fired / booted / canned / got the chop / got the axe / terminated / dismissed / laid-off / discharged / pink-slipped / sacked / downsized / let go / dehired / re-deployed

moved on to other opportunities

souless / inhumane / greedy / ass-kissing / arrogant / thoughtless / spineless / control-freak / micro-manager / petty / insecure / manipulative / political

climbing to the top on the backs of others

lively / learned / happy / fulfilled / valued / priorities-straight / wiser / healthier / skinnier / richer

without you

Word has it that the Human Resources person was let go, (hopefully) because she finally realized that The Company does not love its employees or want to further their growth, and also fosters a culture of fear.

Supposedly several employees had filed complaints against their managers with HR. The HR person went to the CEOs and suggested some management training options, since it had become clear to her that the managers were very uneducated in management techniques. The gossips tell me that the response was that the CEOs did not want the managers thinking for themselves but just wanted them to do what they are told – so the training idea was nixed. Apparently the CEOs were also very upset about the disloyalty their employees were showing by questioning – well, let’s be honest here and just leave it at that – by questioning.

I’m sure the truth is a bit more complicated than that and the rumors are embellished, but I from what I experienced there and in the work world at large, I believe the gist of the message. The Company didn’t really like thinking, which was synonymous to questioning, discussing, and initiating. For example, we got this great new engineer who had worked on a lot of retail products. He went ahead and added an auto-run feature to the CDs, which is no big deal and is a very standard, I’d say expected, feature. He didn’t ask, he just did it. The guy worked lots of extra hours, and he never shirked his responsibilities so he didn’t do it at the expense of something else. He got in trouble. Yep, at least that is the story the rumor mill generated. What they taught me in school is that initiative is what you are supposed to have to show off “your stuff,” get ahead, move up. Well, they need to have a class in school on how to work for control freaks and kiss ass because that is what seems to further one’s career these days (surgical spine removal also seems like it would be beneficial).

The culture of fear is rampant throughout corporate America. When I was fired I heard a lot of “If they fired you, they’ll fire anybody.” I’ve heard this since then at other companies where folks were fired. Really what people mean when they say this is that how good our work is has nothing to do with keeping our jobs. Good reviews have nothing to do with keeping our jobs. Being promoted has nothing to do with keeping our jobs. Being well liked by our peers has nothing to do with keeping our jobs. I also hear a lot of fear about changing jobs. People complain to me about their jobs, but when I suggest looking for a new one I get a lot of maybes: maybe they’d get a job that was worse; maybe the new job would be less stable; maybe this… maybe that… As a result, I know a lot of people who spend 40+ hours a week, keeping their mouths shut, not being themselves, not really enjoying their work or growing, hanging onto the whisp of a hope of a bonus and the fear of what lays outside their cubicle walls.

Why am I writing about this today if the latest decapitation took place several months ago? To be honest, I had decided not to post about it because I’m trying really hard to let it go, but, today’s article on the Slow Leadership site, aptly titled Loyalty and a Culture of Fear was just too apropos to let it go.

I love this paragraph from the article because it really encapsulizes what I felt happened to me (yes, I wasn’t mature when I sent my frustrated email that ultimately got me fired, but that was the boiling point of an ongoing, unaddressed problem where I felt a total lack of respect from my workplace as a whole): Surely respect for others should extend to respect for their opinions, concerns, and anxieties? To be respectful means to listen with an open mind and a tolerant outlook. You won’t find Hamburger Managers with either. That’s why they make such poor listeners. They think they already know everything useful, and they have no respect for anyone who cannot directly advance their prospects. Of course they demand loyalty, even though they give none to others.

The next time you are upset about the lack of loyalty from an employee, boss, friend or family-member look to yourself first. Are you able to listen to this person’s ideas and anxieties without becoming threatened? Can you have an academic debate with them about these ideas? Do you understand that it is because this person respects you that they have come to you with concerns? Have you displayed loyalty to this person or do you try to climb the ladder of success by standing on her back?

