Saying Good Bye
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I may get some grief for this, but I thought I'd share it. I've received many complements over the past year about it, so maybe some others out there will enjoy it. It came up on my personal blog this week from a year ago, so I decided to share.
I left Peoplesoft last May (2004) for a variety of reasons, mostly because I didn't enjoy the job. I sent this letter to the CEO, COO, CIO, and most of IT when I did so.
Over the last six months, I have had the opportunity to greatly expand my horizons, managing the Operations DBAs for a large enterprise, working with different platforms, facing new challenges, and meeting many new people as Peoplesoft acquired J.D. Edwards. I would like to note that I have thoroughly enjoyed meeting and speaking with many of you, too many to name. I do have to mention the people that I have managed as they are a great team and contributed greatly to any success that I have had. They are all extremely hardworking, very technically competent, and always willing to pull together and solve problems.
Thanks to Daniel, John, Jon, Linda, Norman, Oliver, Raj, Ray, Steve, and Tammy.
Peoplesoft has implemented a managed ranking system that forces us to rank each employee with his peers. While I do not particularly agree with this system, especially the quotas that are included with it, I have a fundamental problem with it in that I believe it is responsible for many of the problems plaguing IT today. As I attended the manager training, I was told that my rankings were subject to change, or more specifically that I may be forced to "change" my rankings to ensure the quotas are met, specifically at the low end. There is no changing that occurs to ensure we have a certain number of people at the high end, but I might submit my ratings and rankings, which are based on performance reviews, and then be asked to "move" someone into a lower ranking to ensure the quotas are met.
That was, in my mind, at that moment, in that meeting, a line in the sand.
You see, I believe that this system, the med school philosophy, the forced rankings, the survival of the fittest, is the basic problem with Peoplesoft. While it seems to be designed to promote competition and motivate people to do their best, it ignores the human factor. It ignores that most of us have bills to pay, that we don't want to be constantly engaged in a rat race to outdo our neighbor, that we do not want to search for a new job, and that we do not want to live in fear. This culture of fear that each Peoplesoft employee lives under, the fear that they may be ranked lower than their peers and their employment terminated, creates a race to the bottom. A race to not to outdo your peers, but to not look the worst. Playing not to lose instead of playing to win.
This mentality creates an atmosphere where people don't work well together. Meetings are called where almost nothing is accomplished because of the fear of making a commitment which you cannot keep and thus will be rated lower. Issues arise and more effort is spent deflecting blame or proving it's not your fault than is spent on solving the issue. The achievement of goals for the enterprise takes a back seat to the avoidance of blame. Peoplesoft seeks to promote the individual instead of the team. Not that this philosophy is wrong, it's just not something I agree with. It's something that runs counter to my goals. When I accepted employment at J.D. Edwards, I did so mainly because of a great team of people that worked together. A family style, we're in this together atmosphere that I enjoyed working in. Everyday at J.D. Edwards I enjoyed going to work. Not that there weren't problems, but they paled in comparison to benefits of people working together.
At Peoplesoft I dread going to work more and more each day. There are people that I have to prepare myself to deal with. And despite the many people that I like as people, it is far outweighed by the negatives of the structure of the company. And so I have tendered my resignation because I don't enjoy coming to work and the culture of the company has deviated too far from that which I had known when I began my employment. It has taken less than a year, but I realize that I am not a PeoplePerson.
I don't mean to imply that Peoplesoft is wrong or that any of you should look for employment elsewhere. You should manage your career and do what is best for yourself and your family. There are better places to work and worse ones. The grass is not always greener and be sure that you think through any decisions to make a change. Do not make a decision on emotion. I am sending this criticism as just that, honest, open criticism, which is my personal opinion, but similar views have been expressed by many people to me. Many people who are afraid to voice these same concerns for fear of losing their job.
Thanks and best of luck to you all. I leave you with this.
Leadership is critical
Yet quite ephemeral.
The qualities of a good leader are hard to quantify,
Yet easy to spot by all who would follow.
An effective leader
appears to lead his charge effortlessly,
followers eager to follow,
Driving themselves and others toward the goal.
People want to be appreciated, to feel safe,
and to be rewarded.
They must also be accountable.
Peoplesoft IT demands the latter and supplies none of the former.
J. Steven Jones
Manager, IT Database Services
PeopleSoft
I had planned on sending this the day before I left so that I could get a response from my CIO, but then thought better of it. I wanted to say good bye to some people and leave on my terms, and I figured I'd be persona non grata about 10 minutes after I sent this. So I waited until my last day, sent it, closed the laptop and turned it into my boss. Out the door within my ten minute window.
Besides, they had my contact info. Only one VP contacted me later. He agreed with what I'd written.
Steve Jones
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WOW! It took a lot of courage to say and do what you did (last day - 10 minute window or not)...
