Almost one year ago, I said (here):
The second choice is to get out. It's harder than it sounds... you have to achieve a level of fury in order to produce escape velocity necessary to beat MegaCorp's "suck", whilst at the same time, not destroying everything around you.Today, I put my signature to a contract which means the MegaCorp nightmare will soon end. I hope my CH co-author achieves the same thing soon...
Have you ever noticed how MegaCorp treats it's customers? Smiling faces of pretty women and handsome men, immaculately dressed, usher a bewildered client along a red-carpeted walkway, bathed in warm soothing light. Ahead is a golden desk, and as the client settles into a deep and soft leather lined armchair, MegaCorp's finest soothsayer steps forward and serves every whim, every desire, every possible need of the client (as long as they're paying).
Compare and contrast this to a MegaCorp employee; dragging their ball and chain, barefoot and cold, in the rain and gloom. The grey wall is plain and oppressive; the rusty iron door slides open and stale air escapes, wafting the fug of sweat and toil under the noses of those about to step inside.
Has MegaCorp ever considered the concept of balance? If the balance was tipped and an employee was treated as an asset, rather than a shoe-clinging piece of turd, how much better would their business be? An employee that wants to work will always serve better than an employee forced to work.
Peter Gibbons:
The thing is, Bob, it's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care.Bob Porter:
Don't... don't care?Peter Gibbons:
It's a problem of motivation, all right? Now if I work my ass off and Initech ships a few extra units, I don't see another dime; so where's the motivation? And here's something else, Bob; I have eight different bosses right now.Bob Slydell:
I beg your pardon?Peter Gibbons:
Eight bosses.Bob Slydell:
Eight?Peter Gibbons:
Eight, Bob. So that means that when I make a mistake, I have eight different people coming by to tell me about it. That's my only real motivation is not to be hassled; that, and the fear of losing my job. But you know, Bob, that will only make someone work just hard enough not to get fired.
Revered monk D'Aloofrio comes to town to test his students' ability to exercise humility by begging.
One by one, his students prostrate themselves, and then suggest ways that their studies might lead to more cost-efficient running of the monastery. One by one, D'Aloofrio rejects each idea.
'Why do this?' his students cry. 'We're doing exactly what you asked us to do, but you say no to everything we suggest, and then blame us for doing nothing!'
'I get paid a lot,' says D'Aloofrio.
Working at MegaCorp is like designing a public building. One has limited funds, but not so limited that it is impossible to build well. One has a startlingly baroque bureaucracy to navigate. One has all manner of Dims, resplendent in their total ignorance, scrutinising every last detail.
[One apparently starts to speak like Prince Charles after a while, doesn't one? We're using an architectural metaphor after all - do we not have on our hands an eyesore, a monstrous carbuncle? All one has to do to complete the homage is marry a horse and have a mysterious red-headed second son...]
A downside of public works is the need to cater for every possible minority concern in every conceivable combination. Ramp access and lifts are necessary, because being in a wheelchair needn't exclude you from the building. That's a unqualified good thing. Having to make signs in every possible language because some people can't be fucking bothered to learn the native language of the country they're living in... That's a different matter entirely.
When we build a system, we have our own minorities to whom we must pander. The Dimwatchers have to feel they can find their way around; so our signs need to be at least bilingual, English and Pedantic.
Then, the Dimlords have to manage systems that are technical in nature, but unfortunately they don't know anything technical that's less than ten years old -The poor Dim fools have been trapped in their ivory towers for years because the Dimwatchers insisted that over-technical locks be fitted to the doors. As a result, the signs are now triligual: English, Pedantic, and Condescending.
Now, the Dimcounters are all over everything, looking for opportunities to not spend any more money. No matter that MegaCorp has suffered a decade of under-investment under the yoke of former Dimlord-in-Chief Beachy Whale; what matters now is short-termist beancounting. We have to add layers of fantasy return-on-investment bullshit to the most simple tasks. Thus, signs are quadrilingual: English, Pedantic, Condescending and Lies.
Finally, and most importantly, we have to make everything we do accessible to middle-of-the-road Dims. These are our metaphorical equivalent of wheelchair-bound users of a building. They try their best, but it's not their fault that they're Differently Competent. We have to build them little brain ramps so they can more easily make tiny leaps of intellectual prowess on their own. We build ability lifts so they may rise to previously unattainable levels of ability, uninhibited by politically-unacceptable requirements for understanding, effort or basic talent. It's our job to make them feel better about themselves; we're glad to be of service.
Our poor, overloaded signs are now smart-arsed little Polyglots, written in English, Pedantic, Condescending, Lies and Bluff.