Think about it – what you get from people is often a direct reflection of what you give to them.  Just like the HR person who had, under the direction of others, terminated so many people under ‘interesting’ circumstances.

My in-laws were coming to town and we agreed to meet for dinner the evening of their arrival. We settled on a delicious Chinese restaurant that was central to Hubby’s, my, and sis-in-law’s work.

We were seated and had ordered. We’d finished saying our “hellos” and were settling into conversation when a party of 5 was escorted past our table and seated two tables away against the wall. That party of 5 consisted of the man who fired me / co-owner of The Company, his teenage daughter and presumably one of her friends, and the female co-owner of The Company with her boyfriend.

I whispered to my companions, “And over there, is the man who fired me.” “What, What?” they exclaimed. My mother in-law was too focussed on her potstickers to be torn away (they were really really good potstickers). My sister-in-law is an expert in female subterfuge, so with a wink and a nod she coyly fake-sneezed, thus having to turn her head in the direction of the little fellow and his party of clearly evil friends and offspring. “In the orange sweatshirt?” She asked. I nodded yes. She narrowed her eyes and unleashed a catty barrage of middle fingers and nasty eye-rolls hidden from the party of 5, but directed toward them for my entertainment.

In the meantime, Hubby was quietly tapping my shoulder. I turned to him and he pointed to his shirt. Alas…he was wearing one of The Company’s T-shirts, the “ugly logo 3000″ model. I shrieked a hysterical burst of laughter and covered my mouth. He quickly put on his jacket. (I always give Hubby my company swag. I just can’t stand to wear the hypocritical, “we’re so cool we give you T-shirts (but forget raises or bonuses or just plain being nice to you) – and it’s free advertising for us” clothing. As long as it is an XL cotton T-shirt Hubby doesn’t care. A funny side note is one of the ex-employees of The Company would throw out all the company logo crap we’d get. A brain injured neighbor of hers always went through his neighbors’ garbage on garbage collection day. After about three years of this, she noticed that his wardrobe pretty much consisted of The Company’s T-shirts. Another one of my co-workers used the T-shirts in his shop as grease rags. …and The Company continues to think this is a perk that the employees love… Anyhoo…I digress.)

My father-in-law is a religion professor and one of the most kind, loyal, and intelligent people I have in my life. Like many academics I’ve known, he is also often a few steps behind the conversation. He raised his head from his cup of tea and said “What What! That table over there?” Yes, I nodded. “Well,” he snorted, “I’ll be sending them bad thoughts throughout the whole dinner.”

Our conversation turned to other things and we thoroughly enjoyed the meal. We paid the check and left, just as The Company folks were digging into their entrees. As we briskly walked to our cars, my father-in-law informed me that he had sent them the evil eye, gypsy curses, and bad thoughts the whole time until they left. “Until they left?” I quizzically replied, “But, they are still there.” “Oh no!” he exclaimed. “Weren’t they the table right next to us?” “Nope, that was some nice family out for dinner,” sister-in-law chimed in. The whole family was stunned. What had he done? He’d put gypsy curses on an innocent family?!!!!

Well, I’d like to say that everyone learned a lesson that night about pettiness, unprofessionalism, and arrogance. Unfortunately, I don’t think any lessons were learned since the co-owners of The Company are unaware that by firing me they put a gypsy curse on an innocent family. Considering the things I’ve heard about their behavior since my firing – they’ve continued to put innocent families at risk for misplaced curses.

A word to the wise, when you are out on the town, carry a lucky charm or evil-eye ward. There have been a lot of lay-offs in this town over the last few years and you never know when the well-intentioned curses of a supportive father-in-law will mistakenly land on you.

Hubby and I have actually followed most of the advice in this article over the course of our unstable careers in the software industry. I believe that having a savings account with 6 months minimum living expenses in it at all times and doing lots of networking in the software community are the two best things we’ve done to mitigate the effects of sudden job loss and quickly transition to contract work or new jobs.

