where you're getting a massage or something. I'm not really sure how you get there mentally but that sounds a hell of a lot nicer than being screamed at by some lady I never did anything bad to and am trying to help. Don't know if it's the "happy place" for me, but yeah.

Trying to get the perspective and seeing it that way. It's rough. My head keeps focusing on me getting screamed at and that clogs up anything like me zoning out or focusing on something else. I think that's what the person screaming at me wants.

That's kinda what's keeping me from using your system or however you want to call it. Any ideas, please?

[Truean]

Saved attention is spent on focus. Meditate to save attention so you can spend (and split) it on focus. Attention deficits are real and will keep you from having enough attention to spend when you must.... Not money, but invest wisely when you pay attention....

Save attention to have it when needed. In bed at night, meditate and stockpile attention; it helps sleep. Avoid spending on trivial things. Ignore triviality; identify importance and invest in that. Distinguish based on goals, outcomes, risks, etc, rather than emotion.

Each instant insists on attention; only you determine if these demands are met and how much of that demand is met.

The screaming customer demands your attention, all of it. Ask yourself, are you required to give all of it?  What MUST you do and what happens if you don't. You must listen, answer, and perhaps solve complaints. Boil this to the essentials, as I do. Most people say a great, meaningless deal of words:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Example:
Long Version:
I was out in the park last week and Sally told me her husband said they were talking about school funding for the football team. They might cut it and that'd be terrible, because then how would we have scholarships for the kids and what about the ticket sales for the booster clubs and the concessions! Then there's how much the kids love it and the social part of it for the parents and alumni and everything. It'd be a real shame to loose it so I think we should all get together and talk about it at the next PTA meeting so it doesn't happen or at least we should....

Short version:
Sally said her husband's worried they'll cut school football funding. That'd mess up scholarships, social, alumni donations, booster & concession sales, and fun for the kids. Let's try to convince the PTA it's a bad idea.

See how you cut the amount you have to remember in half by boiling it down to the point?

Say little; mean much. People will listen. Some will never understand this. Boil down their verbose complaints to the point. It will cost you less attention this way. By saving attention, you have more to spend and divide on other tasks, like fantasizing or visiting a happy place.


Do you see?
1.) Save attention to have it.
2.) Spend attention only when needed.
3.) Separate demanded from desired & required attention expenses.
4.) Split stockpiled attention between tasks.

If you wish, we can go over that last one more, but all the rest was required to get there. Otherwise, it would've been an unexplained statement and would've been turning your question into a command with no real step by step answer. That would've been unhelpful. Save. Spend. Separate. Split. For starters.... You must have attention to pay attention. Step One, save your attention.

[wierd]

I am probably a very bad man for this, but--

When I get the 'joy' of being exposed to a shrieker, I imagine them shrieking so hard, and so long that they start to sound like a chipmunk. Usually, such people end up shrieking like this because they themselves focus too much attention on problems, and run out of budgeted resources. (see the concept Truean hinted at above).

They need this petty thing they are trying to buy at less than list price, because it is the only way they can get it while still being in-budget for the grand hoodiedoo they have planned for their dear little Timmy's soccer game, because they decided that this was their week to host the event, and it needs to be more special than when the other parents hosted it, and blah blah blah.

They have focused their attention on every tiny minute detail of this grand master plan of theirs, that they have no attention span left to foresee or deal with problems that might pop up (because they arent nearly so good at planning as they think they are, because they planned their grand event without any fallback room-- again, this is because of the attention deficit they are suffering from micromanagement. They only see the prize they want, not the realities of the road to get there. Only the idealized one where everything happens perfectly.) 

So, when (as it is inevitable) things go a little sideways, they are incapable of coping with it mentally, and go bananas.

I find this amusing.  Very very amusing.  The more they scream, throw things, demand to see the manager, and make a general ass of themselves, the more I smile and laugh my ass off inside.

Remember: It is impossible for a perfect fantasy to come to fruition, especially on a shoestring budget.  People are imperfect, the results of hard work are imperfect. They compound to destroy any vision of a perfect event.  The punch might be a little too sour-- the bunting is crooked-- there arent enough chocolates out because one of the boxes got mooshed in shipping-- whatever.  Because they have all their energy tied up in this event, even the slightest flaw in presentation is seriously destructive to them, and it is all because they are desperately trying to seek outside reinforcement of their self worth. "I gave my daughter the BEST wedding party!", or "I am the greatest mom ever for pulling off this after game event!" or any other reason.

