The Purpose of Rantings
Sometimes you find yourself in the position of needing to rant about the stupidity done at work. If you rant and rave while at work, you are often labelled as a "nay sayer," a curmudgeon, or a disloyal employee. However, I have found that most of my bosses, including the executives for whom I have worked, do some pretty stupid things.
I honestly feel that most businesses would run more efficiently if the bosses would stop and listen to their employees more often. More often than not, most bosses can't get beyond their own egos or their lack of a backbone to stand up to corporate hotshots and say, "No, that isn't an effective way to resolve the issues at hand."
Truly, there are more laws breached and more crimes committed in the name of corporate blunder that crimes on the street. A good example is a company for whom I worked as a national manager. I was assigned to review and make recommendations for a building security project that involved over 300 buildings nationwide. The software and hardware being proposed fo the security system was already installed in a building within my local market. In theory, a simple update of the software and installation via the corporate VPN was all that was required. However, upon careful examination of the project, the existing systems and hardware, and research of the OEM, I found that the project was fiscally and technically unsound.
I wrote a four-paged memo to my boss, an executive VP in the top ten executive positions in the company, detailing how this software was not fully debugged; how there were numerous existing customers that complained about the lack of technical and product support; and how much the project would really cost.
The initial project--a startup project--was to be implemented. Despite my protests, my boss, a longtime friend, put me in charge of the initial project. I was given a budget of $14,000 and 3 weeks in which to implement the project. I immediately whipped off a memo detailing how the project would require at least $40,000 and 8 weeks to implement. My boss began raking me over the coals for being disloyal to him and inefficient in my duties and tasks.
The initial project finished in 7.5 weeks and cost $38,000 to implement. Each of the issues that I raised in my two previous memos were realized. Of course, I kept my boss in the loop on a daily basis. Despite the obvious failings of the software and the underestimates of costs and time, my boss insisted that I take over the entire project. I begged him, on the basis of our long-term friendship, to let me off the hook since he was insisting that we stick with the software and OEM vendor. No such luck.
I was given a budget of $1.2 million. I protested. The budget was limited to that amount. Again memos and e-mails went back and forth. I documented every detail BEFORE it was set into motion as to why it would cost over $10 million to do the job with the selected software, OEM vendor, and the contractors in place. I worked on the project for over 14 months. The project incurred expenses over $11 million in the first 10 months. When I left the company, the project was still no where near complete, there were numerous technical failures, and numerous cost and job estimate overruns (all of which had been fore warned in my memos) that rose to over $15 million.
Seven months after leaving the company, a colleague of mine who had been assigned to take over shared with me that the project was in the red to the tune of $27 million and still did not work properly after two years of implementation.
The long and short of it is the company is now in serious bankruptcy and my stock investments are worth about 69 cents a share. The CEO is going to leave the comapny with a generous golden parachute (despite driving the business into Chapter 11), my former boss and I are no longer on friendly terms, and the project STILL isn't working properly some 4 years later.
Why do bosses hire people for their expertise and experience, then ignore them when they provide solid information and advice?
This BLOG is for intelligent working people to come together and share their working stories about bosses, policies and practices that don't make much sense. Hopefully, the rantings will be of a sound nature and the person doing the ranting will have a safe place to let it out... and not be fearful of who is listening. The rules are simple...
No names please... no names of comapnies, bosses or colleagues. Use pseudonyms or job titles. First names would be acceptable providing the name is not one of those really rare and unique things that would identify the person simply by a process of eliminating everyone without that name.
No swearing, cursing or other vulgarities. An intelligent person can make the point without such crudeness.
No ad hominem attacks toward other postings or posters. Constructive advice is welcomed, but name calling, attacking or unwelcomed criticism of other members of the blog are not permitted.
Rant away.
I honestly feel that most businesses would run more efficiently if the bosses would stop and listen to their employees more often. More often than not, most bosses can't get beyond their own egos or their lack of a backbone to stand up to corporate hotshots and say, "No, that isn't an effective way to resolve the issues at hand."
Truly, there are more laws breached and more crimes committed in the name of corporate blunder that crimes on the street. A good example is a company for whom I worked as a national manager. I was assigned to review and make recommendations for a building security project that involved over 300 buildings nationwide. The software and hardware being proposed fo the security system was already installed in a building within my local market. In theory, a simple update of the software and installation via the corporate VPN was all that was required. However, upon careful examination of the project, the existing systems and hardware, and research of the OEM, I found that the project was fiscally and technically unsound.
I wrote a four-paged memo to my boss, an executive VP in the top ten executive positions in the company, detailing how this software was not fully debugged; how there were numerous existing customers that complained about the lack of technical and product support; and how much the project would really cost.
The initial project--a startup project--was to be implemented. Despite my protests, my boss, a longtime friend, put me in charge of the initial project. I was given a budget of $14,000 and 3 weeks in which to implement the project. I immediately whipped off a memo detailing how the project would require at least $40,000 and 8 weeks to implement. My boss began raking me over the coals for being disloyal to him and inefficient in my duties and tasks.
The initial project finished in 7.5 weeks and cost $38,000 to implement. Each of the issues that I raised in my two previous memos were realized. Of course, I kept my boss in the loop on a daily basis. Despite the obvious failings of the software and the underestimates of costs and time, my boss insisted that I take over the entire project. I begged him, on the basis of our long-term friendship, to let me off the hook since he was insisting that we stick with the software and OEM vendor. No such luck.
I was given a budget of $1.2 million. I protested. The budget was limited to that amount. Again memos and e-mails went back and forth. I documented every detail BEFORE it was set into motion as to why it would cost over $10 million to do the job with the selected software, OEM vendor, and the contractors in place. I worked on the project for over 14 months. The project incurred expenses over $11 million in the first 10 months. When I left the company, the project was still no where near complete, there were numerous technical failures, and numerous cost and job estimate overruns (all of which had been fore warned in my memos) that rose to over $15 million.
Seven months after leaving the company, a colleague of mine who had been assigned to take over shared with me that the project was in the red to the tune of $27 million and still did not work properly after two years of implementation.
The long and short of it is the company is now in serious bankruptcy and my stock investments are worth about 69 cents a share. The CEO is going to leave the comapny with a generous golden parachute (despite driving the business into Chapter 11), my former boss and I are no longer on friendly terms, and the project STILL isn't working properly some 4 years later.
Why do bosses hire people for their expertise and experience, then ignore them when they provide solid information and advice?
This BLOG is for intelligent working people to come together and share their working stories about bosses, policies and practices that don't make much sense. Hopefully, the rantings will be of a sound nature and the person doing the ranting will have a safe place to let it out... and not be fearful of who is listening. The rules are simple...
No names please... no names of comapnies, bosses or colleagues. Use pseudonyms or job titles. First names would be acceptable providing the name is not one of those really rare and unique things that would identify the person simply by a process of eliminating everyone without that name.
No swearing, cursing or other vulgarities. An intelligent person can make the point without such crudeness.
No ad hominem attacks toward other postings or posters. Constructive advice is welcomed, but name calling, attacking or unwelcomed criticism of other members of the blog are not permitted.
Rant away.
posted by Jim Downey at 9:16 PM
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