Quote Originally Posted by Sermil View Post
When I sat down and talked to my eldest son about the "facts of life", it wasn't about girls, it was about corporations.

I told him: corporations are -- literally -- soulless. They are not your friend. They do not like you. They do not care about you. They CANNOT care about you, because they are not human, they are machines designed to make profits.

They pay you a salary because they have calculated that the value you bring, in the form of increased revenue, decreased costs, or decreased risk, is greater than the cost of your salary and benefits. If you want to continue getting paid, wake every morning and make sure that the benefit you bring to the corporation is greater than your cost. This is not about 'enslaving yourself to the machine' or anything like that; it is acknowledging the fundamentally transactional nature of employment -- As a worker, I provide value; as an employer, you pay me for the work I do providing that value. If I am not providing that value, the employer will terminate me, much as if were they not to pay me (or not pay me enough), I would walk away and stop working for them.

Some bosses are nice. Some bosses may even genuinely like you -- they are human, and they might like you as a person. But the moment you stop providing net value for the corporation, it is the boss's job -- it is the boss's OBLIGATION -- to fire you.

Some companies may treat you nicely. But that is only because they have decided that treating their workers well will, in the end, bring them more profit at a lower cost than treating their workers poorly. Even the 'nicest' company will drop you if are a net negative.

To put it another way: Your mother makes you free food every day, and [the company I work for] gives me free food every day. But your mother does it because she loves you. She does it because you are her son and she wants you to be happy and healthy. [The company I work for] gives me food because giving their workers food allows them to attract & retain skillful programmers who can make their business work better and end up attracting more ad dollars, eventually leading to higher profits.

Your family will always love you. Your company will drop you the moment you are not a valuable employee. Never forget the difference, and always make sure you are a valuable asset to them.

Well we all have net values but mostly when I fire people it's because they are totally useless, the standard is bare minimum because if I fire bare minimum I risk getting totally useless instead. I know other bosses that fire people because they don't like their faces, but mostly I notice that a lot of people that get into leadership positions should never ever ever ever have any kind of authority at all.
My current boss is one of those people and one of these days I'll probably have to have him removed....by the police no less.

What I hate the most is the damned propaganda that doesn't reflect the Corporation at all. Nice little advertisements or brochures with beautiful people in work clothes that never get dirty. Then the Corportation tries to inspire loyalty in the cheapest way possible, low costs for your loyalty. My boss tried to convince me to come to work during a weekend when we were moving our local offices and babbled something about team spirit, pizza and getting the work done. I said no because he had no intention of paying me and I know the Corporation won't show up on my doorstep when I'm moving even if we can get some team building done and I give it a pizza.

A friend of mine always showed up for spring cleaning at the "Drug Factory" where he works, they clean the outside of the property, pick up trash and get everything in order after a the winter so it looks nice and then they'll have a barbecue with hot dogs and soda. So he shows up with his kids and they put in couple of hours of work before they have a hot dog until I asked him if he was a tool? The idiots show up and do a couple of hours work for some hot dogs....no wages, just hot dogs and they grill the hot dogs themselves.

Then you have Corporate values. Three or four words, core values of the company. When I get fresh faced trainees I usually tell them that those core values can be thrown into the bin, there is only one core value "do the work at the best of your ability"

I'm sorry to say that most of my adult life I have been in management and I know that a most of the corporate culture is of an exploitative nature. Luckily I have also been a union representative so I am no stranger to disappointment.

Yes I know there are good bosses out there and good companies but I haven't had the privilege to work for them.