This ties in with the "YOU MUST SIGN UP PEOPLE ON OUR CREDIT CARDS OR ELSE!!" madness two posts up as well.  A middle manager wants to show how they are the bestest middle manager ever, by increasing profits in an impossible manner, by pulling off an impossible stunt-- Never mind the harsh realities this causes, A-La Wells Fargo.

As truean rightly points out, these people are quite mad, and quite conceited.  The "clothing" they insist is there,  is the guarantee of success, and all the prestige and fame that goes with it.  They bet everything on it happening, and then they micromanage to DEATH trying to make it happen, when the real world has this way of preventing the perfect outcome they require.

And, when it does not happen perfectly--  they dont have any mental resources left over to deal with that reality, and they literally explode in a hissy fit.

There are other jobs. They may not be glamorous, or even pay well, but there are other jobs out there.  (As an example, last year I found myself in a situation where I was forced to quit a job suddenly. Employment prospects were bad for me that year, so I elected to look outside the box. There are certain vocations that are literally shitty (as in, literal shit is involved), but are always in demand, like healthcare.  It costs 600$ for the vocational training and state certification to become a CNA, and there are never enough of those in the workforce. So, despite being a trained network admin, and CNC programmer as my primary vocation, I did exactly that.  Last year I worked in a nursing home taking care of old people. They pay is terrible, but it is a bullwark against the mental horror of being fired from a better job.  I can always go back to helping the elderly if push comes to shove. There *IS* work waiting for me. About 6 months ago I got a break, and am now doing CNC programming again as a contractor. Good times, but getting that CNA kept the lights on for a full year. Good investment.) Once free from that nagging self-doubt about how this person can harm you,  you can smile, and ask most pleasantly if they would like to talk to your manager.  It becomes like teasing a screaming kid that isn't yours, asking if they would like to tell their mommy all about it.  This is even better when your manager is one of the "No clothes" types.

So, inwardly, when I see that type of crap happen, I smile.  It fills me with sadistic pleasure to know that they are only hurting themselves by their bad time and resource management, and further, I know there is not a damn thing I can do for them except NOT cushion their fall when it all comes down around them. You cannot help somebody that wont help themselves, and placating their fantasies only makes them worse, not better.  I actually help them the best I am able, by allowing life to demonstrate their foolishness for them.

Again, look at Wells Fargo--  They did the "8 is GREAT!" bullshit, where they did everything imaginable to pressure their staff to sign their patrons up for at least 8 financial services, when the industry average is 2 to 3.  When this insane pressure to produce the impossible (you cannot influence market demand, by issuing ultimatums, no matter how important you think you are.) resulted in their workers engaging in illegal signups without customer approval, just to keep their jobs, it first caused people to attempt whistle blowing, (which of course failed, because the emperor was SURE his new clothes were real), and then finally, the malfeasance was so apparent that federal regulators got involved, and issued some very harsh penalties including clawbacks of compensation for the CEO and community banking manager, who were driving the whole ordeal.

The reality, is that if Wells Fargo had simply FAILED to reach target goals, when it was only 4 or 5 services per customer, they would never have been involved in so much fraud, and this whole thing would not have blown up the way it did.  Allowing their grand master-plan to fail, due to opposition with reality, is really the best way to help them. In fact, the sooner they fail, the better for everyone. In fact, if it fails before it can make any profit for them at all, the better as an educational aide it is.  It will better encourage them to avoid that kind of thinking in the future.

Take comfort in the knowledge that there are ALWAYS options, even if they are unpleasant. Safe in that knowledge, see screaming patrons and demanding bosses for what they really are, and be quite happy to let them fail. Do your job the legal way, and dont encourage failure through sabotage-- but allow it to fail naturally.  If they fire you, or they refuse to give you hours, seek alternatives to their employment, even if those alternatives are unpleasant.

Once you do, instead of the raging dragon in the corporate office, they turn into a screaming 2 year old demanding a diet of straight cookies and icecream.

It is very funny watching them give themselves a tummy ache.

[Truean]

Please do not quote

Actually, wierd is a lot closer than most people will ever get based upon the post above this one. I take a different approach but who knows. Maybe his will work better for you. I'm not perfect and sometimes the human urge to see people who hurt me get screwed over will surface, but I try not to let that happen, because I just see no value in it.

It's like the people who did bad things to me who went to prison. I could say "yeah, they're probably getting all beaten up and far worse in prison." The problem there is that's still a 0 sum game and nobody wins. Sure, I don't want them running around doing stuff to other people, but them getting screwed doesn't make me any less screwed over, does it?

