Friday, August 04, 2006

Ruining a good thing

When I started in with The Company, it was privately owned, very profitable and had long been the most powerful force in its marketplace. Most of the employees I knew were at least satisfied with their work and numerous people had been working here for decades. Entire families were employed here, with parents spending so many years here that they sometimes had the opportunity to work with their children. We had Christmas parties and regular departmental gatherings. Morale was by and large very high. Every business has its malcontents and the environment wasn't perfect, but generally the mood was good. Of course, our high profitability reports and strong market position made us an attractive target of acquisition. Eventually a Dutch media conglomerate started the buy process and ultimately completed the acquisition in 2001.

Everyone knows that executives are by and large greedy, shortsighted, cynical leeches. Generally speaking, a vast majority of them contribute little of real value to a corporation, so they try new management styles and trendy strategies as a means to justify their jobs. Often times, they are responsible for much of the strife we modern, upwardly mobile drones are forced to deal with. For every great CEO or executive, there are a million inadequate or inconsequential contemporaries doing a substandard job of guiding their companies through the mass marketed mess that is modern business. In many ways, I think we had been cursed with more than our fair share of such executives.

Our parent company's former CEO became a bit acquisition happy, so he was eventually stifled and then forced out by the Board of Directors. During his tenure, salary increasese went from around 5% to the current cap of 2%. Granted, that is not very unusual in this age of outsourcing, downsizing, book cooking and stock options, but for those who aren't paying attention, 2% does not even come close to matching the annual rate of inflation, forget about cost of living. Essentially we have been getting pay increases each year that leave us making less, in real dollars, than we did the year before and that is assuming you were getting reviews on or above target.

Not only did salary increases become something of a joke, but the various company functions effectively ceased altogether. Benefit cuts came into existence for the first time in years, culiminating most recently with the complete cessation of pension contributions. Instead of a 3% contribution to a pension fund, a 1% contribution will be made to our 401k. If you do not have a 401k, one will be provided for you. You have the right to remain powerless. Anything you say can and will be used against you in interoffice politics...sorry, I got off on a tangent.

But that is not the entire story. They also instituted a very clever salary structure called "broadbanding". This was a new salary construct that saw grades replaced by tiers or "bands". Instead of moving up a pay grade, you now move laterally through a band. Eventually, if you get enough promotions, you are put into a new band, but broadbanding allows for extended "growth in place", which is a nice way of spinning the idea that you could start in one band and effectively work within the salary limits of that band for your entire career, should you not be the motivated type.

That in and of itself does not bother me, but here's the rub: all they really did was lower the minimums and raise the maximums for any given position, which means you get less when you move up and theoretically could languish in the same pay bracket for years before receiving a promotion, piling up inconsequential, 2% pay increases the entire time. It was a blatant and obvious move to limit salary obligations and the potential for salaried workers to increase their pay. My personal experience has been farcical. With capped increases, which I exceeded each review period because of high performance reviews, I am STILL not making the minimum salary of my previous position, prior to the institution of broadbanding. Worse still, had I been promoted 6 months earlier, I would have made $6k/year more than I did at the time of my promotion. Needless to say, I was not pleased and lately things have only gotten worse.

So then, witness one of the primary reasons I am returning to school and seeking a degree in fields I am actually interested in. Where once I would have been happy to spend my career here, I now find myself thinking that 9 or 10 years (I will have 7 years in this November) will be enough. The key is acquiring the skills and knowledge necessary to move on and into a better situation, rather than leave for more of the same elsewhere. I'm hoping that Eckerd will not only provide me an opportunity for higher education, but also a chance to network and establish new connections in the local business community. In the end, that's half the battle. Only time will tell, but I find myself more and more optimistic as things move along.

For the time being, I've got to get back to work. :)

Posted by Erik @ 8/04/2006 07:58:00 AM