Stupid ideas our companies came up with

[ls99]

Had a short stint at a Radio Paging company. They required everyone to use personal credit cards for running expenses, then submit them for approval. They only cut checks once a month.

About three months along my em*loyment the company's owner sent around a news letter showing his new Porsche at his mansion. Wise guy that I am, sent an email to corporate explaining that I too could be filthy rich if all my emloyees carried the company debts for 45 days on average.

They did not like my comment.

Then a "team building" trip was organized to Florida. Complete with a visit to the Motorola pager factory, some coerced Motorola employees to keep us entertained at dinner. etc. The time was scheduled from 0600 to 2200. For three days.

Upon returning to home base a survey was posted regarding the team trip. I wrote that since all waking hours were scheduled with required presence, could have held it in Siberia. They did not like that either.

Shortly thereafter I found more satisfying ways to make a buck.

 

[FinanceDude]

True story............one of my first jobs after college was to be the planning assistant in the planning department, reporting to the VP of Planning. I was the 2nd person hired after the VP of Planning..........

What did we plan? Corporate events like golf outings, vendor fairs, trade association meetings, etc. We also had a travel department, but they were in a different city and state, and we were not linked at all computer wise..........

 

[scrabbler1]

I never understood the A-B-C rating system which included quotas, particularly for the C-rated people.

What happened at my former company was that the Cees would get crummy or no raises and usually leave the company. Okay, I can understand that. What I felt was unfair was that people who were otherwise satisfactory workers but in the lower part of the Bee range would become the new Cees even though their job performance did not worsen. Their only "crime" to get the dreaded Cee was to have someone worse than them resign and create a new opening for a Cee.

 

[Alan]

I never understood the A-B-C rating system which included quotas, particularly for the C-rated people.

What happened at my former company was that the Cees would get crummy or no raises and usually leave the company. Okay, I can understand that. What I felt was unfair was that people who were otherwise satisfactory workers but in the lower part of the Bee range would become the new Cees even though their job performance did not worsen. Their only "crime" to get the dreaded Cee was to have someone worse than them resign and create a new opening for a Cee.

Exactly. We had wave after wave of cutbacks and lay-offs so that we were running with minimal staff but by corporate law we still had to apply the bell curve on appraisals and p-off some really hard working folks.

 

[donheff]

Another great scheme that was in place for many years, including when I left, was the policy set by the Corporate Legal Department that computer back-up tapes could only be used for true catastrophes. (There was a good financial reason for this.)

Over the years we had multiple occasions where really important data was lost forever because if a server crashed and all the disks wiped out, or the database of an important application became corrupted, then recovery from back-up tapes was not allowed since a catastrophe is defined as a fire, or hurricane or flood etc.

That is one of the craziest things I have ever heard. Once burned, twice learned. After that heads should have rolled. Good financial reasons my butt. Is the company out of business yet?

 

[Alan]

That's a stupid policy, who set that?

In 1998 I [-]drew the short straw[/-] was selected to attend a week long business training seminar in Brussels, along with 29 other managers from around the world. I was the only one from our site but there were 3 other Americans from our US HQ in New Jersey, 2 of whom that I knew.

I was dreading it - we had some homework to do ahead of time including a drawing we each had to do, no words allowed, that depicted what our jobs were. These drawings were to stuck on the walls on Day 1 and we had to guess what job functions everyone did (I hate drawing - I'm useless at it).

During the week, interspersed with the usually stuff on courses like this, the CEO and several senior VP's gave presentations and we got to meet to all of them over dinner on the Thursday night. We had assigned seating that night and the VP that sat next to me introduced himself and when I told him who I was he said he'd heard all sorts of good things about me, blah blah blah. He was in the USA HQ but was obviously English so I asked him where he was from and he said "Hartlepool", so, without engaging my brain, I immediately responded, "oh, a monkey hanger ". He went ballistic - I forgot how touchy those folks from Hartlepool are

Next day (the last) I happened to sit opposite the CEO at lunch and at one point asked him for his business card. Looking at it I said "oh, your card doesn't conform to company policy as it has your e-mail address on it". He responded, "That's a stupid policy, who set that?". "Well, policies are only set by the Board and I can give you the reference number of the policy so you can see that it is authorized by you".

A few weeks later a revised policy was issued that had the stupid rule removed about business cards not having e-mail addresses on them.

 

[Alan]

That is one of the craziest things I have ever heard. Once burned, twice learned. After that heads should have rolled. Good financial reasons my butt. Is the company out of business yet?

No heads rolled and this was not the first time this had happened. The business reason is that when a company gets sued (and we did get sued regularly) all computer records pertaining to the suit are discoverable so it is very expensive to extract the relevant records including e-mail and have our lawyers go over everything before passing them over to the plaintiff's lawyers.

