I know times are tough. I know money is needed – not just to make profits, but to survive.
However there’s an interesting byproduct of all this penny-chasing/penny-pinching, and that is destruction of corpoate culture … or should I say, the corporate culture that talks about how important it is to be a ‘team player’.
To be honest, I’ve always had doubts whether companies really mean it when they say that sort of thing, mainly because I’ve seen too many examples where the opposite is true … however we all know the ability to work together, even if its interms of fulfilling the whims of a superior, is important both interms of effectiveness and just general office culture harmony.
But ever since the economy has decided to do a good impression of Lyndsey Lohan’s career, I’ve noticed that many organisations aren’t even pretending to practice what they preach to all their staff.
Recently I was sent an email from someone within M&C [Sunshine’s “legal guardians”] about a book they’ve launched.
“Cool” I thought … “I’d really like to read that” … so clicked on the link expecting to be taken to a place where I could download the .pdf.
But no.
Instead I got directed to a website where I could BUY THE BOOK!
Hahahahahaha … what next, charging staff for internal training?
Actually I shouldn’t laugh at that because a previous agency I had a very brief dalliance with tried to pull that very stunt on me and to be fair to M&C, they take their responsibility about people’s development pretty seriously, however this sends out totally the wrong message and I am sure it’ll be rectified shortly. Either that or I’m going to be living in a bus shelter within the week.
Talking of training …
I recently got asked whether I’d like to ‘train’ the global planners of another agency – a multinational agency – how to ‘think in ideas’.
Naturally I found it abit weird that …
1/ They would ask someone from a competitive company to do this
2/ They would need training in something they’re supposed to do anyway
3/ They would need training in something their organisation claims to be brilliant at
… however the lure of top travel on someone elses dime [something I am quite the afficiando at] and being able to get into the ‘Death Star’ was too good to ignore so I happily said yes.
How sad that this company – someone who goes on and on about how their staff are their greatest asset – have now decided that spending any money on training is expensive and postponed the whole thing till “later this year”.
Yes, I know … you’re thinking that’s their excuse to basically get me out the picture … but I have ‘insiders’ in the company and they’ve told me the whole thing has been rainchecked, not just me.
Then there’s the company who is running a global pitch.
They’re selling the fact they’re a global network who work seamlessly and collaberatively with all their local offices and yet I know for a fact each ‘outpost’ has submitted an ‘estimate’ to HQ as to how much their ‘time/involvement’ will cost.
Nice. Very collaberative.
To be honest, I can’t really blame them given seemingly every corporation is telling their local offices to ‘break even or die’ … so whilst it looks very “robbing Peter, to pay Paul”, if you’re the “Paul” it matters a whole bloody lot.
Whilst I appreciate the enourmity of the current economic environment … and that some of the things companies did in good times could now be viewed as ‘indulgences’ … I don’t think ‘training’ or even ‘inspiring’ staff should be seen as one of those – infact, these are the very times where uniting and encouraging staff can make an even bigger difference – both to their morale and the companies success – because as much as every ship needs a captain to steer, it’s the engine room that makes it actually happen.