Ranting Rex

I was thinking the other day, that if someone in a company thinks they need to layoff a group of people then the person making the decision to do the layoff has to meet the person and the family of the person, they’re laying off face to face. This might be pretty difficult in some situations, I realize, but I bet you would have a lot fewer layoffs if the individual knew they would have to tell you and your family to your faces. If they had to face the family members of the lives they’re about to ruin, I would imagine things would be a bit different than they are right now.

It used to be, back in the old days, that companies became successful by being beholden to their customers, and their workers. Now it seems that they are beholden to their stockholders, and to hell with everyone else. The problem I have with that mindset is that when you forget the customer, and you forget the worker, then you’ve pretty much eliminated the reason to be in business in the first place. How in the world does a company expect to make money if they don’t make anything, or don’t provide a service?

I’m not saying our recent economic problems are anything new. We’ve had problems like this throughout history. However, what I think is recent, is the dot com attitude that if you create vaporware, then you can get rich without actually doing anything. There are some of you that won’t understand that comment, but what I’m getting at is that there were hundreds of companies in the 1990s that were making millions in investment dollars, and never made, or sold a product. I’m really wondering if some of the executives who came out of that era in the 90s aren’t still trying to run their businesses that way.

What appears to be the M.O. of most companies is to see how much they can skim off the top without having to actually do any more work. These companies don’t try to look for better ways of doing things. There’s no massive strategy. There’s no real plan. They just look at a set of numbers and say “If we can reduce our payroll by 30%, well then we have increased our profits by 30%.” But that’s never the case…and I mean never. If you look at a set of numbers on a spreadsheet, and you decide to make a decision in whole on those numbers, then you deserve to get what you don’t pay for. It never works out that when you let someone go that you instantly reap an economic benefit. Someone still has to do the work, or the work doesn’t get done. If the work doesn’t get done, then you can’t sell your product. If you can’t sell your product, then you don’t make money. It’s that simple.

Many companies have decided that to make money, they need to ship jobs offshore. This is even after other companies have tried this over the last decade, only to ship jobs back to the U.S. The most noticeable are customer service jobs. There was a time when you called customer support, and you didn’t understand a word the person said. Now they are moving these jobs back because they found that 1). It really didn’t save them what they thought. Sure the labor cost is lower, but the cost of doing business in two countries erased any benefit, and 2). They lost customers.

The other jobs that were being shipped overseas were manufacturing. It’s just recently that these jobs are starting to come back. Let’s face it…you can’t sell toys with led paint. Companies found that products didn’t meet any quality standards, and they had to spend three or four times as much money as they did before, for the same product. It turned out that the cheap Chinese and Indian labor didn’t really pan out all that well. They removed any profit because they had to ship things back and forth to get them fixed, or they had to hire someone here to fix them anyway.

It is true…you get what you pay for. I like to work on houses, so my favorite example is this. You can buy a of paint brush for $4.99, but if you pay $25.00 for a brush, you will spend less on the paint. Sure…you your brush for 20% less than I did, but you still didn’t get the job done with that brush. And, you wasted hours, and a lot of paint to figure out that the crappy brush you bought, just ruined the wall you were trying to paint. So now you have to go spend another $50.00 on a gallon of paint, and still buy the good brush to cover up what you did when you tried to save $15.00. So…how much did you save?

I think shipping jobs overseas is un-American. If there is anything that we can all agree upon, I think it just might be that. With all the rhetoric of people pointing fingers at others and calling them un-American, from politicians, to pundits, I think one thing we should all agree upon, is that if you run a business in this country, and you think that putting Americans out of work to add another nickel to your pocket is a good decision, then you are no better than the people who flew planes into the twin towers. It might not kill as quickly, but like cancer, it’s just as deadly, and I would guess, that it ruins more lives than any terrorist we will ever encounter.

The continuing stream of political nut jobs that are coming out of the woodwork is starting to frighten me. It used to be that the crazies stood at the fringes of the political spectrum. Left and right wing extremists, conspiracy theorists, and the like would tout theories no one listened to, and news agencies had the good sense not to quote them, at least not any paper other than the Inquirer.