Incremental back-ups are taken every single night and 3 months of backups are held before the tapes are rotated. - 90 copies. Most of the data is held in large files that change every day so that means 90 copies of all files. Since back-up tapes are never used except for true catastrophes they are not discoverable - and this has been held up in a court of law several times. So, for example, if the suit is to do with price fixing then every employee who has anything to do with pricing will have their mail files examined but instead of 90 copies of the mail files, only the current version is submitted. (It also means that if you delete a message then it is truly gone - exception being criminal investigations).

The big failing is that IT don't make the consequences clear or provide alternatives. For example, critical databases can have a routine disk to disk copy made onto another server to preserve the data - then there are only 2 copies that are discoverable in a lawsuit.

 

[Khan]

How about the famous "Who moved my cheese " days ? All the employees had to watch a video presentation on it including the cleaning people who did not speak english .

I had to watch that. At one point I asked: Why don't they just follow the mice who know where the cheese is?"

 

[Khan]

I'm not sure if this qualifies: Putting non-IT people in charge of IT people. This includes former jet-jockeys.
No, IT people are not completely interchangeable. Was transferred from main frame maintenance to website manager in early '90s. Yes, I am capable of learning, but would a few days of instruction be too much to ask?

 

[travelover]

I worked for a small company of 18 people in northern Virginia where times were good. We got bought out by a company from Boston, Mass, where times were bad. The buyout was supposed to be a secret but there are no secrets in an 18 person company. The buying company decided to hold a meeting and give us an ultimatum. Either we move to Mass. or get laid off immediately. Well, 17 out of 18 of us already had replacement jobs lined up. Some of us started our new jobs the very next day. We did not tell our new evil overlords any of this, we just sat there with sad faces and took our severance pkgs. As soon as the new company HR rep left the building - out popped the champagne! The one guy who moved to Mass was unable to keep and hold any job so essentially, they got none of us. They folded a year later.

Great story - this would make a neat movie.

 

[Alan]

Great story - this would make a neat movie.

+1

 

[bbbamI]

Arggghhhh...appraisals and A&Ds (acheivement and development).

I had one boss that would make me write my own appraisal and he'd sign off on it. Of course I couldn't get away with all positive remarks about myself, so I had to come up with areas where I needed improvement.

I had to whack my own fanny.

I learned well by putting myself down.

 

[M Paquette]

Arggghhhh...appraisals and A&Ds (acheivement and development).

I had one boss that would make me write my own appraisal and he'd sign off on it. Of course I couldn't get away with all positive remarks about myself, so I had to come up with areas where I needed improvement.

I had to whack my own fanny.

I learned well by putting myself down.

Ah, the self-review process. My manager quickly learned that he had to read my self-revews (and weekly status reports) before cutting and pasting them into his reports.

From 2003:

He is almost always willing to spend time reviewing proposed work and changes, except during Sunday 49'ers games.

From 2005:

Key Areas for Development:*

... Some other teams and individuals respond best to face-to-face contact, rather than through E-mail or phone, so more aggressively seeking out others to drive work forward when Mike is on-site might be beneficial. In the interest of safety his clue-bat should be replaced with a lightweight foam bat beforehand.

From 2007:

***-***What didn't you achieve that you wanted to?

I'm not quite retired yet, but I'm working on it...

 

[bbbamI]

Oh man....why didn't I think of doing stuff like that?

 

[Purron]

How about the famous "Who moved my cheese " days ? All the employees had to watch a video presentation on it including the cleaning people who did not speak english .

Our director bought into this lock, stock and barrel. We all got a copy and were instucted to soak in the inspiration in it. Yuk. Someone in the office got a copy of "Who Cut the Cheese" a parody of the book and it got passed round the office like wildfire. Management was none too pleased but we loved it. Our little revolution.

 

[Rustward]

I'm not sure if this qualifies: Putting non-IT people in charge of IT people. This includes former jet-jockeys.
No, IT people are not completely interchangeable. Was transferred from main frame maintenance to website manager in early '90s. Yes, I am capable of learning, but would a few days of instruction be too much to ask?

Understand this completely -- and it qualifies. After 25 years in IT I reported to a director who had formerly been a diesel mechanic and was currently a "weekend rancher" (the vanity variety with a few acres and a few cows and a big diesel-guzzling pickup truck). Funny, he complained that Exxon-Mobil made too much profit.

He was unable to compose an email consisting of more than one complete sentence -- seroiusly. Most written communication originating from him was "call me".