It's the whole thing about an eye for an eye leaving us all blind. If the guy who messed up my life gets raped in prison, that doesn't make me any less raped for what he did to me as a kid. It still happened and that sucks. Now instead of one person being abused, we have two people. The only ... "thing" that wins is [ahem] abuse [ahem]. So we get tricked into thinking there's this score and now it's even rapist: 1, society 1, when he gets thrown in a terrible prison. What's really happening is more like rapist: 0, society: 0, rape: 2. You see that? Nobody wins and it's just more bad things. It isn't like I'm ever going to get any restitution from that jerk and him getting messed up won't make me any less messed up or take away what he did. .


All I can really do is try to work with what I have and make the best of that. At least that's my take. Hard? Yes. Any better option? Not that I can see, no.
Please do not quote

[wierd]

I don't advocate active harm. Very important.

I have just learned that tough love is a very effective teaching aide for those who are averse to the realities of the world.

Tough love is letting that person get burned by the natural consequences of their actions. It is not seeking punishment for percieved wrongs. A kid refuses to listen about gorging on candy, let them get the tummy ache. It is not the same as forcing them to eat the candy.

The child is not taught the life lesson by that latter-- that it learns only from the former.

I am a bit of a bad man, because I do admit to getting a naughty satisfaction from seeing people suffer from such consequences, but I am not malicious or callous. There are people who just do not know better, and find they cannot find the right path on their own even when looking, desperately. Such people want help, but get served a steaming pile instead.  Those I will go out of my way for. The screaming "master planners" though?  Not so much. Those I step aside for, to watch walk off the cliff.

[Truean]

That's not bad wierd and is better than most.

Simple respectful difference of opinion. I ignore, and live in a better fantasy. You embrace and enjoy watching just deserts being served. Pros and cons to both.

I know the world is a crapsack, in vivid detail. Thinking on that isn't productive for me; thinking around it is. Put it this way, repeatedly telling yourself, "it's ok" means it isn't and there's a reason repeat reassurance is required. This survival technique is useful, regardless of truth.

I sense you also know this, and are somewhat a connoisseur, appreciating the subtleties without causing them. It's the same idea behind the theory of capitalism: turning vice to virtue, namely greed. Here, it's tragedy turned to toleration of it. It simply doesn't work so well for me.

Rather, I assume things will go wrong at, in, or for the worst time, way, reason, and / or place. They do. Others complain, I try not to, but rather to compensate. My life had numerous setbacks I could've never anticipated, prepared for, or prevented. They were all incredibly unfair, as a rule. I have cried about them, a lot; it didn't help. I saw many who causes these events be punished and imprisoned. Oddly, that didn't help much either at least not psychologically and emotionally.

Would seeing the angry, ranting, cursing, screaming, unreasonable, and who are we kidding, terrible customer getting hit by a bus help the poor clerk who was forced to deal with their abuse? I personally don't think so but what do I know?

[Robot Parade Leader]

What do I do when people talk over me while I am trying to answer their question? Example:

"Did you forget your shop keys this morning because there was a [insert horrible list of crap I just don't care about and basically is them looking for somebody to blame].

I tried to answer this person with "No." and digging my shop keys out of my pocket to show them. I had to up the volume and drag out the "o" on the "no" because they wouldn't shut the fuck up and let me answer, either verbally or practically by showing them I still had my keys. Long story short, they wouldn't shut up and allow me to answer (continuing to implicitly blame me in the face of objective proof. Issue was that the keys were lost and bad things happened cause of it. I still have my keys so it wasn't me).

Basically I say "Nooooooo"

I get told I have an "attitude."

I can't zone out during this and I'm trapped. If I don't immediately answer, then I'm "holding back and not answering a 'simple question' that should be easy and so I must be hiding something...." BUT I can't answer because the moron won't stop talking long enough for me to answer. When I try to answer anyhow, then I'm interrupting him and giving him "attitude" for answering a question he just asked....

Can't answer question immediately without talking over him. Can't talk over him or I "have an attitude." Can't delay answering question until he stops talking or I'm "not being cooperative."

There are three ways this goes and I loose on all of them, even though I can absolutely prove I didn't do anything wrong.

WTF do I do?

[wierd]

Wait patiently for them to finish. A warm smile helps too.

When they are done, make a quip about the potential intruder being very polite by returning your keys to exactly where you left them when you went to bed, then hold up the keys.