However, building up a buffer of living expenses, pursuing other paths of income through contracting, attending networking functions, and adding different skills to your repetoire all take time in addition to our 50+ hour work weeks (and I’m being kind here on the hours – lots of people I know put in 60-70 hour weeks). My concern is that job loss in this industry is so widespread and accepted, that workers are sinking into an unhealthy job-loss paranoia. This leads to constantly working multiple jobs, squirreling away money, and not taking time to care for one’s health and relationships. (Obesity is up, divorce is up – gee, I wonder why?) Additionally, you become afraid to spend even a little money on a reasonable vacation, car maintenence, or home improvemnets. Hubby and I went through a phase of complete job-loss paranoia. We worked constantly and spent little. It was beyond preparation or ‘being responsible.’ It was paranoid and miserable. It didn’t lead to a new career or business; it lead to exhaustion and depression. We didn’t enjoy even a fresh slice of the fruits of our labors. My advice is be prepared and financially responsible, but make sure you play too. Maybe cut out an expense that you don’t use much and don’t take that third contract. You’ll have the same amount of money and a little more time to sleep, hike, and visit Grandma.

My second concern is the psychological damage that layoffs cause. You can say it is just business. You can say you saw it coming. You can already have cleared your desk 2 weeks ago in preparation. You may be just fine if you can’t find another job for 6 months. This may be THE opportunity to get your own business on its feet. I’ve been in this position, where losing my job was ‘no big’ in the great scheme of things. Still, if you are a person who works hard and invests a bit of passion or even a little ‘caring’ into a product, company, or team – every job dismissal is emotionally painful. You still can’t help but feel scared of the unknown future, self-questioning (why me? how did I get to the top of the lay-off list?), angry (but all my reviews were 5 star reviews! I had no notice!), and sad (but I loved working with Kenneth, I’m really going to miss him). You are finanically prepared, you have other skills you can fall back on, you just finished your certification, but you may still be really really depressed. The only advice I have is – it really isn’t you, it is Corporate America. Something is truly going wrong in this country when it comes to employing the American worker. The best way to immediately feel better is to grab your craziest relative and go on a vacation (see previous posts). That vacation may just be crashing on their couch for a week – but believe me – the adventures you can have on a crazy relative’s couch are numerous, unexpected, and refreshing (even if you break the couch, which Uncle E, Aunt S, Mom and I did once – during an especially depressing time that inspired the invention of ‘Couch Basketball.’ There is nothing a little duct tape won’t fix). Once you get back from your vacation start thinking about not just how you can get another job, but how you can change this completely shitty job-situation the American worker-bee is stuck in. Stop shopping at big corporations and support your small, local businesses. Vow to stop working more than 40 hours a week for a corporation that will lay you off based on some esoteric thing that has nothing to do with actual performance. Instead spend that extra 10 hours a week cultivating your own business or a new skill. Get a non-work related hobby – learn to play the banjo (believe me, you can’t play the banjo and still feel sad, even if you are a really really bad banjo player). Exercise 30 minutes a day. Walk your dog and do NOT for any deadline set by any company skip your kid’s band concert! You will have more personal satisfaction, be healthier, and be more entertaining at parties. Your dog will stop chewing up the couch cushions and your kid will grow up a little better adjusted because her parents were actually able to hear her one and only amazing performance of the oboe solo in Samson and Delilah (oops…I think I got a little too specific there…but really it was just an example I pulled out of thin air…really…)

