Oh Business, Up Yours!
Okay. It all started when I was reading the business section of the NY Times. With the economy being what it is (read: in the toilet) and the job market being what it is (read: right there in the dumper with the economy), there are a buttload of people who are out of work. This includes executives. Well apparently, the executives are now temping. You heard me. Not only are they temping, but they're doing the exact same thing that you did when YOU temped. They're crying about how they're not regarded as "real" employees, they're not respected, nobody listens to them, sob sob sob. It hurt me to read that, it really did. I hate to see anyone go through that. But y'know what? I have the feeling that this is a good experience for them to have. Maybe. JUST maybe they'll remember how shitty they felt when they were temping once they've finally gotten themselves another permanent job and hire a few temps of their own.
But I doubt it.
Which brings me to the next part of it. Employee appreciation, among other things. See, those executives had to go through a tough time in their lives. They had to be treated *just like the rest of us*. And it sucked for them. Just like it sucks for us. I wonder if it will teach them anything at all. See, I've been thinking about all of this. Power structures in business. Who decides what, and who? Who was the first person to say "Screw it. I'm smart enough to do this on my own, but I don't have enough hands, so I have to hire people. Hmmm...I don't want to have to LISTEN to them, however.".
So that guy hired a bunch of other people, but then he realised that he didn't really feel like dealing with that unwashed mass of heathens at all, so he hired somebody that he deemed was marginally more intelligent than the rest, and called him a Middle Manager.
And now we have the state we're in today. We have company owners who know precisely nothing about what their individual outposts are doing, we have middle management making decisions based on what they think would be most effective. We have employees who are miserable and smart. They're probably miserable *because* they're smart. I have personally worked a pile of jobs in my life, and I have never ever ever felt like I was "working to my full potential". I never felt like my ideas were heard. I never felt like I mattered at all. So far, the best christmas bonus I've ever gotten was a gift certificate for a pint of ice cream. Ice cream. For Christmas. I ask you. I mean, this is sad. Even sadder is the idea that no matter how many places I whore out my resume to, no matter how many power interview outfits I go without groceries to buy, no matter what, that job or employer just doesn't exist for me. I mean, the optimist in my head is tired of me, and keeps screaming "Nonono...there's employers out there who would LOVE to hire you! Your manicure may be trashed, girl, but your brain is honed and sharp and polished. You just gotta FIND them." But how? Somehow, if that employer is out there, they're not collecting resumes the usual way. They wouldn't make me put on an outfit I'll never wear again just to sit there and be uncomfortable and answer stupid questions about what my biggest weaknesses are. Interviewing is a silly farce. My biggest weaknesses? Cheese. Sleep. Spa treatments. Fluffy white socks. Apparently, that's not the right answer.
Now you might be thinking "Oh, come on Crickett. This is just sour grapes from you." Except that it's not. Because it's not just me.
I'll go with something we can all relate to first. Retail. How many times have you made disparaging comments about "that moron behind the counter", "this stupid bitch who rang me up at the store", or something along those lines? Quite a few, probably. I know I've made my share. Much like former waitrons, though, I find that lately I've become a little more kind to retail people. It's a good possibility that they're fighting the same battle I am. I mean, there's always gonna be some people who work in retail simply because it can be a fairly mindless way to make money. But there are quite a few people out there who are just treated like that goo around the bathtub drain by their employers simply because they had the bad luck to get hired there. Like, if they wanted that retail job, they must be really lame and should be treated accordingly. These people are the thinkers, the doers. They're pro-active, and maybe they wanna learn more about what they're doing. They ask questions. They offer suggestions. They get slapped down, ignored, and treated with either outright scorn or simple condescension. They then become quite unhappy, and the usual reaction at that point is "Why bother?". Why bother, indeed. So they get a little surly, maybe. They slack off, they might come in late a little more often. Sick days get used up. Eventually, they quit with no notice, because they're tired of killing themselves for a person that doesn't even notice. They go to the next job. It's the same thing all over again. Next time you have a bad retail experience, consider the possibility that the person you're dealing with is perhaps suffering from Whybotheritis.
