Atta Girl
I didn't realise she was doing the Drake meme pose in panel 1 until I was done drawing it
Comments (104)
This is going to be a glorious disaster to watch. I'll start making popcorn.
That's a very brave step. You go Claire. Much better to try and see how you do rather than say "No" and always wonder how it could've been.
They're being replaced by their cousins Coy and Vance.
i-understood-that-reference dot gif
Is this Jeph writing Marten and Claire out of the comic?
If he does, I'm done.
Totally off the topic - are other people getting hit with the captcha prompts from Cloudflare almost every time they connect to Patreon?
Hasn't happened to me ever. At least not on Patreon
THAT'S RIGHT CLAIRE! OWN THAT SHIT.
They've never had an IS Dept. or manager to judge you against. Use that!
This does sound like the beginning of a spin-off: “Claire Catalogues It All.” Now we just need Marten to zoom up to the 69th floor window in his jet backpack and awkwardly climb through the open air window.
I love Claire but this is a mistake. For a start its going to be a nightmare trying to recruit people to work for someone who has no experience (can you ever see Claire doing what Moray just did?). I can see her ending up hiring Martin and maybe some of her other friends and that'll be a disaster all round.
A few comics back I was thinking "this sounds like one of those jobs that does present a lot of opportunity for personal growth / valuable experience early on but you eventually get tired of general company management not having their sh*t together" lol Somehow I don't get the feeling Claire will have a lot of patience for things like.... Not having an HR department and basically just vibing company policies and benefits as things come up.
Currently riding a similar situation. Went from being "warehouse guy" to learning stocktaking, inventory management and investigation, returns processing and all sorts of crap, to the point where *managers* ask me about how to do this and that. All because I was vaguely interested in how processes worked (and was a previous student of IT (I was good, but couldn't get a foot in the door), which people seem to mistake for being smart). I will say this, Claire: winging it can go any number of ways. One can soar beyond their horizons, or slam into the ground, or fly so high they get caught in a flight path. I hope she goes far and enjoys the view, though.
If she can make hiring decisions for her team, I can imagine Clinton badgering her for a role...
When I saw the title, I was convinced she'd stand her ground and say no. Now I'm worried for her. 🙁
Oh, and she can hire Martin to be on her staff! That'll be perfect! What could go wrong?
So so many things...
I really hope the next strip involves Yay stepping out of the shadows to tell Claire "You're going to need help."
You don't need a Deus ex Machina for this, especially since Yay is lousy with interpersonal stuff and organizing people who aren't them. What you need, and what Claire can absolutely get a handle on, is finding a a few key competent people to fill important roles she can't and making sure they have resources and accountability.
I now require the full Claire version of the Drake meme
Claire is about to organize the entirety of Cubetown just SO hard. You simply love to see it.
Proud of her <3
My guess is that this first "I believe in myself" will advance to her having to make a moral choice in which she will refuse to assist the AIs in work that she believes is unethical. And if that decision puts her in danger, Hannalore and Station can threaten to launch some Rods from God. Overall moral: Believe in yourself, and stand up for what you believe in.
I'm going to go on the hunt for Claire doing Drake Meme pic 2. If there isn't one in the QC'istory, I think Jeph's ~~obligated~~ (highly encouraged) to produce one. After all, we used to have regular bonus strips. =P
I fall into this trap before. The whole "you just have to take a deep breath and believe in yourself" before taken a job with responsability, while having not only had 0 experience on it but also no other senior to guide me. It was in my field ( IT), It was 10 years ago, I'm currently on of the best engineer of my sector, But I still count it as the worse mistake of my carreer. And NO "I didn't learn a lot". You don't learn in total isolation of people of you field. Grow up. Oh , and the whole " men take risk, and accept jobs they only know at 50% while women take only the jobs they know at 100% " didn't help AT ALL. (Im a girl) It may be (maybe) true, but those kind of jobs proposed to women are also porly paid, and usualy proposed to them after all experimented folks(both gender) have refuse them.
It depends on the person. I, for instance have made a super successful 26 year career in IT doing it.
I am now confused as to whether this is supposed to be an inspiring story about taking chances and seizing opportunity or a cautionary tale about recognizing red flags. Because I was 100% seeing the latter and it seemed like Claire was recognizing them too, but... maybe not?
No, she knew. It’s pretty clear she knows. But, she chose yes anyway.