My final concern is about how people do when they get another job. I’m currently working in a company of refugees. You could call them ‘sudden job-loss experts,’ but really we are more like refugees. We joke about it and try to be aware of our behavior in light of it, but I see this “refugee syndrome” becoming more widespread across many companies where it is not discussed openly or addressed. One reaction I see in many software company refugees is to become very afraid they’ll lose their jobs again. Therefore, they aim to ‘fly under the radar.’ They say yes to every managerial request – whether it is possible to fulfill or not. They don’t ask questions. They do not innovate or initiate. They will not stick their necks out for their reports or peers. They will get the job done just enough to not get fired, but they aren’t moving the company forward, they aren’t moving themselves forward, and they aren’t having any fun (and frankly, it ain’t no fun to work with them either). Things that used to be the hallmark of an outstanding employee are now viewed as risks that raise your name to the top of the ‘lay-off’ list. In a way, the software industry is creating a body of employees who are not good employees because of the way they’ve been treated by the software industry. This in turn is going to make the software industry less stable, less productive, and less competitive in the world market. On the flip side, there are a few people, like me, who have gone the other way. I’m pretty much poised to tell anyone to f*** off, becasue I’m just not going to take one extra drop of shit if there isn’t something in it for me right now (not a dangling carrot, but a real thing that you can give me right now to make me put up with you). With this attitude, the current estimate of me retaining my new job through the end of this year – I’d say is ummm…37% success. How do we, the workers, solve this (because I sure don’t see the corporate executives doing anything other than mouthing those same old words “It’s just business.”)? First of all, I think we need to check ourselves and make sure we are still enjoying that 40+ hours a week enough to warrant the pain of the job. Like my orthopedic doctor says “Let the pain be your guide.” Living in fear 40 hours a week to just get a paycheck that you squirrel away to cover your next layoff – it just isn’t utilizing this great gift of being healthy, alive, and in a country where we are free to pursue pretty-much (within the basic rules of humanity) whatever interests we have. Even without our fancy software jobs, we are still wealthier than a huge percentage of the rest of the world – so maybe having to share one bathroom, not having a TiVo in every room, not eating out 3 times a week at good restaurants, not having a different pair of cute shoes for each exercise machine at the gym, not having a brand-new gas-guzzling SUV for each member of the family – maybe these things are worth sacrificing for better health, better sex, intelligent kids, relaxed dogs, beautiful gardens, healthy home-cooked meals, and some majorly blazing licks on the banjo!

This is what I believe and what I *theoretically* aim to practice. I haven’t been able to achieve consistent practice of my own advice, but I’m going to strive to do it – in honor of the Intel refugees.

http://www.escapefromcubiclenation.com/get_a_life_blog/2006/05/open_letter_to_.html

Here is the story:
A typical small but rapidly growing company gave an entire department of employees, probably about 7% of its staff, an ultimatum — your department is being shut down; you will be transferred to a new job; new boss; new responsibilities and you will like it (we’ll check back after X days – draw some blood, do a polygraph test, and ensure that you like your new job — if you don’t, you’ll be let go) or you will ‘choose’ to be laid off now. You have until tomorrow morning to decide.

The next morning, the entire department decided to walk.

Before the ultimatum was given, there was great discussion and number crunching among the executives. It was agreed that the numbers clearly showed that they could expect a 25% “attrition” of the 7% offered the ultimatum. A few people, those pesky questioners who you can already identify as the bad apples (like me), will certainly go, but the good ones – the ones who need their jobs and have stuck through whatever abuses have been heaped on them in the past – will stay. Imagine the shock when 100% of the 7% left.

OK — so far I’ve been trying to be sarcastically entertaining, but now I’m actually serious. This kind of event in a company is a real morale killer. It is one thing to have a big lay-off, to re-organize several groups in a company, or to switch methodologies as a response to changing times and technologies. This kind of event always creates perceived (if not real) instability, and some people will leave. Most people can wrap their brains around these common corporate events and turn to a Dilbert cartoon or tell themselves that they weren’t laid off because they are really good at their jobs, or whatever it takes to rationalize the uncertainty, guilt, and fear that employees often feel after lay-offs and reorgs. However, giving an entire unified group of people, many who have worked for you for 5+ years (In the software business, years are like dog-years. Being able to stay in a single software job for 5 years is equivalent to 25 years in a government position.), some who have been promoted multiple times and clearly were considered exemplary performers — giving these people a choice to buy into the new system or leave — and having them all ‘choose’ to leave — isn’t a typical lay-off/reorg occurrence. In fact, it is a statement. It is leadership from the lower ranks, the little guy who really needs a job saying, “You know, you can only push me so far. I’ll give up my luxuries and risk unemployment in exchange for never working for you again.”