Now it seems that the nuts have taken center ring! And to keep their time on the TV, political pundits like Newt Gingrich are going to the crazy to keep up. Gingrich is now saying more investigation is needed into the socialist Muslim background of Barrack Obama. This is right up there with thinking that Bush planned 9-11 to help Cheney boost his stock portfolio.

The birthers have now given up on whether Obama was born in Hawaii. Now they’re saying that Hawaii is not legally a state. If that’s the case then neither is Alaska, so could you please take Sarah Palin back with you?

That’s not to say that the left doesn’t have their share of nut jobs. I mentioned 9-11 earlier, but there’s still more. We have the people that burn down buildings in a forest to prevent forest fires. I especially like the people who protest the World Bank because they think they’re killing poor people. I guess it doesn’t matter that the World Bank does more for peace and world hunger than any other single institution in the world.

In a time when Sarah Palin appears moderate to Christine O’Donnell, you have to ask yourself where the world is going. Sarah might think she can see Russia from her house, but O’Donnell sees mice with human brains (see http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/09/odonnell-mice-human-brains/ I’m not making this up). Can someone please check the medicine cabinet to see if this person is taking her medication?

Our economy sucks. That had nothing to do with the current administration. People attacked us. That had nothing to do with the last administration.

I long for the days when the worst thing we had to think about was if Clinton lied about sex. I mean, can anyone deny that the world was a better place when he was President? I’m just sayin…if we can get Bill elected again, I’ll pay for the hooker.

Being completely screwed is rather liberating. It provides you with a perspective on life that you didn’t have before you were screwed. For example, when you weren’t screwed, you didn’t know you had all these opportunities before you. It’s rather nice actually.

When you’re 18 and just out of high school, you have no idea of what the world has to offer. All you know is that your parents want you out of the house, and you have to prepare for four more years of education, or get a job, or both. Add onto that the raging hormones and the lack of insight, and the world can seem pretty daunting. However, when you’re completely screwed at 45, you don’t have those problems. You’ve seen the world. You know how it all works. What’s usually blocking you is not the lack of opportunity, but a lack of motivation. By this point in life, most people want to rest on their laurels, and glide through until retirement. You also have to often deal with individuals who think that’s all you want to do as well. For some reason, people in their 20s think people in their 40s have one foot in the grave. Oh how little they know.

At 45 I’m smarter, more patient, open minded, and far more insightful than any 18 year old. I’m also a better friend, a better worker, and a much better lover, having the capacity to focus more on the needs of others than I do on my own. At 45, your focus changes, where you find it far more pleasing personally to see others around you satisfied than being satisfied yourself. I assure you…you don’t get that from a teenager.

So with my current job coming to an end, I look out before me at the many opportunities life has to offer. It’s amazing that with all these choices, it’s difficult to focus on just one. I have no idea what the world has in store, but I do know that I have the knowledge, and the perseverance to deal with whatever might be. In a lot of ways, I’ve gotten that wish where, “if I only knew then, what I know now.” Well…I do know it now, and I have the same opportunities I had then. And I plan on taking full advantage of those opportunities as they come up.

I feel young again! I feel the same as I did when I first set out to conquer the world at 18. I’m strong, I’m virile, I’m randy, and I’m ready. There’s no stopping me now!

Just tell me where the bus stop is, and I’m out the door!

Rex

OK…I don’t understand corporate America. The institution defies logic. The following is just one example:

When I first started working, I was a “temp” employee at Blue Cross of Iowa. I was supposed to be there one day. The reason I got the job, was that some idiot who picked up insurance documents to take them to the shredder, had left the back door open to their truck while driving down a major highway. The ensuing paper storm caused another type of storm, requiring executives from the company to be out on Fleur Drive in Des Moines, Iowa picking up confidential claim information that had burst onto the streets.