Suggest that maybe somebody else neglected their keys, or perhaps the door is not locking properly.

[Truean]

Wierd's advice isn't bad.

FYI, everyone's stupid because they can't handle emotions. (See every post I've made in this thread). They're fighting over blame instead of solutions. Guess what they end up with, and what they don't end up with....

Keys have nothing to do with it. The guy is scared, would laugh and maybe get violent if anyone said that, and won't admit it to himself. Imagine you manage some place and it got ... broken into? ... because somebody left it unlocked. That looks really bad to whoever is the manager's boss (owner? district manager? I dunno?). The manager's immediate thought process can be summed up as "Oh, shit!" Somebody is going to be blamed for this mess, and everyone's praying it isn't them.

Now, a smart manager (don't hold your breath) would simply determine a what happened, how to keep it from happening again, submit an insurance report, privately sit the employee down for a chat, and move on.... That assumes it was an accident and the employee wasn't the thief or in cahoots with thieves. Then you'd call the cops and let them deal with it. Notice what's missing there? Drama.

Drama lets people get their insane emotions out and dealt with, importantly without imagining they personally could've been partially to blame (that's each and every one of us, by the way). Everyone's obsessed with "Should" or "Shouldn't."

Should doesn't happen; shit happens.

It's all in how it's dealt with, rather than bitching about what "should" or "shouldn't" happen. That's the way societies move forward. It's why ours doesn't. Blame has never solved anything, but it sure does feel good (as long as we're not the ones being blamed). We punish the blamed and don't solve ... anything.

In the real world, nobody can handle anything they don't like. Critical thinking is dead or dying and has been replaced with confirmation bias. That last sentence is absolutely huge, and I can't say that enough. It's an outgrowth of denial. People like things that confirm what they want to believe and don't like things that don't confirm what they want to believe. Truth, practicality, reasonableness, etc, simply doesn't enter into their thinking. Both sides of the 2016 election did this. Businesses do this. People do this. Everybody....

That's why people are going to talk over you no matter what. Hell, they did and do it to me, even though I'm 1000% right on things. I tell them 2+2=4, and they hate me for it. They really, really badly need it to equal 5, because if it doesn't, then they're totally and absolutely screwed beyond belief. They can't face the truth and they will believe anyone who will even lie to them that what they want is possible. They'll hire somebody who tells them it equals 5, when they know damn good and well 2+2=4.... "The customer is always right." Nope, but if you say that, they'll come after you with a vengeance. 

In your case, you can prove you didn't forget your keys. Manager is in freak out mode, because he owes somebody an answer he doesn't know how to provide. He's hoping it's something easily explainable that doesn't make him look bad. If it isn't, then he's screwed. You have to outwardly take the BS abuse while inwardly knowing you didn't do anything wrong. You can prove it. Do so once he's gotten his anger out, because that's what he's really doing "venting." There's no better option. Fair? Nope. Again, no better option. This is loss mitigation.

This is that retreating into your mind and keeping a bullet point list of things to bring up .... thing I was talking about. Let him bitch, because who are we kidding, he's going to.... People think blaming solves problems, so they blame. It doesn't; nothing gets solved.

For what it's worth, and I realize it's not much, it is unfortunate that our world puts people like your (and many other peoples') boss(es) in charge. There's not a whole lot we can even really do about it. Until and unless we somehow radically alter our society where people don't need their jobs as much (totally), then I'm afraid the best I can offer is a temporary rest inside your own headspace. It's what I do when I can. I confess that I'm not perfect with it as much as I'd like to be, but it's better than booze or drugs or something else bad.

People never listen to what's being said to them. Instead of considering what's being said, they immediately think about what they're going to say back (usually shooting down whatever's being said unless they like it a lot). That is, they're not listening, they're planning a counter.... People end up talking past each other or over each other, etc.

Does that help at all when addressing your question about what to do when people talk over you while you're trying to answer their question?

Grin and bear it; keep your answer in the back of your mind; somewhat retreat into headspace; present answer. Realize internally (without showing it) that this is their damn problem and they are trying to make you feel bad over it.

[Robot Parade Leader]

New thing.

Work is kinda set up like an assembly line. I get work after somebody else is done doing what they do with it. Somebody else takes what I do and then they do their work on that. It's in stages. The person before me screwed up, so they had to take things I was supposed to work on back to fix it. This left me with nothing to do.

I asked for stuff to do from somebody, they said yes and gave me stuff. I told my supervisor, and he said it was cool.