This will apply to any industry, any job, any where. If you're a person who is NOT a CEO, Business Owner, or otherwise Grand PooBah, ask yourself these questions:
When was the last time you were asked your opinion, or to give input on solving a problem?
When was the last time that asking was done by a person higher in the food chain that you?
When was the last time that you were made to feel valuable at work?
If the answer to either one of those questions is "oh, just the other day, actually", then you may officially count your blessings. The rest of us are busy saying "What? People DO that?"
Okay, so CEO, Business Owner, Grand PooBah. I didn't forget you. You get questions too.
When was the last time that you mined the vast resource that is your employees' brains? (No, your little upper echelon and middle managers don't count, so just stop that.)
When was the last time you considered the impact of any of your decisions on your employees?
When was the last time you showed those employees that you really did appreciate what they do for you?
When was the last time you recognized something a little more special in one or two of those employees and tried to find out just what more they could do for you?
Okay, so if you said "Well, gosh. I do that stuff on a regular basis, and it gets me awesome results!", you need to get out more and maybe write a book about these techniques so that others can learn them. Because the rest of your colleagues could use a lesson.
Here's the deal. I'm really confused as to where executives come from. I mean, I know their mommy met their daddy, and they were in love, and so they gave each other a Special Hug. That's not what I mean. How is it that people who have just been "in business" get hired to a specific field in a higher-up position when they don't really know what they're doing? When they operate with disregard to employee impact? Does it just take a business degree? What do they TEACH people in business school? I don't think I really wnt to know. It simply doesn't make sense to me that companies with vast numbers of employees wouldn't be bothered to *talk to them* to see if any of them are paying attention and are perhaps ready to move up to the next level? Companies with a comparitively small number of employees don't bother with this either, and that scares me. Is "hiring a person for one job that he's qualified for and then making him do a bunch of jobs that don't work out so well but at least they're getting done" count as "cost effective" when you go to business school?
How does it work that CEO's are paid something like 537 times their base-level employees salary? I'm sorry, but I've seen all the assistants and helpers and toadies and advisors that these people have. They don't do ANYTHING by themselves that warrants that kind of money. They just don't.
Look. I know a lot of stuff. I've worked everything from fast food to mall store to VIP Executive handling to retail management to shop foreman. I've learned quite a bit in my time. I've got a wide and varied knowlege base. But no matter who I'm working for, I've never seen them ever come down from the tower and try to find out if maybe we could help solve a problem. Not just me. My co-workers have found this to be true as well. It's frustrating, because either things don't get fixed, new possibilities are never realized, or what does happen winds up being ridiculous and ineffectual. This because they're Executives and we're not? Meh to them.
See, I'm pretty convinced that there's precious little actual promotion going on in the world. Apparently, all those spots are now taken. There isn't much "he started in the mailroom and worked his way to the top" happening. Or maybe it's just that there's not so much "she started in the mailroom and worked her way to the top" happening. I don't know. But seriously, I've seen so many people who were qualified to move on up the ladder and rather than have that happen, the companies have brought in a different person, oftentimes from outside the company! Is promotion a myth? Who says that executives know any more than the rest of us? Who says that they could do our jobs for us? Not me.
I have a lot of friends who are completely miserable in their jobs. This isn't just me. They don't feel like they're going anywhere. They don't feel as though they have an impact. They sweat every time they have to meet with the boss. Why does it have to be like this? Because it's always been?
Then again, what do I know, right? I mean, it's not like I'm running a company or anything. I couldn't possibly know anything at all about any of this, and should shut up with the criticism and just do my damn job and aspire to be nothing more than a monkey who can make change. If I was supposed to THINK, I guess they would have told me to do so. What the hell do I know? I know a lot of things that should be obvious but clearly are not.
Here's a little of what I know.
You either get to understaff your facility and pay that small staff a decent wage OR you can adequately staff and pay that staff a small wage, but you are NOT allowed to understaff your facility and underpay that staff and then use "We're short-handed" as an excuse for anything at all.
Happy employees are more productive.
High turnover in employees means a higher overhead cost, because training costs money.
