Anyone have info - articles, links, about postal workers going crazy? What is it about their job exactly?

Question

that makes them go so crazy?

I understand why they would, but don't a lot of other people have jobs like that too?

Answer 1

There are tons (tonnes if you like metric) of links. Here I've used google to get them together.

http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&q=Postal+workers+workplace+kill+murder&btnG=Google+Search&meta=

I've worked around post offices, but never in post offices, thankfully.

The people who do work there are really good people but the manner in which the post office selects its front line supervisors was rather bizarre. A note here. The selection process has changed.

Frankly they used to pick people for supervisory roles, they didn't follow up on their selections and they didn't provide enough support training for their supervisors with regard to human relations. People who shouldn't became supervisors did and those who should be supervisors didn't get there. Result, human chaos.

The workplace in a post office is phenomenally difficult. There are enormous time constraints because of shipping deadlines receiving deadlines and physical effort. People would go home stressed.

I am sure the post office now takes a look at what happens. The problem is perception. More work place incidents occur outside the post office. But the spree murders involved in the postal service were due to obvious employee abuse which is also common in other firms private or public. The perception is that it happens all the time.

Its a question of demographics. The US Postal Service employes around three quarters of a million people give or take. It has 260,000 trucks alone.. Like a few of them might be a little nuts. Its simple demographics. Further when there is a workplace spree killing the media coined the term "going postal". This amplifies the reputation, the perception that the post office had something to do with the murder when it did not. Its a bum wrap really.

Answer 2

work can be extremely monotonous (inside work as clerk, not at counter, just sorting and moving tons of mail) and unchallenging, in a fairly rigid environment

Answer 3

g-o-v-e-r-n-m-e-n-t
b-u-r-e-a-u-c-r-a-c-y