Thursday, April 15, 2010

Members Column Day: Turning Members Into Numbers

Today let's open the mailbox to find another fascinating message from one of our members:

Dear FakeMike, many of us are questioning the company's way of managing employees for the past couple of years. It seems everything is colder every day, rules are fixed, nobody is having any kind of fun anymore. Directors show signs of mild to severe depressions. What is the place of the human nature at CGI? Celine from Mtl.

Human nature is overrated, Celine, sorry to bring you the news in such a way. If you want to have fun, get yourself a Wii or a dog, although the latter requires recurrent investments for food and vet. If you want to earn your living, medication is part of the package and pleasure is definitely not within the scope of work. C'mon, where is it written that work has to be fun? Employees who are having a good time is a suspicious activity, it means something is not right and that the manager should definitely check into it. When you laugh, you are not thinking about strategies and tactics to reach a higher level of profitable growth.

As for the company that provides your pay check and therefore feed your family, we might not be perfect yet and we definitely consider humans to be important. Important in a soylent green fashion, meaning humans have to be useful and contribute to the company long term goal. It's no secret that human capital is gradually converted into financial capital, and I think this is normal evolution.

Companies like Google which displays a very abnormal company behaviour toward employees are bound to return to a normal state. Don't even think for one second that on-site gym and free massage are sustainable company expenses. WIthin a few years, Google will transform itself into a standard company, and they will start by using a monochrome logo. They'll drop the freaking expensive free cafeteria, encouraging employees to get their food at Togo's or Taco Bell on El Camino like everyone else. Google will of course drop the 1-day-per-week personal project idea, which is completely useless and goes against every practical management rulebook ever written. Google will hire managers from IBM or Ernst & Young to bring order and decency. Even Eric Schmidt will stop acting like a total lunatic or he will replaced by a more sensible manager who will be able to understand the untapped power of IT consulting services. I'd like to see Lou Gerstner or someone similar leading GOOG.

Gosh I'm getting goose bumps just writing this.

Once people are exposed to the genius behind our service industry and the core ideas of profitable growth, they quickly ditch their ideas about revolutionary products and hardware (yuck). They understand that products are meaningless and risk-ridden, that R&D is a almost a communist idea and humans are just financial resources ready to be put into action.

Celine, I hope you share my grand vision and please report back to your manager immediately if you have any doubt. We may send you back to one of our CGI 101 session to let you adjust your personality to our management philosophy.

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