Don't tell every single employee (especially if you're hiring a pile of them at once) that if they discuss their wages with each other, they'll be fired. There's always some wiseass who knows that that shit is against the freakin' law and will make sure that everyone else knows it when they're grousing to each other about it. Because as soon as you say something like "If you talk about this, you're canned", they're gonna talk about it. Because then, once they know that you can't really follow up on that threat, they're not only going to hate you for lying to them right at the start of the relationship, but they're also going to think that every other threat is just as hollow, and possibly just as illegal.
If you say you're going to do something, you do it. End of line.
When you lose a vital employee, you need to replace them as soon as possible. Otherwise, the person who winds up taking up all the former employee's tasks on top of his own is going to be forgetting, ignoring, and just screwing up *both* sets of tasks, to the detriment of your company.
If you had a company dinner last year, you'd better have one this year. People talk. We all know. Cough up.
Communication is key. If your staff is ignored or lied to, they are going to start either doing things their way or just quitting like mad.
Return the damn phone call already. Also, if somebody leaves you a voice mail, listen to it *before* you call them back. Otherwise, you've wasted their time, and they hate that.
Protection of one's investment means longer life for that investment. It may cost you a little something, but it's worth it in the long run. You may even be able to make some money from it.
Buying cheap is vastly different from buying wise. A bargain isn't a bargain if it sucks, breaks quickly, or is already broken when you get it.
Do not open a satellite operation in a location that you are not prepared to support just as much as the rest of your locations. This inattention looks bad for the whole company. That one slummy McDonald's taints the name of the whole company.
If you present interesting questions/problems to your employees, they might surprise you with their solutions.
There's always going to be slackers in every bunch.
There's always going to be a thinker in every bunch.
That thinker will adore you and be more loyal than a Rottweiler if you let them use their brains to your advantage.
However, I've also heard that it's not WHAT you know, it's WHO you know. Well, let me tell you who I know.
I know a 32 year-old man who is an incredibly smart Systems Admin with eight years of real experience in the field. He's stuck killing himself looking for a job, and it's being made more difficult by those who just put "MCSE Required" in the requirements because, as one recruiter told him, "Well, they want to make sure that they get somebody who knows what they're doing." I guess that eight years of experience means that he hasn't a clue what he's doing as long as he's not waving an MCSE. (Now you MCSE people just chill out. I'm not ragging you. I'm ragging on those who would completely refuse to entertain the idea of interviewing somebody without one. You probably know more than one person who got that certification who just managed to take the test really well but still doesn't know what they're doing.)
I know a 22 year-old female who was working for some franchisees of a major ice-cream chain. She started as part-time. Worked her way up to cake decorator, shift manager, and then store manager. In two months. All she got for her troubles was a $0.75 raise. She went in at all hours, on no notice, and worked every single station in the store. In the contract she signed, it mandated a certain amount of pay per hour, and it was way more than she was actually getting, but she kept getting the run-around about when she'd get it. She finally told them that it was alright, they didn't have to give her a raise. She'd even take a cut in pay, she just wanted to step down and return to regular old ice-cream slinger. She was fired. Then, they suddenly wanted to meet with her to discuss it. She said "forget it, I already got another job". They played like they were all hurt, when they threw her away pre-emptively. Now they've got a 17 year-old doing the same stuff she was, and making even less money, and about to quit.
I know a 29 year-old IT Director who is brilliant beyond belief. He, too, is miserable in his job. He is having difficulty finding a new position even though he's got the kind of brain that's so smart it's scary.
I know a 30 year-old retail manager who is filled with ideas, crammed with logic, overworked, underpaid, and yet still busting her ass trying to do *something* constructive with a store that her company seems intent on killing off. She's got a work ethic that verges on Puritan, a real connection with her customers, and not only a hunger for knowlege but a great eye for what will sell, and yet she is being ignored.
Who are you? Tell me your story. Nobody else is listening, but I will. If you're downtrodden from work, I wanna know. If you're looking for a few good employees, I wanna know. This ain't Monster, but it could be something. A resource that's off the beaten path, if you will.
Are there any CEO's out there? Business owners? Grand Poobahs? I doubt it, but if there are, I have some words of advice for you. Pay attention.
Start listening to your employees.
We know more than you think.
We think more than you know.
Thank you. This has been a public service announcement.