Taking over a Hot Desk
I’m currently working a mere 6 miles from home at a Gas company, where I am attached to the IT department helping them implement Oracle Primavera P6 for one of their business processes. I’ve been here since last April and have been using a Hot Desk until this morning, when I took possession of my own desk.
It had been someone’s desk a few weeks ago and then turned into a Hot Desk before being delivered to me.
I thought I’d share the list of stuff I found on the desk and in the pedastal filing cabinet underneath it. In addition there was a newspaper on the floor that was published as long ago as the 6th September 2010. Tomorrow I will be bringing in a black plastic bag and dumping all the rubbish in it.
I went back to my previous desk to see what state I had left it in, and am quite pleased to say I left a HSSE booklet and a hazard reporting card. Two things that should be there for new people. The next time you are sitting in work at your desk, please take a look around. Ask yourself if it is the kind of place you would show your husband/wife/children. You’ll be spending a good portion of your weekly life there so I think it is worth making it the best you can. I like my work desk to be tidy, and adopt a clear desk policy at the end of the day. Any drawers, filing cabinets and the like have just the immediate work in it, if anything at all.
I found no work related documents on my new desk or in the pedastal, but this is what I did find.
Stuff on the Desk
- 39 pence lying in a loose pile as 2 × 10p, 2 × 5p, 3 × 2p and 3 × 1p
- a small reel of tape with a 2p in the hole in the middle.
- a post-it note with a mobile telephone number on it.
- an unsolved Rubiks Cube for one of the internal projects
- an almost empty bottle of Cholula Hot Sauce
- a 2010 Calendar setup on display and a 2011 calendar not on display – it’s 2011!
- two swipe cards with nothing but a magnetic strip and an arrow on them
- one unopened item of mail addressed to an individual – dated fall/winter 2010 so has probably been here for at least 2 months
- 2 sheets of paper stuck together by tape which looks like 5 rows of a very wide Excel spreadsheet
- A novel called Autumn by David Moody with a tag line of The Hit Zombie Novel
- A book called The 80 Minute MBA by Richard Reeves and John Knell
Stuff in the Pedastal
- an empty food bag from the canteen
- a pair of dirty Merrel trainers – see photo at top of post
- a carton containing 11 Non-Drowsy Hayfever relief 10mg tablets from Boots
- a Fruit Flapjack with a best before of 21 February 2011 – I won’t be eating it
- a new box of Berocca 15 tropical fruit flavour effervescent tablets
- a small bottle of Carex Hand Gel – Moisture Plus
- a small bottle of Covonia Chesty Cough Mixture
- a packet of Marks & Spencer liquid filled blackberry & echinacea flavoured gum
- half a tube of King of Shaves Shave Gel
- a little cannister of Nivea for Men Silver Protect
- a razor
- a tube of John Frieda Conditioner
- an opened Lynx Rise Shower Gel
- two tea spoons, one metal and one plastic
- a small roll-on of 4Head headache treatment
- a small tube of Norwegian formula hand cream
- several Gaviscon chewable tablets