 

[Khan]

Understand this completely -- and it qualifies. After 25 years in IT I reported to a director who had formerly been a diesel mechanic and was currently a "weekend rancher" (the vanity variety with a few acres and a few cows and a big diesel-guzzling pickup truck). Funny, he complained that Exxon-Mobil made too much profit.

He was unable to compose an email consisting of more than one complete sentence -- seroiusly. Most written communication originating from him was "call me".

I had an ignorant @#$% supervisor who didn't like computers or women (who were out of their place). He always tried to give me low ratings & I finally told him to put his concerns in writing and I told him I would have evaluations sent in from our clients in the field; the !@#$ backed down.

Of course that pissed him off even more.

Just a memo to ignorant misogynists: Don't mess with women that can decode in hex.

 

[Keim]

Had a boss that would call and ask how many new recruits he could expect. If the number wasn't what he wanted to hear he'd say "You know, Keim, a goal should be achievable, but it should make you stretch. I think you can recruit more this week. Stretch. I'm going to call you in about an hour, and I expect you to tell me that you can recruit X number of people this week." This happened weekly, so we soon learned to give him inflated production estimates. Then he'd wonder why the projections he gave his boss were never accurate. When he moved on the new guy couldn't believe how rosy our estimates were. He got burned once by believing them, and reporting them to his boss. After that, he talked with us about giving ACCURATE projections.

Had a boss tell my supervisor that I didn't have a "proper sense of urgency" about achieving our year end recruitment goal. My supervisor passed this on to me. I went ballistic, marched into the bosses office and asked him to detail precisely how I was being lackadaisical, and what items I had missed or not done to his satisfaction in my pursuit of the goal. We talked, and I cleared up his mis-perception. He didn't have one valid suggestion for me. Jack-ass.

 

[bbbamI]

Methinks we are glad we are no longer w*rking....

 

[Emeritus]

Since back-up tapes are never used except for true catastrophes they are not discoverable - and this has been held up in a court of law several times.

I suspect you are using the wrong term. Absolutely everything a company or a third party has is potentially "discoverable" unless it is privileged. The question is fundamentally who pays the cost of searching. If it is records you use, the defendant pays the cost. If you don't use the records the plaintiff pays the cost.
pretty good piece at
http://www.craigball.com/What_Judges_Should_Know_About_Discovery_from_Backup_Tapes-corrected.pdf

 

[Emeritus]

I'm not sure if this qualifies: Putting non-IT people in charge of IT people. This includes former jet-jockeys.
No, IT people are not completely interchangeable. Was transferred from main frame maintenance to website manager in early '90s. Yes, I am capable of learning, but would a few days of instruction be too much to ask?

I agree that it takes special talent to control IT people . Skill with a whip and a small handgun might qualify. IT people in general hate the idea that they are staff and not line and that they work for other people rather than the greater glory of the IT department. I conducted research for more than 20 years on the role of IT in health care. The same problems occur over and over and over again. Fundamentally in health care you have to keep the end users (medical types) happy, and you have to keep the system running properly ALL THE TIME. It is very difficult to find IT people who understand these concepts, much less how to do it. Add in the complex medical problems of "need to know" and patient privacy and you have an incredibly difficult task. Nothing in the training or experience of general IT people prepares them for the health care environment. Many Many Many companies have entered the field and failed dismally.

 

[Meadbh]

I conducted research for more than 20 years on the role of IT in health care. The same problems occur over and over and over again. Fundamentally in health care you have to keep the end users (medical types) happy, and you have to keep the system running properly ALL THE TIME. It is very difficult to find IT people who understand these concepts, much less how to do it. Add in the complex medical problems of "need to know" and patient privacy and you have an incredibly difficult task. Nothing in the training or experience of general IT people prepares them for the health care environment. Many Many Many companies have entered the field and failed dismally.

Don't get me started. Working with a clinical management system that produces meaningless data and has dramatically reduced the utility of the information we had on paper. Point this out at a big meeting. Supported by bigshot surgeon. All eyes turn to the CIO. "This system is not designed to help you understand what's going on".

WTF is it for, then?

 

[target2019]

Megacorp defense contractor offered everyone an incentive to leave the company before two divisions were combined: Take your accrued benefits and leave.

 

[ls99]

Riffing off of Meadbh's WTF.

In the light rail system where I spent 15 years, we used to call the Maintenance Management System --- input only -- no one ever was able to get any useful report out of it. Then it was upgraded to GUI--- same usefulness as before, but now in color.

 

[Nords]

In the light rail system where I spent 15 years, we used to call the Maintenance Management System --- input only -- no one ever was able to get any useful report out of it. Then it was upgraded to GUI--- same usefulness as before, but now in color.

I bet you're really gonna enjoy watching Honolulu build a light rail system...