The Hidden Work

So the audit is over.  2.5 days of two auditors equaling 5 days of auditing, a single nonconformity.  Over a 90% improvement from the first go round some years ago.

You would think I would be more excited.  I mean, after all, a 90% improvement is something which seldom happens in anything.  And the result of this successful audit is that everyone at the company will continue to have a job for some number of years.  It is legitimately sort of a big thing.

And yet I already feel it passing into the wind.

This is the reality, not just for myself for thousands of those just like me throughout industries, the ones performing the hidden jobs which so desperately need to be accomplished to keep the wheels of any commerce and industry working.  They are seldom the recognized or powerful,not often those for whom press releases are written about or appear in board meetings.  These are the ones that keep the whole machine moving from day to day.

I wonder, in my off hour thoughts, how many are actually conscious of that fact, that their documents move or products get produced or machinery is maintained by those who names they may never know and whose jobs they quite possibly could not do.  Do they actually think of such things or are they merely conscious of their own worlds of planning and strategy?

This is not meant to open or be a discussion on economic systems or the comparison of them but rather a simple reflection on the fact that in our modern society, most of what we benefit from is not directly planned, documented, or performed by ourselves.  Are we ever really conscious of this fact?