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baits and switches
Friday, July 23 1999
At lunch, as usual for a Friday, some of my colleagues and I were up at the Frazee-Friars food court eating pizza and drinking Coronas. Also as usual, we were bitching about the insanity that is our workplace. The unusual thing was that today my lunch-time contingent consisted of two guys from sales and two of us from engineering. Comparing notes, we discovered we're being motivationally manipulated by a lot of the same tricks. The most usual of these is bait and switch. It all starts when we're promised lavish bonuses if we accomplish outlandishly realistic goals. Then, even if we somehow manage to exceed expectations and meet our deadlines, our bosses, usually people who have been with the company a long time, call a quick meeting to raise the wire and rob us of our accomplishment, and, more importantly, our financial reward. This is an easy thing to do in engineering, where the "doneness" of a project is the subjective opinion of our engineering bosses. But in sales, "doneness" is an absolutely measurable number. To deny someone his bonus in sales requires more obviously sinister manipulation. One of the sales guys (whose name I'll refrain from mentioning) told me a most interesting story.
It seems a promise of a vacation in Hawaii was made to those on his "revenue team" if certain extremely aggressive strategic partnership goals were met. But as his statistics showed him to actually be on track to meet his goal, he was pulled aside and told that his required number of sales would have to be raised, that it had obviously been set far too low. Also, he was suddenly told that "everyone on the revenue team" had to meet their goals for anyone to go to Hawaii, because it "didn't make sense" for only some to go.
I had no idea that such transparent bait and switch was going on in the other departments. Suddenly I realized something: the bonuses and promised vacations in Hawaii aren't even budgeted, because no one in management believes that any of the goals will ever be achieved! "We shoot for the sun and hope for the moon" is our motto, and that's all well and good, but it basically means that no one ever earns much more than their meager salary. When you realize this, you also realize that there's no sense in staying late and working through the weekend because it doesn't matter. All the promises mean nothing because the system is completely rigged. And since the motivational effectiveness of the promises depends on the ignorance of the employees, there comes a day when an employee is jaded and unmotivated. What can he do at this point but move on to a job at a rational, less exploitative workplace? Consequently, the turnover in my workplace is high. It's a company operated by the easily-bullied, ignorant, naïve, and inexperienced. How can it possibly succeed?
We got to talking about our need to organize and support one another. We even said the "u-word." Wouldn't it be cool to unionize the workers of the digital sweatshops of America? If it weren't for unrealistic faith in stock options, companies like mine would be hot beds of unionization. And I'd be thrilled to lead such an effort.
My workplace has definitely changed in the nine and a half months I've been working there. There's been a gradual change to faker and faker emotions, fancier and fancier workplace outfits, and better and better cars in the parking lot. My immediate boss recently went out and bought himself a Land Rover. The Grand Pooh Bah traded in his old beat up Corvette for a new one. Most of the hauncho-types are driving Lexi and BMWs.
Of course, none of this applies to me. While I'm arguably one of the most productive engineers in "the enterprise," I've never been offered (or asked for) a raise, I come to work in ripped jeans and torn tee shirts (never the company tee shirt, though, since I find it embarrassing). My transportation is still a rusty old Huffy 12 speed I bought for $25 at a yard sale. But most importantly, I've never started talking the talk and walking the walk of corporate America. As much as possible, I go out of my way to subvert every instance of corporate duplicity, fakery, and ass-kissing I encounter. I also make a point of supporting the subversive inclinations of others, whenever I see evidence of them. I know I don't go far enough in shooting down unrealistic expectations, but I go much farther than most of the amiable yes-men around me. My ideal position in this corporation would be to be someone who talks lots of shit, doesn't take any shit, but also cannot possibly be fired because of my vast quantity of proprietary knowledge. But the idea of kissing the right butts and talking the right talk so that I might rise through the ranks from exploited to exploiter holds no appeal for me. I want to be a rogue asshole programmer.
In the evening, Al, his neighbor Jereome and Al's 17 year old brother from Indiana all came over and we watched The Jerk, you know, the movie with the kitten-juggling scene that dissolves into fast-forward chaos at the end. Al had brought a bottle of Russian vodka for his brother, so I did my part and introduced the young man to the wonderful world of vodkatea.
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