Stormbringer's Thunder

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen Edited June 2, 2020 On this anniversary of my first weblog (began in 2007), I wanted to do something very personal that also including material that applies to many people in the workforce. Readers from The Company may wonder, "Is he talking about me?" For the most part, "you" will be a combination of people. The big business shall remain unnamed. Background image: Unsplash / Rupixen This article may get me fired or I could receive some other form of retaliation, but I am presenting the truth and the situation as I see it. Some people can't handle that . The Hazard of Hiring Humans It's problematic for  laissez-faire capitalism (see " Evolutionary Thinking and Human Capital ") that they have to employ people. Not automatons, not (as Mr. Gordons says) meat machines, but people. We are not baunistic. Mayhaps some bigwigs would like to completely automate, but even androids need maintenance. (What was that old ...

Start with good people, lay out the rules, communicate with your employees, motivate them and reward them. If you do all those things effectively, you can't miss.   — Lee Iacocca Tweaked for clarity 3-26-2011. Buona sera. I have an attitude with thunder and lightning heading your way. You may have noticed that the title of this missive is the opposite of true intelligence. It constantly amazes me that so many companies seem to think that if their employees are not in a minor panic, sweating and frantic, that work is not getting done. Brace yourselves, this is Bluntness Day: They are too cheap to supply their employees with the proper tools to get the job done. Remember my buddy Neil? He works for a cheapskate Fortune 100 company. They are certainly not in the "100 Best Places to Work" list, but they cannot determine the cause. Spurious surveys to make themselves feel good, with faked results and continually contemptuous workers are the r...

Today's thundering rant has some advice for business executives. Uncle Bob has been hearing some unpleasant things from Neil and his friends. Too bad I can't get them to join my crew. It's dangerous and sometimes borderline legal, but my organization shows appreciation. Well, I do, anyway. Neil's department at a huge Fortune 500 soulless company is run from ivory towers with incompetent stronzos. They have to process forms in a "timely manner", and the semi-sentient subhumanoids that run the show have made the situation worse by quadrupling the work load and not providing extra staff to cover the work. The amazing thing is that the upper managers have no concept of how the work is done! They just come up with schemes and make things worse. And yes, the people that actually do the work resent the meddling of the ivory tower managers. Let me interject something that puzzles me here. How is it that his department resents having a manager that has no experience i...

Buona sera. I received some distressing news from Neil. (Yes, he's fine and the Bulletproof Bitch's influence is less pronounced in his life.) He works for a huge company that shall remain nameless for now. It's a "Fortune 500" company with international activities. They count their profits in the tens of millions of dollars each quarter of the year. The distressing news? No raises this year. Neil's company sent out a memo announcing that not only would there be no raises ("economic uncertainties"), but employees should work harder and be happy. Stronzos! Who likes to work extra hard without appreciation? Everyone wonders how big the salaries are for the CEO and the Ivory Tower Management, and if those will be frozen as well. Not bloody likely. Part of the problem is that this company has regulations to follow. So, they are in and out of court a great deal. If they are late or foul up somewhere, they have to pay fines. There seems to be a lawsui...

Buon giorno. I should have Neil write this because it's his story, but he's too busy trying to make money to pay the bills. As for me, I'm in a better mood because some money has come to me that I've been waiting a long time to receive. Neil works for a major American corporation. It's very big, and has international holdings. They complained that in their last quarter, they did not make as many tens of millions of dollars as they expected. Poor darlings! Neil says that this company is too big and too impersonal. I agree. The problem is, that's the way most of them get. His company does not care about its employees. They make a pretense at benefits because they could not get anyone to work there if they did not offer them (and their health benefits are laughable; many employees rely on their spouses for coverage). They cut out the overtime that many employees relied on to survive. Instead, they will have to learn the hard way that there is too much work, too li...