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The picture's pretty bleak, gentlemen...The world's climates are changing, the mammals are taking over, and we all have a brain about the size of a walnut. —Dinosaurs talking in The Far Side by Gary Larson
Pretty much every day someone calls me, sighs, and launches into a description of why his or her company is utterly dysfunctional. If any of the following sounds familiar, you are working for a dinosaur. To be more precise, I mean a company destined for extinction in the near future...
Colleagues are actively competing with each other: Jerry's trying to undermine Jimmy, whom he views as a threat to his leadership. By "leadership," Jerry means the job he hopes to capture, should John ever retire or get fired, as "everyone" knows he should. Meanwhile, Jenny sits in the corner and thinks "I hate these quasi-macho morons."
While all this is happening, the CEO delivers a nice, superficial speech about teamwork that makes everyone want to gag. Instead - of course - they all smile and race to compliment him.
Even your new products are outdated: Your company's product development strategy seems to be... release products that succeeded in 2012. This may be related to the fact that no one in senior management has spoken to a customer since 2012.
Lying is encouraged: When you attend company meetings, you struggle to resist screaming, "What the #@!# are you people talking about?" One after another, your colleagues distort reality and spew utterly fictional accounts of their activities. The sales funnel couldn't be better. Customer satisfaction is at all time highs. Candidates are banging down your doors trying to get hired.
None of this explains why sales have been flat for three years and it's been twice as long since anyone got a reasonable raise. Sad reality: your culture is to whitewash the truth.
Oh...sorry: When friends ask if you're still working at the same place, this odd look creeps into their eyes like, "I am SO sorry to hear that." Instead, they just smile weakly.
No one understands the strategy, even the strategy guy: Sure way to know you're in deep trouble? When you ask the strategy guy to explain basic aspects of the strategy he just presented to 20 folks in your organization, he gets overly defensive and attacks you.
It's much like the day you caught your 14-year-old with a pack of Marlboros in the garage and you asked him if he was smoking. "No!" he screamed. "Are you crazy? These are Jake's. Why are you wrecking my life?"
Yeah, he was smoking.
Every morning, someone quits: You arrive at your desk, take a big gulp of your coffee, and open your laptop. As expected, the third item in your email is your colleague telling you that Susan just quit, but no formal notice will be going out because her boss didn't consider her a vital employee (Susan's job was to try to resurrect some semblance of a viable product development program).
When companies don't value their employees, they tend to view every unhappy employee as a unique problem. They watch passively as employees run for the door for a variety of "personal" problems, such as:
• They needed more money
• They needed more respect
• They wanted to collaborate, rather than compete like rabid animals
• They were tired of being harassed, ignored, or belittled
• They were actively recruited by other companies who value their skills