Stupid Manager

Those of you that know me, know I am old. The term is "old foggy" I think. Being old, sometimes I think I've seen it all. Sometimes I hope I've seen it all, then I am brought back to reality.

Here is what happened - again. I know a person hired into a company about seven or so years ago. This person has a superior education background as well as a good work history. The person was promoted from menial engineering assignments through the ranks to achieve a VP level in the company. At each step or phase in the career, the results are amazing. 30%, 45% improvements in productivity, profits up, people working for this person are productive and happy, growth is managed at 25% per year.

Consequently the company was doing well.

Never in six years did the boss ever say thank you for a job well done. Yes, there were merit increases and the 'golden handcuffs' were snapped in place. If something in a department managed went a bit off, all hell would break loose. The boss would proclaim this person stupid, lazy, not focused enough, not diligent enough, etc. I can attest no comment was ever true.

As the company grew, a legion of VP's  in Sales, Marketing, Office Administration, IT,  Operations Management et al were hired along with their requested assistants, office mini kingdoms, cars, country clubs, travel first class, premier hotels, etc. In the area of this manufacturing person's responsibility, no one was hired. No one was needed. Sales, Marketing, Finance grew exponentially while manufacturing continued their productivity improvements and yielded the profits.

With the downturn, came the cuts. And, as usual, manufacturing took most all the cuts. Sales, Marketing, and Finance headcount continued as nothing had happened. Had Sales and Marketing managers been doing their jobs, there would have been no downturn for that company. Overhead had grown, sales were down, consequently profits vanished. The Manufacturing people were given Hell for it. It was not their fault. This old axiom states, "You can never cut costs fast enough to achieve a permanent quick return to  profit." That should have been known by anyone with any intelligence.

Every time a company does not make it's numbers, the first action taken to fix the company's profits is to cut personnel. It is seldom the personnel being cut are the fault that stupid over paid managers made dumb mistakes. God forbid they should be fired.

Cuts were mandated again and manufacturing was to take another hit. The VP would be put back into production supervision and the staff in manufacturing including experienced techs, engineers, and managers would be laid off.

With that pronouncement, this person's will to see the company succeed and grow - ended. The spark simply died, never to return to this excellent manager at this company.

Still employed? Yep! But, rather then focus on new better, faster and more efficient methods for manufacturing in this company, the day is spent on networking, polishing a resume, researching other companies, etc.

The stupidity and lack of management skills killed another great, profitable employee. Now the cubicle is filled with another warm body, another hundred thousand of overhead that is mentally unable to give anymore to the company because of the stupid management's inability to say "Thank you!", or "Great job!"

This is another company that needs a good house cleaning from the top down. But, I would think it too late. I think with this persons departure at some point coupled with the other really dumb managers remaining, this once great company will be another footnote in manufacturing history soon.