The Best Companies to Work For ... For Now
Copyright © 2009 By Ethan A. Winning
When I was with Wells Fargo many many years ago, there was an unwritten rule that supervisors should not fraternize with subordinates. That's not to say they should not associate with them, but not on a social basis. It may have been taken from the age-old U.S. Army's own regulation, or it could have just been adopted because of the possibility of supervisors dating subordinates which almost always led to problems with performance evaluations and/or the perceptions of others. In actuality, I think it existed because such fraternization, like familiarity, bred contempt. (If you've never heard the saying, "Familiarity breeds contempt," then you're much, much younger than I who came from a family of quoters.)
Succinctly, what this means is that the more you know something or someone, the more you start to find faults and dislike things them. Maybe that's why "it's lonely at the top" since the top don't associates with the bottom.
I wrote about this some 20 years ago, and while most of you would disagree today, believe me when I tell you that the principle still exists, it's just not spoken or printed.
This is why when I see a program or read about the 15 best companies to work for (or 100 or 50 as three articles recently published ranked them), I am at best skeptical. Well, it's not just because of the thought that senior management has no idea who's at the bottom or even middle in larger corporations. It IS because a list of 50 that was published by Fortune ten years ago has fewer than five still on the list. The rest have disappeared either because of bad management (my assessment), poor sales, a change in management and style (no more carrots and humus delivered to your desk as a snack or foosball tables in the lobby, always a favorite), or that the stock is now selling at 92¢ when it was $74 this time last year.
Honestly, if you will go to a list that is five or ten years old, you'll be lucky to find one or two of the same companies mentioned, especially of the established larger companies. The bigger they get, the harder they fall, and the faster they disappear from such lists.
One of the characteristics of such companies, i.e., the ones who disappeared, is that they are and remained bureaucratic with layer upon layer which weighed down those who do the work, are the most creative, and who get little credit. Another characteristic is that there is the implied rule that you, all of you except the very top, should be part of the corporate culture meaning that you should share all things related to your interests, your family, and just about everything than doesn't have to do with politics, religion, or war. But what if you are the type of individual who is circumspect about personal matters, and who works better as an individual than as part of a group, also known as "a team?" You become an outcast which may please you in some ways, but don't expect the salary increases or promotions. You're not one of the team. You don't work well with others even if you do.
If you've seen my performance appraisals, you won't find "Gets Along Well With Others" as a criterion. You will find, "Gains Cooperation From Others" and on some of my forms, you'll actually see, "Can Work On His or Her Own." I didn't care - nor should management - whether you play well with others or run with scissors. I want someone who can work on his own and who doesn't bother me with every minor issue that comes up. I want someone who's willing and hopefully able to make decisions and take action without being so creative that she or he cooks the books creatively.
I recently talked with a CEO who said that she tried to keep up with all of her employees, 85 of them, but it was relatively soon in the company's development and growth that she realized it couldn't be done. She made certain that all employees could see her if there was a serious problem, i.e., a problem with a supervisor or even HR, and she made certain that all the benefits that the company could afford were given to all employees. What she found was that middle and upper middle managers started to set up their own hierarchy, and kept certain people out of the loop who should have been in the loop. In fact, many of the individuals kept out of the loop were the more innovative people in the company. It was as though she were running a biotech company and the scientists who developed the balms or "cures" had no way of getting credit and sometimes couldn't even get the news up the ladder.
In the years I was an employee in a company, I can't tell you how often credit for an idea was taken by the manager rather than being given to the employee. You got promoted on how well you played the game, not on how well you did your job (and sometimes your manager's job). Managers played golf together (or in banking, dominoes) and became "a club" unto themselves.
It was less than a month ago that a manager complained that one of his subordinates didn't even have pictures of his wife and kids in his cubicle. Why does that bother you, I asked, and he told me that an employee who did not personalize his cubicle was purposely placing himself apart from the team and was not part of the team. When I then asked if he was doing his job, the answer was yes, but "he's not seen as one of us." And then I actually saw the manager taking credit for an idea this individualist came up with, an idea that the manager wasn't even capable of explaining without asking the employee.
I reported - as is my job as the company's management consultant - this to the president, and I was told that the president couldn't be involved in every such problem, and that that should go through HR. The problem is that, in order to get that problem to HR, the employee had to get permission from his manager. I kid you not! I know of four huge companies with this same inane system.
Individuality is not appreciated in large companies. My experience is that it exists and is rewarded most often in smaller businesses, with some rules, but the rules are meant to foster creativity or working alone so long as the individual ultimately shares with the group or department. Invariably, one of the rules that goes to managers is that the individual gets to put his or her name on the idea/blueprint/memo whatever so that we can actually give credit and raises and promotions where they are due. But another caveat is that not all individualists are capable of being managers and, since we no longer train managers, we have to have room for people working by themselves and we have to have some parameters for them and the way they communicate to more senior people.
Where does this work? Actually, it it wasn't part of the corporate culture already, then it will certainly work in engineering, tech, biotech, labs, and I'm sure other places I haven't thought of. Speaking personally, I've always worked best on my own. Leave me alone and I'll get the job done and come up with some rather unique and productive management systems. Keep bothering me and I'll start my own company. Oh, wait. That's how I got here. That's why my doctor started a boutique practice. That's why my old vet went off on his own. If nothing else, poor management in those best companies to work for generate our next group of entrepreneurs. Too bad we're in a recession, and the potential is sucked out of those with potential.
Copyright © 2009 by Ethan A. Winning. All rights reserved.