Evidently, the next day, said Executive Management demanded that lower management get someone to box all that shred paper, so that this would never happen again. Understandably, they didn’t want a person’s private medical information floating on the wind across the city. Obviously, this would be a huge liability problem for them.

The result of this ordeal gave me a job. However, I was there about two hours when I had a brain storm. Yes…they could spend the $320.00 a week to the temp agency (I was getting $170.00) to have me pick up and box all this paper…OR….they could just close the back of the damn truck. I know I was just the guy boxing the shred, but hey…it seemed logical to me. I brought this up to my employer once removed (AKA…the client Blue Cross), but they said that management wanted to box the shred, so they would box the shred. It occurred to me, even at the very tender age of 18, that this was a bad decision. If all you had to do was close the door, why would you waste $320.00 a week just so you didn’t have to close the door?

However, this is how decisions are made. Someone at the top sees what they perceive is a problem, and someone at the bottom follows the order, and no one with any common sense stops them. Not that I was complaining about having a job. I needed the work. After two years they finally did hire me full-time, and I only boxed shred paper for a few weeks. However, it took another 15 years (5 years after I left), before someone in management said, “We’re paying someone to box shred paper? What idiot thought that up? Why not just shut the door on the damn truck?!” It would not surprise me if the person that said that, once had to box the shred paper. If you’re doing the math, that means that Blue Cross spent (factoring in just a 3% increase in cost over 15 years), $49,880.00 to not shut the door.

Anyway, when I see some of the decisions U.S. companies make in an effort to save their asses, I’m often reminded of my time boxing shred paper. I’m reminded that people blindly follow managers without any consideration that the decisions might be wrong. No one stands up, and says “No, that’s not a good idea, and this is why.” No one points out the failed logic, and no one considers that the decisions they make and the decisions they accept might have ramifications that go far beyond their office door.

So if you’re in management, and the next time your bosses make a decision that you think is ridiculous, and you don’t point it out, don’t be surprised when you have to pack your desk. Your job will just be another loss in a litany of bad decisions. And in my opinion…you deserve to be unemployed.

Anyone who makes you enter or exit the building from a different entrance than customers or management.
When I was younger, I once worked for a Country Kitchen, and was chastised for entering through the front door. “That’s for customers’ only, we have to maintain a level of service, and that means using the employee entrance” my boss said. My response: Um…you do realize that this is a ‘Country Kitchen…right?’” I was only there a month.

Any company where the boss has better facilities than you do.
When I first started working for Blue Cross of Iowa in the early 80s, we tried like hell to get a weight room, or some type of shower facility so we could work out at lunch. We were shot down by Sr. Management, repeatedly. Then not too long after that I found out that all 10 of the execs had their own private bathrooms with shower facilities. And the Sr. VP, and President had full wet bars. This is why I’m not surprised when I hear about $16,000 umbrella stands.

Any company that tells you that you can’t have a tattoo earring, etc.
I love this one! I don’t wear them anymore, but I once took a part time job at a sporting goods store, just to get me out of the house. I have a tendency to become a hermit, if permitted. After about a week in training, they told me I had to take my ear-rings out. I didn’t get this at all, especially since 99% of the clientele were in no way qualified to provide fashion advice. How anyone would think, in the last 30 years, that someone would be offended by a piercing is beyond comprehension. If company pays me less than my real job takes out in payroll taxes, I’m sorry…they can’t offer fashion advice.

Any company that requires you to refer to your boss as Mr., Ms., Miss, or Mrs.

When I was still living in Iowa, I had to work at Sears part-time to make ends meet. We were supposed to refer to the store manager as Mr. Whateverhisnamewas. I called him by his first name once, and was taken to task by my supervisor. She was shocked when I laughed in her face. I once worked under Governor Robert D. Ray. I called him Bob. I wasn’t ABOUT to call this asshole Mr., anything. There is an exception, however. I think doctors who work in hospitals should be called Doctor. I only make this exception because the last time I was in the hospital I had no idea who was working, and who was just taking up space…i.e…the Doctor.