You got this, Claire!
No she don't. I've been her. "you just have to take a deep breath and believe in yourself" is not enough to survive a job you are not qualified to do with no one senior to guide you. Unfortunatly beginner worker usualy learn it the hard way.
Oh Claire, darling, what have you done?
Taken the first step to a rewarding and challenging career as a next-generation Feral Time-Traveling Librarian, the most Fell and Puissant Being in the Multiverse
I look forward to finding out how this goes. It could be an amazing opportunity, but it is throwing so many red flags that I can't even calm down and count them.
🚩🚩🚩🚩 👩🦯
Just wanted to let you know: One of my sons will be starting a job in South Deerfield Mass next month, and invited me to travel with him from Northern Illinois last week to go apartment hunting. Looks like he may end up living at the old Clarke School for the Deaf just down the road from Smith College. Seeing that was the highlight of the trip for me! Is Coffee of Doom at all based on a real place, and if so are you at liberty to say what it is? The wife and I will probably visit in a few months.
I mean, as a positive, great positive attitude. However, as previously mentioned, there are so many red flags here they are holding a Communism conference. Will be interesting to see how it plays out.
The way Claire is holding her phone ... is she getting a picture? She does seem to at least sometimes look at the screen.
I wonder if Working from home, or Telecommuting is an option?
Surely there's a purely VR version of the workplace as well.
What happened to her piercing?
It flew out when she whipped her head around in disgust in panel 1.
Nooo, this place sounds like a disaster. Find a functioning workplace, Claire!
Thank you. It is very rare to see someone overcome their self-doubt and make a decision like this, and it makes me happy to see it.
No, no. She is signing up for hell. There are no job requirements, no clearly defined goals, nobody in leadership wants to set them, and no support structure to fix any of this. I've seen jobs like this, my wife has worked one. You just kill yourself with work until you quit and some other fool takes over. Repeat until the company folds.
I'm really excited to see more of the folks in Cube!
this still works reading right to left
Is…is this the beginning of the end? Martin and Claire moving; Dora and Tai getting married; Faye and Bubbles have their business; Marigold and Dale getting a house together…
Jeph recently tweeted that it is not the end: https://twitter.com/jephjacques/status/1555508880326758400
YOU GO GIRL, PUSH THROUGH THE IMPOSTER SYNDROME. No way they're impatient or fire her if she's not instantly great no?
I don't think this is imposter syndrome. She has an idea of what they need, but that's not the same as knowing how to implement it on the scale this place needs, just after graduation!
Oh no. Am I Claire?
Claire! Claire! Claire! Claire!
One hand: I think this is a horrible idea. Other hand: sexy nano/slime robot babe might stick around a bit longer.
Cubetown sounds like a nightmare workplace
You-know-what-that-is?Growth.meme
I'm probably putting a bit too much real-life thinking into this, but like. How does this not sound absolutely horrible? Claire is vaguely aware of this as a trendy organization, but now she has firsthand knowledge of some unbelievably devastating incompetence over there. I know, I know, it's a webcomic and not real life...
Sure, but what kind of incompetence. I know someone who worked for a couple of start ups back in the late '90s setting up their offices and generally keeping things running on a practical level. Back when there was a ton of money floating around and almost no managerial experience it was an amazing job because her employers would usually rubber stamp any request, confident that she knew what she was doing. Claire's new employers seem to have the same combination of optimistic naivete and a bottomless bank account.
Just make sure they're paying you in real money and not CubeCoin.
Don't be absurd, they pay in Canadian Tire money
de l'audace, encore de l'audace, et toujours de l'audace.
THIS! More than once I've pushed engineers I've mentored to make the leap to product or project management. I love being an engineer, and I have no desire to enter management myself, though I do want to be managed by truly talented people. These junior engineers often felt weird about becoming my boss, or felt unsure of their abilities or their qualifications. There was one line I finally found that worked every time: "I will NOT let you fail!" I realized that if I had no desire to rise in the ranks, then I should serve as a launchpad for those who can and should.
My brother is an electrical engineer and he refuses to let the corporation promote him to project manager or higher in part because he believed a promotion meant he’d have go to school again for a MBA. He struggled with school and basically hated college.
... and that is how toxic workplaces are born.
Nah, this place was toxic from the moment their Director decided to collate unification theory in a spreadsheet!
