It’s easy to get lost in your job. You spend all day with people all day that are chosen for you and perform tasks that you may or may not feel are worthwhile efforts. Anything that you do for most of your waking hours has got to take a toll on how you think, act and interact with the world. But is it you?
Perspective is hard to have when you only get to see one side of an issue. Since I had left (thank goodness I was able to) the regular working life, I’ve been able to gain some “perspective” on work, my last position and what was occurring where I had worked.
There are people that are self destructive, but have you seen this in a company? It’s not so much the “company” but the people that make up the company, with each thinking they are doing the right thing, but each in their own way, chipping away are respect, trustworthiness, all the while moving further and further away from “success” and closer to a failure cliff.
When I was making my own plans for escape (I had my own long term plans), I could start seeing the failures in culture, planning and direction that had formed deep roots in the company. Here are just some of the seeds of destructions.
When HR becomes a common concern for all employees. This comes in the form of overly difficult “Goals” for staff, “Other” tasks and duties required at the behest of HR (other than basic training requirements) and blanket overrides of managers by HR. When HR becomes a second manager over all staff, it’s a indication that something is wrong at the top. This type of culture is derived from the top, so the CEO would know and does not trust employees in the company. This is a concern.
When product direction is not based on what the customers needs are but what individual management personal goals are, this can be an issue. Most companies are lean and can not be experts in all areas of technology and the companies I’ve worked for are no exception. The different is when “Moon Shot” directions are envisioned (or even existing technology is ignored) with using shoestring technology and staff that no-experience in the selected area. All the while ignoring “human” needs of the customer for what solutions they are looking for. Examples of this are : We can just add AI into our product and it will be great. Or we’ll just write code to provide everything all the time for our customers (kind of nondescript product planning) just with our existing technology.
When management levels (at all levels) can make business decisions but can’t quite make any personal decisions so staff never really know internal policy on important topics.
I could go on and on, but these are signs of major problems. Companies don’t turn on a dine, but over years the course a company takes will appear in market share, being sold, resold, etc. and in social media (glass door, etc) as indirect information leak out about unhealthy conditions.
It’s OK for a company to just be OK, but it’s another thing for a company to decompose from the inside. It will have processes to adjust and fight the cancer but until major medical intervention occurs, it will continue in poor health and customers will notice.
This is where the private equity firms come in to fest. Too bad there aren’t better company doctors to help instead.
There are people that are self destructive, but have you seen this in a company? It’s not so much the “company” but the people that make up the company, with each thinking they are doing the right thing, but each in their own way, chipping away are respect, trustworthiness, all the while moving further and further away from “success” and closer to a failure cliff.
When I was making my own plans for escape (I had my own long term plans), I could start seeing the failures in culture, planning and direction that had formed deep roots in the company. Here are just some of the seeds of destructions.
When HR becomes a common concern for all employees. This comes in the form of overly difficult “Goals” for staff, “Other” tasks and duties required at the behest of HR (other than basic training requirements) and blanket overrides of managers by HR. When HR becomes a second manager over all staff, it’s a indication that something is wrong at the top. This type of culture is derived from the top, so the CEO would know and does not trust employees in the company. This is a concern.
When product direction is not based on what the customers needs are but what individual management personal goals are, this can be an issue. Most companies are lean and can not be experts in all areas of technology and the companies I’ve worked for are no exception. The different is when “Moon Shot” directions are envisioned (or even existing technology is ignored) with using shoestring technology and staff that no-experience in the selected area. All the while ignoring “human” needs of the customer for what solutions they are looking for. Examples of this are : We can just add AI into our product and it will be great. Or we’ll just write code to provide everything all the time for our customers (kind of nondescript product planning) just with our existing technology.
When management levels (at all levels) can make business decisions but can’t quite make any personal decisions so staff never really know internal policy on important topics.
I could go on and on, but these are signs of major problems. Companies don’t turn on a dine, but over years the course a company takes will appear in market share, being sold, resold, etc. and in social media (glass door, etc) as indirect information leak out about unhealthy conditions.
It’s OK for a company to just be OK, but it’s another thing for a company to decompose from the inside. It will have processes to adjust and fight the cancer but until major medical intervention occurs, it will continue in poor health and customers will notice.
This is where the private equity firms come in to fest. Too bad there aren’t better company doctors to help instead.
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