The serious part is, how do you recover from this? Now, as the leader of your company, you need to explain something pretty negative that you put into motion, not just a few folks who didn’t fit in anymore (like me and my ‘deserved’ firing). You have to explain a unified group of well-liked people choosing to leave. No matter how you spin it, this looks to the remaining employees like you did not offer a reasonable ‘choice.’ How do you settle people down, get them back on board with the “new” plan so blatently rejected by their now-ex-coworkers? How do you get them through the grieving of losing people who they worked with and respected 40+ hours a week? You need to get the people who remain to trust you again and feel that you aren’t going to do this to them, because you value them in a way that you didn’t value the others. If you can successfully get this message across (and possibly come off as sincere) then the typical rationalization that goes on after these events can begin. You can pray you’ve stocked your company with emotional eunuchs who are just there for the paycheck and aren’t phased by these events – but that just isn’t reality. People say “It’s just business,” but most of them feel insecure, fearful, and don’t trust you anymore.

One company’s solution was to provide free snacks for everyone, starting the day after the morale killing event. One day – a shocking morale killing event happens. The next day – no problem, don’t worry, your company loves you, look we bought snacks.

My intial reaction is I am absolutely incensed at how condescending and disrespectful this is. Is the value of my livlihood – are 40 hours+ of my life week after week – worth only the value of a free cookie? Maybe when I was 5 and fell down roller skating, a cookie helped me forget about my skinned knee, but I am not 5 anymore. Anyone who has any respect for me will acknowledge the situation in a way that coincides with my age (36), professional experience (9 years in this field), and IQ (off the charts). A cookie just doesn’t even begin to do that. Plus, I have high cholesterol and can’t eat your damned cookie anyway! (I can eat a chicken (or tofurkey) in a pot, though.)

A little reflection, though, led me to realize one positive thing about this seemingly cheap and transparent attempt at calming the troops. People will talk about what happened. They will need to process it together. They will blame you; they will say negative things about you; they will say the middle-managers are spineless … did they know – did they not know … who do we trust? You can’t stop this behavior – it will happen. Let the employees do it — let them say what needs to be said, explore the possibilities, bond over it, process it, and move on. Facilitate it by providing a place and a reason (snacks) to gather around each other and hash it out. As the executive, stay away, keep your ego in a box, and let them do what needs to be done to move on. Don’t take names and punish the gossipers later – stay away and let them work through it. In a way, this is an insightful and kind of healthy (emotionally healthy, not physically – the snacks actually contribute to obesity, diabetes and heart disease) acknowledgement that people will need to ‘detox’ after such an incident.

I guess the problem I have is – can companies that put their employees in such ‘rock and a hard place’ situations turn around and do something so insightful into human behavior? My benefit-of-the-doubt is melting away, like butter on the popcorn at a lame morale-building company event.

Morale building (or re-building in this case) events at work has been a recent topic on the Scott Berkun blog. Check out this post and especially check out the comments: http://www.scottberkun.com/blog/?p=313. A lot of people have interesting experiences and opinions that executives could learn from.

Something the article doesn’t address, though, is once you have gotten something so…how do I say it…. Once you are at the point where an entire group of employees chooses to leave you and your new ideas and your paycheck – how do you get the people who remain to continue to believe in you and your ideas – without just coming off really lame or condescending? I actually think companies have to grapple with this more than I’d like to admit. How do executives come back from “the abyss” as strong leaders with credibility?

I came up with the title for this post on the bus home today, and I’m not entirely sure it fits. I guess what I am trying to convey is that it doesn’t matter what you say or how many shiny pamphlets of The Company’s fabulous values you produce – as the leaders of a company (or any kind of leader – a parent, a sports coach, a member of the neighborhood association) it is what you DO that people notice and remember. If what you DO doesn’t match that shiny pamphlet or your teary-eyed heart felt speech, then you will be viewed as a person who lacks integrity. People may continue to follow you – to a point – for money or whatever agenda they have. However, they won’t take any risks for you, they certainly will not trust you, and they will never be loyal to you. To put it in the words of the movie “Office Space” they will only do enough to not get fired, and most of them are probably polishing their resumes, surfing the help wanted ads in their spare time, or gunning for your job behind your back.