Lord Ellingson has recently announced, internally, that there are to be some job losses in our corner of the MegaCorp world. At least, that's what we're assuming he meant by 'reductions in function' and 'streamlining of teams'.
I think we all knew redundancies were the reason for the specially convened conference call (with no agenda or information in the invite), and our suspicions were confirmed when the phrases turned from 'focus on our expenditure' to 'consultation period'.
Such an announcement is not a total surprise, as we figured that MegaCorp couldn't possibly avoid an opportunity to move on some talented and experienced (read:expensive) staff under the umbrella of 'difficult market conditions'; after all, they'll be able to rehire some graduates or newbies for a fraction of the cost in only a few months when the 'upturn' of the market begins.
It's not clear how at risk myself and fellow non-dims are at; our 'dim' bretheren are on decidedly shaky ground. However, it's at times like these my thoughts quickly turn to "should I stay or should I go?"
I've previously posted that escaping the 'suck' of the MegaCorp black hole is an extremely difficult task to complete, so if they were to push me out of the door, better yet with a fistful of dollars, would I take the money and run?
I like the idea of a wedge of cash in the bank, being able to go out into the brave new world and pick up some work, contracting perhaps. Maybe I could start my own firm? Maybe I could travel? My mind soars high, carried by a wind of fantasy and indulgence into a sky of freedom...
But what about the mortgage? My overall mortgage isn't that huge, in relative terms, and is below the average house price, but it's still a huge slice of my monthly takehome.
BOOM! The port side engine begins to trail smoke.
What if I can't get a business off the ground?
BOOM! The starboard engine coughs, splutters and dies. We're merely gliding now.
What if I can't get another job or a contract? What if I'm so institutionalised by MegaCorp that my skills are useless?
CRACK! The airframe creaks and groans; we're nose down now, losing altitude, fast...
What if I can't look after my family? What if the house gets reposessed? How do I explain all of this grief and pain to my son?
BANG! We just hit the ground, and a thousand miles per hour. My mind plane is totally destroyed. No survivors.
The fear grips me tightly; I'm scared. Without even trying, I'm afraid to be split from MegaCorp; the "suck" is as strong as ever.
Ever wonder why battered wives stay with their abusive husbands? Fear.
Fear of the unknown, of what's might happen, of leaving the world they know, as painful as it is.
MegaCorp - wife-beater to thousands upon thousands of people.
I love how Dimlord thinking operates. When times get tough, simply make the internal bureacracy even more impenetrable. Productivity won't increase, the share price will still fall, but hey - we're doing something about it! At any rate, we're doing something.
Case in point: I was entering a 'Work Effort' into our management substitute application ITBlows earlier, and (after I'd spent twenty minutes staring at the web browser and trying to explain how I was maximising productivity by filling in an incomprehensible form) I got to the end and hit 'submit'.
I wonder if a psychologist has ever investigated why so many bureacratic forms end with a button marked 'submit'. Granted, it's easier to fit on a small button than 'I'm greased - go ahead and do me up the council gritter, big boy'. Still, if the 'submit' button became the 'fuck it, that's got to be good enough' button, or the 'cancel' button were instead marked 'bollocks to this, I'm off for a nice relaxing crap', I'd feel more honest when pressing them.
I digress.
So, I hit 'submit', and as usual was left feeling slightly soiled. My submission, degrading as it was, was not sufficiently abject for ITBlows. I received the following cruel rejection:
What the fuck does that mean? I write software, that's what I'm paid for. Not only do I not know what half of that even means, but the stuff I do understand I can't answer for the simple reason that it refers to stuff I don't know and don't want to know. At all. I mean, 'Relative Annual FTE cannot be blank'. FTE is 'full time employee', what the hell does one make a person annually relative to?
We're all forced to fill in stupid bloody forms all day long, and (apparently) most of them are means by which our productivity can be measured. It seems relatively obvious to this drone that if I have to fill in forms before, during and after doing stuff, and then can't fill in forms because I either don't know what they mean or can't answer the questions, then they already know my productivity level (definition from The Free Dictionary):
2.productivity - (economics) the ratio of the quantity and quality of units produced to the labor per unit of timeSince I can't work without the form, and can't fill in the form, my output is zero. That makes the maths easier, since zero divided by anything is still zero.
