"Clouds Of Smoke Everywhere In The Office And No Way For A Nonsmoker To Avoid": People 50-Plus Are Revealing What Work Culture Was Like When They First Started
If, like me, you watched Mad Men, then you know what a WILD experience it is to see just how different work culture was in the 1960s — particularly in the type of behavior that wasn't just allowed to be okay but expected. However, when you think about it, even within the last 15 years of work culture, things have changed quite a bit.
And recently, Reddit user LightningStrikes818 was interested in just how much things have changed over the decades when they asked: "Redditors who are 50+ years old, what has changed the most about working when you started working vs. working nowadays?"
Well lots and lots of people over 50 responded with the changes they've seen both good and bad. Below are the top and best comments:
1."We took a company van — with the company's logo on it — to take out of town guests to a strip club. I don’t even think I can say that out loud at work today."
"Strip clubs were standard practice. Especially in sales. Many deals closed in those places over my career."
2."Skirts/dresses and pantyhose required of women in many offices through the 1990s."
"Pantyhose were expensive. I had nice department store hose for special occasions, and bulk mail order hose for daily wear. They had to be washed in mesh bags and hung to dry.
In the summer I’d get swamp crotch when it was hot and humid, and heat rash on my thighs where they rubbed.
Heels had to be polished, and the heel tips replaced at the shoe shop. Most office clothes were dry clean only, and it was expensive, and yet another errand. Office clothes were expensive. I didn’t have many clothes; I had to plan what to wear and time the dry cleaning. I don’t miss the nightmare of heels and hose from the '80s."
3."Having to go to the bank to cash my paycheck."
"Ha, I worked in a grocery store and was able to cash my check right at the front desk. And I didn't have a credit card until I was in my 20s, just a wallet full of bills."
4."Things run so much leaner now as the excess is gone. When I started, it seemed everyone at VP level and up had an expense account. Eating lunch at your desk was weird. You always went out, always had a beer, and it was almost always paid for with an exec’s company card."
"It could get kind of nuts. Bonuses were almost considered mandatory. I remember a holiday party at the company owner’s mansion — with about 150 hammered employees and their equally hammered spouses. The evening culminated in him standing at a balcony throwing envelopes of cash to everyone below like some anemic Caligula."
5."So when I started working, my first job was to install a computer and printer into a bank where they had 50 people typing form letters for late mortgage payments. They had a form, and they would line up the blank areas of the form and type in the numbers. Imagine a giant rectangular room with desks, each one holding an inbox, an outbox, and a typewriter — a manual typewriter."
"I installed the computer and a copy of WordStar with Mail Merge. When this room of workers watched all of the letters they needed to produce in a week come out of that printer before lunch, they all knew that their jobs were over. Banks are not sentimental."
6."People smoking indoors. Clouds of smoke everywhere in the office and no way for a nonsmoker to avoid it. That was the norm so you just had to suck it up."
"Yes, at one stage I had the misfortune of sitting next to someone that used to smoke a pipe. I could barely see my computer screen at times for the clouds of smoke. Also, the IT support guy would come over to do something, and he always had a cigarette dangling from his lips, dropping ash into my keyboard. Urgh! Different times!"
7.'"Zero tolerance' at schools. Back then, 'boys will be boys' could have been the motto of the entire school system. Fights? Who cares! No adult did. Now, if bullies start a fight, both the bully and the bullied get suspended."
"Hell, I remember two teachers at my high school (who hated each other) duke it out in front of us in a classroom. Chairs and fists flying. We cheered them on. Nothing came out of it; the administration acted like it never happened."
8."Hardly anybody has a pension anymore."
"Companies felt a sense of obligation to their employers. Now these days, companies only feel a sense of obligation to the shareholders."
9."You worked for an employer, and they valued your experience. You rose in the ranks of your profession, you became a valued team member, and you stayed until you retired. Changing jobs often is frowned on, if you make a job commitment — you follow through on it. People get bothered and quit/move/change really quickly now. That's not necessarily bad, but it has created a gap in expertise — everyone is new all the time, and there isn't any value in having experience."
"I remember when I was in high school, my dad was big on me finding an employer I can grow with. That was 12 years ago. He retired from the same company he started working with at 20 years old."
10."For myself, it was a culture of fear. Sexist bosses who would harass female employees constantly. They didn't have to be male either. I had a female boss that would measure your skirt length by having you kneel on the floor, and would measure your hem with a ruler. More than two inches too short? Clock out, go home and change, and then come back. Rinse and repeat. Many male managers took pride in being able to make women cry. There was public embarrassment if you made a mistake. Feeling like your job was in jeopardy at all times. Surprisingly, I don't miss it."
11."I watched office work go from sedentary to virtually immobile. We used to retrieve paper files, pass memos around, consult with coworkers in other sections and floors. Now everything is available on the screen in front of us, everything can be shared with a few clicks. It’s convenient, but so unhealthy."
12."There was a lot more understanding back in the '80s and '90s that each employee had a life outside of work, and work would end at 5 p.m. You could leave work and go do something that you liked, maybe a martial arts class or some learning workshop somewhere. There were no phone calls. Text messages and email hadn't happened yet. Pagers were rare."
"These days, it's the opposite. There's no encouragement from your boss or your coworkers other than to just work around the clock. You're never 'off.' Emails, text messages, Slack messages, video calls come in at all hours of the day. You're tracked in every way possible these days."
13."I am 58-year-old engineer. When I started, we shared computers at work. They were expensive, and lots of things were still done by hand. We also did not have cellphones, texts, email, video conference, internet, etc. It was nearly impossible to collaborate with people in other offices. Blueprints were sent out for printing, and we had flat drawers full of archived prints. We would have to hand sign/seal every page. Now we can collaborate between offices, and everything is an electronic file. It is amazing to me."
14."People used to answer their business phones."
"OMG, work landline numbers. I never see those anymore. I don’t even have a phone number in my email signature at work anymore. And business cards used to be such a big deal. I used to get really excited to see my name and title in print. I would always send my parents one when I got a new job. What a dork!"
15."My first health insurance was Blue Cross, top level. Cost me nothing monthly, and I had $5 copays."
"What was considered mediocre insurance in the '80s is now considered a 'Cadillac healthcare plan.' Most of the plans sold nowadays would not have been legal to offer prior to the deregulation efforts of the '90s."
16."Sending a memo meant typing something, sometimes on an actual typewriter. Physically passing said document to the people in the 'to' line. They would sign their initials, signifying they read it. Then pass on to the next."
"FYI, for stuff where I worked, the memo would be put in an envelope that had everyone's name written on it. Those gray envelopes with lines on the outside and a string on the flap to close it. After reading the memo, we'd scratch our name off and drop it in the next person's inbox. The envelopes would get reused until there were no more blank lines on the outside of the envelope."
17."Maternity and paternity leave are new (US). When I started working, it was still common to fire women who were expecting. Or require them to take very little leave. Women used to brag about taking only a few days off. Today, the young men where I work get months off as paternity leave when their spouses have a baby."
18.And lastly, "My mom said back in the '80s, some people would do coke at work. Also, a lot of sexual harassment happened a lot, and no one ever did anything about it. This was at a government job."
"When I talk with 20-somethings about the TV show Mad Men, they act like I'm high when I say that drinking and smoking on that show was normal for white collar jobs in the '60s and '70s. They dialed the sexual harassment and racism down to one and the homophobia to below zero. The word 'sexual harassment' was coined in 1968 — previously, it would have been called 'that's just the way it is, baby' and 'you should wear a tight sweater more often.'"
You can read the full thread of responses on Reddit.
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.