Recently, a few things have brought up a lot of feelings about my firing. Namely, some recent articles on Guy Kawasaki’s blog and the Slow Leadership blog started gnawing at me: Guy Kawasaki’s (http://blog.guykawasaki.com/management/index.html) July 26 post on The Art of Firing and a related post on The Art of the Layoff as well as the July 31 Slow Leadership (http://www.slowleadership.com) post, Leaving a Wake Behind, keep popping into my thoughts. In addition to resurrecting my personal feelings that I was treated very poorly by The Company and the human beings who manage it, I think these articles also surfaced some tangled thoughts and emotions on integrity and greed in the American workplace. I even wonder if the U.S. is becoming less of a democracy and more of a corporation every day. People I used to think of as intelligent and innovative, I now see as greedy and gutless. Am I just ‘growing up’ or is America changing before my eyes?

My new job has me thinking about work-life balance, leadership, organization, and communication. What do these things mean in the software business? Do I fit into this business anymore? What are my personal beliefs now about these concepts which are very important to me? Am I any good at any of these things?

Finally, The Company had an apalling and poorly handled employee ‘situation’ today. Several skilled long-term employees who were personally dedicated and invested in The Company and its leaders (and whose ideas and hard work made The Company a lot of money in the past) were given an ultimatum to leave now or ‘fall in line’ (more on this later). This latest showing of corporate arrogance, greed, abuse of power, and lack of humanity in business underscores all the thoughts that have been rolling around in my head. Additionally this incident sparked these questions: Why don’t people stick up for each other anymore? What carrots can companies dangle that turn ‘activist’ people with high integrity into tow the line for “the man” (even if it is a sleazy thing to do) managers? How far can you push your employees before the fear of losing their jobs no longer outweighs the frustration of their job or that dangling carrot? After 10 years of “bursting bubbles,” layoffs, outsourcing, underemployment, automation, and management through fear (of losing one’s job), why would any American worker in the software industry give an extra hour of unpaid time, invest themselves whole-heardedly, take a risk and introduce an innovative idea, or even be able to get remotely excited about another job in the software industry? With the global economy, does corporate America even care about retaining its American employees? Have they forgotten that the workers of the U.S.A. are also the consumers of the U.S.A.?

This is everything that is on my mind today. I want it to change. Better yet, I want to hear that I am wrong. I want people to respect each other. I want the people who do the best work to be the most valued. I want passion for your work to be seen as a positive thing. I want intelligence and thoughtful questioning to be seen as traits of an excellent employee. I want people to stick up for each other. I don’t want people to be afraid to tell the truth. I want the underdog to win! I want Mr. Smith goes to Washington, Norma Rae, and a “chicken in every pot.” I want the human dedication that we, as a people, had for each other for those few months after Sept. 11 – before we went back to our rushed world of greed, politics, and hate-mongering. There, for just a little while, it didn’t matter if you were gay, Jewish, poor, black, brown, yellow, male, female, vegan, canine, feline, young, old, Democrat, Republican, or politically agnostic. It didn’t matter where you were on the corporate ladder. People were willing to risk their lives for each other. They gave their money and their blood for each other and each other’s families. We sat as a nation and cried for total strangers and their losses and their families. It went away so fast, and it is so sad that an apalling, cruel, national catastrophe is what it takes for us to turn away from our money and our rightousness to just treat each other with a passionate kind of caring… Only to abandon our short-lived compassion and intelligent discourse and turn our attention to mean opportunists (and, thus, make them rich) like Ann Coulter or to have Mel Gibson spewing hate on the national news and to forget that all of this is about people, flesh and blood, spiritual, intelligent, and important people, all of them. None of them are truly good and none are truly evil — they are just people. We need to help each other make it through this increasingly difficult and morally complex life – hopefully with some personal satisfaction, happiness, health, love, (and a chicken (or tofurkey) in every pot, dammit!) for each of us. It isn’t just business. What The Company did today. What The Company did when they fired me WAS personal, and it left a wake affecting not just me, but my husband, my parents, and even my new job. Everything I did, personally, before and after The Company left a wake. I am now realizing this, and I want to change myself too. I want to leave a wake that is positive, shockingly humanitarian, and brilliantly supportive. I’m still going to be annoying, passionate, rosie-eyed, CHICKEN (or tofurkey) IN EVERY POT me!! I can’t be the impassionate, unquestioning, unrecognized, low-paid, yet productive zombie that corporate America wants and still leave a positive wake. I can’t help but feel that what I want from my life is not a popular thing to want in America right now, and that this attitude will only get me fired again and again!

