When I was a Service Manager at Cintas, and even when I was starting out as an Assistant Manager at Wells Fargo Financial, I was always told I had to be "tough". That I had to make those hard decisions and fire people even when I thought it was wrong. Why? I didn't understand why it was bad for me to disagree with my manager regarding hiring and firing. I wasn't in the armed forces and I didn't need to obey direct orders. I just didn't get it. Why couldn't I disagree with a decision about someone's future? Maybe that's why I don't play well in the corporate environment. There's too much machismo for my taste.
I'll give you an example. Recently, I heard that a District Manager with a healthcare company for 35 years was being let go, just 2 years from retirement. 2 years from retirement! WTF?!!!! What type of message does that send to your people? And is the person who made that decision really "tough"?
35 years in sales for the same company nowadays is unheard of, but to let a person go just 2 years from retirement is ridiculously stupid. And some of you members of the Jerkstore Management Team might actually defend the firing of a 35 year veteran:
"Same standards for everybody. No one gets a pass."
My response, "You're a moron. If he's been performing for 35 years and has one bad year, he'll figure it out the next year. He's been doing it for a long time, he knows the consequences. He's in sales."
The Jerkstore MT response, "We're paid for performance. Not for tenure."
My response, "Absolutely, and he's been performing for 35 years so again, he'll figure it out."
What the Jerkstore MT doesn't understand is that this message tells all your up and coming young people that no matter how loyal you are, and no matter how hard you work, that the company doesn't give a damn. I asked a friend who works at the company exactly who fired this 35 year veteran, and sure enough it was a Regional Manager with less than 2 years on the job. Not only that, my friend told me she got the position because she was the BFF of the Vice President. In addition, I was told that the VP said of this regional manager, "she's got bigger balls than most of the guys on my team. No one else had the guts to fire him."
What a surprise...not. Too often VP's promote someone who they think is exactly like them, and then they mold them to be little foot soldiers. However, this only breeds monotony, stifles creativity and ensures resentment from those people who aren't in the "club". Apparently it also creates a woman with big balls? What does that even mean?
Personally the only big balls I want to see are beach balls, and I definitely don't want to see big balls in the conference room. Leave that machismo stuff out of the office.
-SFTD