Come to find out, people seem to be grumbling about what I did. The details are hard to get, but people are bitching in the background. Now I got assigned shitty tasks coincidentally the same day this happened.... God damn it; I just wanted to be valuable and have a better shot at keeping my job. I purposefully try NOT to make anybody else look bad. I do pretty much whatever the hell people want at work how they want it. Just let me know. Why and how the hell are people pissed at me?


WTF?

[wierd]

life deals out shit.  it happens.

nobody wants to deal with EXTRA shit.

consider:

you had to take something back upstream in the assembly process. Somebody who felt they had completed thier task just had that task returned to them with a "do this the right way" implication, (suggesting they are lazy, incompetent, inattentive, whatever), and now must, in addition to the nw work coming down the line, find some way to squeeze out time to fix the product that is not ready for downstream processing at their station, and NOT fall behind schedule.

then there is the guy who just returned the product upstream, asking for something else to do.

it is pretty easy to see how other people would get pissy about seeing it.

spilled miilk, and water under bridges aside, here is how I would have approached it.

First, I would alert my foreman that an upstream defect has been found in the product, and that I am going to try and get it addressed. He should be down with that.

I would then have walked up the line, and asked the uptream station if they were aware of this defect, and how it can be addressed discretely. they are intimately familiar with that stage of production and likely will have an answer for you. ask them to watch out for the defect and see if they can keep it from coming downstream anymore, while you try to address the defect at your station. The goal is to keep the line running smoothly with good product moving downstream. If you both can shoulder the burden of the defect and mitigate it on the line, great. Once you have succeeded in correcting the defect, alert the foreman that the issue has been addressed, and to please validate your break/fix solution. (we sell good product, we dont hide defective product.) If your fix is accepted, you have saved part of an order through effective teamwork. Your foreman will likely ask each of you to describe how the defect happened, and how you adressed it, so that official process can either remove the recurring risk of the defect, or give an official method of addressing the defect should it happen to avoid jeapordizing the line.

[tonnot98]

To answer the thread title's question, I just slip on some nice tunes (Justice always works) and kick some ass in games I know I'm good at.

[Truean]

Office politics and a culture of blame, what a sad combination. Doesn't help anything, but it's what we've got....

I advised lots of companies on production bottlenecks. "Margins" help, and JIT (Just In Time) doesn't. JIT is running bare bones, basically no inventory and on a strict "as needed" basis. It doesn't allow for any problems, "no insurance policy." JIT material shortages are dangerous as Hell, til you get more. This "cheaper" method is immensely popular in business. It's immeasurably stupid, so of course they do it. It has good portions, like 5S and ISO 9000, but yeah....

Sounds like JIT is what screwed you over. You ran out of stuff to do, decently asked for more, and inadvertently made somebody else look bad. The focus is now on the problem.... The blame culture wants "accountability" which is sacrificial victims. Everybody's trying not to be that. Some manager probably asked or thought "why don't you have anything to do?" WHO CARES? Just give the guy more, would be the most efficient response, because somebody is trying to do good things.... That won't happen. The system is stupid and doesn't want to acknowledge the inevitable failures that just happen not matter what. "To err is human." (Machines screw up too). "Shit happens."

So what do you do in this imperfect system? Roll with it as best you can. Wierd had a decent solution. Actually, it depends on the workplace. Most of the established ones have workarounds for stupid managers.
There are actual positions of power with titles and official authority, and then there are unofficial people with unofficial power doing things in the background and working around the stupids (unless they end up being the stupids, which is problematic). Nobody will back the unofficial people if shit hits the fan, and those people have weathered the storm enough to know how to deal when it all goes sideways. These are the crafty veterans who knows how shit really goes down, careful, that doesn't mean they won't throw you under the bus to save themselves. That said, it's nice to see how the guy who has been working there for 15 years has dealt with these problems.... I'm imagining you're fairly new at your workplace?

I've sometimes had success with putting into place contingency plans on production lines (physical or mental) where they put procedures in place for just such an occasion. Either they have a reserve of material (blasphemy by JIT standards) or they do a "contribution." That way everyone gives like, one thing for the out of material guy to work on, so production doesn't suffer. After that, they slowly work everyone's workflow back up to normal. Some businesses will do it and others won't. I'd be very careful discussing any of this with your boss, because, having never met him or her, I don't know how they'd react to it (maybe badly).

This is another reason why the social aspect of work is so important. That way, you can chit chat with people to see how they deal with bad shit and how others have coped. It is a very fact, person, situation, location, and administration dependent thing.