Examine, if you will, the following gem of righteous Dimspeak from Borodino Bonaparte of MegaCorp application development division:
Based on your input implementing fine grained ACLs in MegaCorp-hosted SVN would need additional engineering to enable the functionality for all users. I see the value in it for your use case, will you be able to provide us any information on what is the $ benefit that you are projecting to your business for moving the repository into MegaCorp hosted/managed SVN? We may be able to justify a one off that suits your requirements if there is considerable cost benefit to the business.For the uninitiated, I have translated this into English:
I am very lazy and don't know how to do my job. You are cleverer than me, and I know it. Luckily I can hide behind cost savings and avoid doing any work. Hopefully you see the silliness of my questions and will kindly fuck off.By this means, shareholder value is maintained. Unnecessary expenditure due to increased developer productivity and use of economies of scale are avoided. Strategic thinking worthy of his namesake.
In the last week, a strange thing has occurred. At first, CH contributors were puzzled as to just why things were a little better. Weirdly, the dims are a bit more switched on. The dimherders are almost reasonable. Even the dimlord has been... friendly.
We considered various possible explanations; perhaps a unique combination in biorhythms of all involved. Maybe the planets are perfectly aligned. We even wondered if all of the dim-crew had been replaced by beings from another planet.
But the truth is rather more revealing... A particular person is absent, and most worryingly, this person is from the non-dim side of the fence.
From the outside, MegaCorp is a 'halo' company; that is, the biggest, the best, and where everyone wants to be. I fondly remember my days of ignorance, when MegaCorp excited me. I could hardly believe I'd landed an almost 'dream' job at the biggest firm in it's field, a powerhouse of money and influence, with zillions of dollars in assets.
What I didn't know, and was yet to learn, is that MegaCorp is dangerous, potentially fatal.
MegaCorp is a little like the X-Men character, "Rogue":
Rogue (Anna Marie) is a fictional character, a Marvel Comics superheroine of the mutant super-team, the X-Men [..] Rogue considers her powers a curse. She involuntarily absorbs the memories, physical strength and, in the case of super-powered persons, abilities of anyone she touches.Early on, the sense of 'wanting', the way MegaCorp draws you in and demands your attention, is flattering; it boosts your ego and makes you feel as though you're able to make changes, do something useful.
Listen. And understand.The instruments of the attack are chiefly poor management and the fact that everyone has given up; all they care about is the next pay cheque, or the next course of action that will secure their position. No-one wants to do things 'right'. Ethics? Bollocks... As Dilbert points out, once you've got a fucked up moral compass, you're on the fast-track to management.That terminatorMegaCorp is out there. It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead.
The opposite to the Midas touch, is perhaps obviously, known as the Sadim touch. Whereas the Midas touch turns everything to gold, the Sadim touch turns everything to shit.
MegaCorp is well staffed with people that have the Sadim touch.
Got a great idea? Present it and promote it. It'll save millions, make life easier and fix global warming too. Be ready though, once the Sidam touch has been applied, once the 'procedures' and 'standards' have been setup, once the apathetic people you're trying to help have given their collective 'meh'12, your idea is no longer a huge, impressive, gleaming statue of gold; now it's grey, dark, and limp pile of poo.
From Wikipedia:
Thom Yorke explained the idea of the lyrics to The Independent in 2006, saying, "It's for someone who has to work for a large company. This is a song against bosses. Fuck the middle management!"
I've given all I can, but were still on the payroll
This is what you get, this is what you get
This is what you get, when you mess with us
MegaCorp employs a lot of people. Hundreds of thousands of busy worker bees, dedicated to the 'firm' and ensuring the CEO gets his next multi-million dollar bonus.
The HR (thats 'humanity reduction') drones promote the idea of excellent 'benefits':
Come and work for MegaCorp! We're big! We've got great stuff for you to do! We'll give you excellent employee benefits!To be honest, the list of benefits (the one you reel off to a recruitment
by Our Guy on the Spot
Two senior managers at MegaCorp were left crying into their trust funds yesterday, when a nasty man threatened to take their toys away.
Mr G.R.R. Jarhead and Dr. J. Quincy, from the Detection After the Fact That Something Odd was Done division, found themselves strongly resenting suggestions that their product was (to quote an unnamed source) 'a badly-implemented, ludicrously expensive pile of poorly thought-out shite'.
Following MegaCorp standard operating procedure, they immediately set about hiding the truth in an avalanche of remarkably uninformed and bitter criticism of competing products.
Luckily for Quincy and Jarhead, their monitoring product has no effective filters for lies, misrepresentations and other MegaCorp staple items (and no effective means of acting on the result of such filters if they should ever exist); so they were able to communicate effectively their ignorance of the subject matter to a wide, contemptuous and slightly bemused audience of considerably more intelligent people.
The matter was left with the MegaCorp status quo safely preserved. No advantageous changes were made, no money was saved; as a result, inefficiencies continue apace and stock prices continue in freefall.