OK…I’ve gone all Drama Queen…but this is how I feel tonight…and it is a feeling that has been brewing in my gut for awhile now. Please, prove me wrong. Tell me I’ve just had bad luck. Send me your stories, ideas, and opinions.

I want these feelings to change.

http://money.cnn.com/2006/05/02/technology/business2_nextjobboom_cover0502/index.htm

Here is an exerpt:
“The number of workers who are delivering take-this-job-and-shove-it speeches and bailing for more rewarding, less spirit-crushing work is at a five-year high.”

Here is what happened. The company re-orged to the Muck style of project development for all projects except the one I was on. The project I was on was being managed by the “nano-managment” concept. Never heard of it? Well, I’m sure you’ve heard of “micro-management.” Micro is a millionth while nano is a billionth. Instead of just managing your employees at every step, as in micro-management, the cofounders of the company had decided to do everyone’s jobs themselves. I call this nano-management. This meant, for the first time ever, the co-founders of the company were both in my ‘team’ meeting (I put ‘team’ in quotes because there was nothing teamlike about this project unless you define a team as a group of people who sit and watch the co-founders redo or undo all of the work that has just been done).

I walked into my second ‘team’ meeting and everyone was there except the two co-founders. We twirled our pencils and small-talked for 15 minutes before we decided we’d better just start the meeting. Another 15 minutes passed before the co-founders finally arrived. (To help you create some imagery in your mind’s eye, one cofounder was a female marketing person and the other a male programmer.) The woman stormed in the room. The look on her face was like a thundercloud. The man arrived about 30 paces behind her. He looked irritable – like when you tease a cat until its ears are flattened back against its head and its tail twitches. They sat at opposite ends of the table.

It was my turn to talk, so I brought up some software defects that seemed problematic and were a result of uninformed design decisions. I presented the problem, some solutions, and the time it would take to test those resolutions. The male co-founder admonished me as if I were a stupid child, telling me it wasn’t important, and that I’m too cautious (helloooo, quality assurance person here, of course I’m cautious, that is why you hired me). Honestly, he was nasty in his demeanor and his word choice. Next, the project manager explained to the female co-founder that we were going around the table reporting on our weekly progress and would she like to report on the marketing stuff? That unleashed the cattiest most inappropriately condescendingly toned progress report I’ve ever heard in my life. If she were my employee instead of my boss’ boss’ boss, I would have called her into my office and had a little chat with her about her attitude.

After that, the rest of the meeting continued under an atmosphere of what I can only describe as the ‘team’ sitting like a bunch of children at the dinner table witnessing that final pre-divorce fight between mom and dad. I walked away with a renewed energy to surf the job ads on a daily basis. Clearly, something was terribly wrong. The ship must be sinking. Why else would two successful, adult, professional CEOs behave so nastily at a pretty mundane project meeting?

Later that day I ran into a co-worker that said he thought his Muck project presentation really made the co-founders mad. Right after his presentation, he saw female co-founder storm out of her office, slamming the door behind her, and stalking down the hall. Shortly there-after, male co-founder exited the office and followed a safe 30 paces behind her with the operations guy in tow, frantically scribbling notes. What could cause such a scene other than news of a project going seriously awry, losing lots of money, and blowing another hole in the deck of an already sinking ship?