I'm a bit sad that they are (probably) leaving, as it will mean less interactions with the rest of the cast. However, I am really excited to see how Claire deals with the new job, and how Marten handles moving away from his job and friends, so I hope we get to see that and also follow them, rather than them being written out.
Grab life by the balls and hang on. Then 5 years later let go and spend the rest of your life dealing with the PTSD.
I can imagine 5 years of clutching balls would definitely cause PTSD
On the one hand, there's no way she can be worse than the less than nothing Cubetown already has. But on the other hand they seem to think Claire is going to save them, despite not asking how she's qualified, or if she's even capable!
Maybe. It also seems (at least within the AI world of this comic) equally possible that they don't expect her to be any more competent than they are, and they will have a strong sense of "none of us have any idea but we'll figure it out together" and meanwhile they will be impressed by even minimal displays of competence. I'm not getting much of a sense that they think they need someone to save them, at least.
The look on Moray's face is adorable. I really need them to be friends with Yay, and Melon. Millefeuille...also Roko! ❤️😍
YAY! WE GET TO KEEP THE SLIME GIRL
I assumed it was more like a mottled patterning on their dermal rather than them being totally gooey and amorphous.
Oh god this reminds me of when I was a freshly-minted EE, got a gig at an electronics design house and I was nowhere NEAR the level of technical expertise required for it. At least my next job felt like a breeze after that trial by fire...
... tetraptych? (Eyes fully closed, it fits the trend.)
I'm not sure if the teraptych should have panel 4 or panel 5 from this comic, though. (I justify this by noting that panel 4 of this comic, like panel 5 of the previous three, is the third Claire panel in the comic). Perhaps it is a quintych and includes both.
She accepted! Goodie! It would have been super awkward if we'd gone through all of this for the plot to just go "WELL, that's the end of that storyline and now we're never seeing goo-girl again."
Nah, Moray would have swum back into the narrative somehow. Hiding in a crevice, waiting for her chance to lunge out and strike...
Good job, Claire! Honestly, one pattern in QC is that there are a lot of AIs that are very smart, very powerful, and very young and naive. Which, given how recent the Singularity was, makes sense. So there are going to be jobs like this out there, helping powerful AIs cope with aspects of reality that just aren't as obvious to them. That doesn't sound like the worst job. If a human-run org were doing this, run very fast. For an AI-run org... maybe not.
Oh. This made me think of, who was the first AI, in the comic, in a humanoid chassis? Was it bubbles or someone before that?
Opportunity, or nightmare trap? Deeply suspicious of any prospective employer who doesn't know how to set boundaries. ... Capitalism has broken me. 🙃
Opportunity if she has resources and authority in the same county as her responsibility
You go Claire!! The upshot is that the Cubetown crew has no clue as to what Claire's actual expertise is. She'll write her own ticket for a win. Or at least I hope so.
It's nice to see that Claire goes into these things the same way I do.
Off the deep end?
Go Claire! Learn by doing! Sometimes you see a mess and just know you can make it organized and beautiful, or that could be the OCD/librarian talking.
As someone who was thrown into something like this, there are only three options. Rising to the occasion, having crippling imposter syndrome or both. I hope it’s just option one for sweet Claire.
She's an overachiever, I bet she does both.
I still think it's a cult
Cults need organization and competent employees like everyone else
Brave! I love it.
Misread this as 'braw' at first, which also works. She's a good Merida with the hair eh?
Claire...?
Claire...
Quick, change the last panel to the second Drake meme pose!
This is gonna be interesting
I don't know what's more fantastical: The auto-adjusting drone webcam (an AI?) which only exists so she can videochat. An interviewer seriously asking "Do you think we should look for someone else then?"
I have told recruiters, "I think you should look for someone else!" I have also been told by a recruiter after saying so, "The candidate is not allowed to end the interview process."
Yay, Claire! Now you’ll need to befriend Emmitt and their mom to learn how to be a proper Canadian!
oh god
at least when she burns out after six months she can put it on her resume
She's gonna have to walk in the door with a big list of work/life boundaries, but I am excited for this!
Though she has more experience than most, but do you think she really has it in this area? Educators know skills don't translate like that; Knowing how to set boundaries around your transness doesn't necessarily mean you know how to set boundaries around your work/life balance.
You can do it Claire!