I found out the answer to that question a few days later. It wasn’t his project presentation, it was the men’s urinals.

That’s right, you don’t need new reading glasses. It was the men’s urinals that caused all that commotion and nastiness. I’ll explain:

One night while working late on a doomed project, the doomed project manager swung by for a bitch session. We discussed the doomedness of the project and various things before he said to me, “and then there is the whole urinal thing.” Huh?

Some background: We had just moved into a new building. All new cubicles and furniture were purchased. Custom carpet was designed. Many things were done at great expense to make the company look ‘corporate.’ It was a nice building and nice stuff, but a lot of people were unhappy that this money had been spent while good workers were laid off in the same time frame. Additionally, workers were given no input into their environment and the cubes were too small for the super technical folks who needed to use multiple computers and too tall for the collaborative folks who needed to brainstorm with their co-workers a lot. All of middle management was mad because they were given inner offices with no windows. In the meantime, the male co-founder was tearing down the cublicles of his people, removing the nice furniture, and making them practice MUCK in messy non-corporate looking ‘bull-pens.’ There was a lot of bitching going on and apparently the female co-founder, who spent months agonizing over carpet swatches and color schemes, was fed up.

According to my source who was in the most recent managment meeting, which had happened right before my ‘flashback to dinner with divorcing parents’ meeting, another complaint was lodged by the male co-founder. Apparently his all-male programming team was complaining that the urinal closest to the door of the men’s bathroom, was in plain sight of the company lobby when the bathroom door was open. As a result, the programmers were uncomfortable (some were even unable, if you know what I mean) using the bathroom.

The response of the female co-founder was that she would absolutely not spend any money on this issue. The male co-founder countered that it was not appropriate to dismiss a complaint about a privacy issue like this. He pointed out that some of the guys were UNABLE to use the bathroom due to the fear that someone in the lobby, a female co-worker or the UPS guy, might see their ding-a-lings.

The operations guy started brainstorming, “Maybe we can buy a really big plant for the lobby, to block the view, or maybe one of those Chinese screens around that urinal. Those don’t cost much.” The manager tellling me this story was, at this point in the meeting, sitting with his head in his hands trying to hide that he was laughing so hard he was crying. Apparently the issue escalated to the co-founders yelling at each other about the urinals. It climaxed with the female co-founder saying “Well, let’s just go look at the damned bathroom,” and dramatically storming out of the room, slamming the door, and stalking down the hall. Male co-founder stood up and silently followed her. Operations guy stumbled behind them, still spewing ideas and scribbling notes “Perhaps if we change the direction that the men’s room door opens…” Once everyone was out of the room, my informant collapsed in hysterical laughter. Finally, he managed to compose himself and head to the men’s room.

When he arrived, the scientific part of the process was already underway. Male co-founder had propped open the men’s room door and was standing at the nearest urinal miming urination. Female co-founder was in the company lobby, testing various positions and angles around the room to see exactly how much she could see of the urinator. Operations guy had pulled a measuring tape from his belt and was madly measuring the width of the door, the distance from the urinal to the door, the distance between urinals, etc…

And this, my dears, is what caused the co-founders to behave in such an unappreciative and rude fashion toward the ‘team’ of people who were working extra hours to try to plug up the holes in the sinking ship.

I like it, though. It brings about very specific imagery. I wish I could draw. Imagine this cartoon: There is a ship, its mast flies the company flag. The ornament on the front of the ship resembles the female co-founder. The ship is clearly starting to sink. There is water on the deck. The employees are already in the life rafts, and the operations guy is lowering them to the safety of the open sea. The male co-founder is standing on the deck peeing and, as happens from time to time to all of us, his aim isn’t so good. That little bit of urine that splashes on the deck, instead of over the side of the ship, is like the straw that breaks the camel’s back. As the urine hits the deck, the ship tilts and quickly sinks into the ocean, female cofounder ornament first – the operations guy clinging to the mast that still holds a battered and torn company flag. The employees in the life rafts look on, some in horror and others with relief; then, they turn and paddle out to the open sea.