Unfortunately PeopleSoft doesn't seem to be very different from more than half the companies out there...but then you're so right - "the grass is NOT always greener...."!
**ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI !!!** -
Hi Steve,
Great editorial and interesting topic. I have two comments:
1. The reason the grass is greener some places is because of all the fertilizer they're spreading there.
2. If only 20% (or 30% or whatever %) of the employees in a company are the top people, who's failing? Is HR failing to hire great people 80% of the time? Or are 80% of the great people hired managed so poorly that they underperform?
Andy
Andy Leonard, Chief Data Engineer, Enterprise Data & Analytics
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Wow -- excellent letter, good for you for not just taking a "who cares" attitude but for expressing your views and concerns. However, sometimes a "ranking" structure like that might actually be a benefit. I am a consultant to the US Air Force and was a former USAF officer, in charge of many military and civilian personnel. The deal with performance ratings was that everyone needed to be a "firewalled 10" or you were killing their career. Try to give a AF civilian employee less than stellar performance ratings and you'd get a grievance filed against you thru the civilian union. I had folks who had been in their position 3 - 5 years or so (sw developers) who couldn't write a simple, working ASP page. I kid you not. I gave a less-than-stellar rating and spent the next 2 years fighting grievances and discrimination claims. The DoD is trying to implement a new personnel system where promotions and pay is based on true performance (I would assume rankings must be part of it). We'll see how that works out. I would have loved to have PeopleSoft's ranking structure in place because I could "blame the system" if needed when giving performance reports. But I do agree that in a team of awesome performers, rating someone in the lowest category really stinks. Especially if you have a team that outshines many other teams. Your "lowest" performer may actually be better than the "highest" performer on another team. Man, I love being self-employed...
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Nice letter. Good points mentioned about how upper management often forgets the human factor. We're not all widgets...
I've heard Microsoft fires the bottom performing 15% of their workforce each year. Anyone know if this is true?
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Steve,
That's a great letter. I'm sure some might argue that there are those who thrive in that kind of environment, yada yada yada. But what seems now is more companies focus on 'management strategy' in a vacuum and not with the over all picture or at least with the human factors and products in mind, and that might be the definition of a corporation, and I just never understood. I think vocabulary is the key issue in letting the joining party know in clear words what is part of the game.
In the States and to a certain extent Canada, there seems again the push on the accounting of labour and 'the poor costs of us rats in the maze' as being the ill of all that fails America and their corporations This does show that if you indenture enough people you can make a place in the marketplace and stay there for sometime with a poor product or service.
While many other countries enjoy great benefits and holidays, ie more humane treatment of the rats, and I would supposition therefore a greater standard of living.
But here in NA every big company I've ever worked in or dealt with always seems like a 'cult', and that goes from the giant in the software industry, service related management companies, and electronics distribution. And I do not feel the 'high standard of living' except for the ring leaders of their respectiive circuses (circii?).
And now, peoples personal life choices such as smoking and obesity are grounds for non-hire. Between the insurance companies and HR departments and the DBA's who assist in proving these are risks to a companies bottom line not the high paying CEO, CIO, and C whatever.
I'm downright amazed given the land of the free and my own gives greater weight to rights of the corporation than humans. Until we stop thinking we have all the answers and the corporations have them through risk perception and analysis, will we be truly enlightened.
The less of a chore work is, more will get done. And taking care of your fellow man should never be a negative.
Keep up the good fight, Steve
Cheers
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Glad you guys liked the letter and hopefully you won't find yourseld in a similar situation.
As far as I know Cisco launches 5% a quarter. I believe MS and some other larger companies look for a 5-15% a year turnover, striving to get better and better. But to me this ignores the fact that you cannot have a company of all stars. It doesn't work and striving for it is stupid. You will always have a spectrum and there will always be work along that spectrum, so building a cohesive team, IMHO, is way more important than having superstars manning every position from the secretary to the architect.
I do think that a manager should rank his people for bonuses, raises, promotions, etc. But it shouldn't be forced and it should not be disclosed. If someone isn't doing their job, get rid of them. Don't use something else as an excuse, just move them on to something else. Or somewhere else. But for people that are doing their jobs, help them to grow and fit in the company. That doesn't always mean get more work out of them.
We still have bad doctors. The Med school philosophy doesn't prevent that and neither does this.
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Brilliant Steve. Thanks for sharing that letter. I've worked at companies that tried to accomplish what peoplesoft seems to be. That is rewarding some more than other based on perormance yet staying within a budget. There is only so much to go around.
You are right that if an individual does what they need to get a certain ranking yet are downgraded arbitrarily because someone else accomplished the same is bad for morale. Companies will naturally have turnover and trying to force turnover is just poor management. If turnover is required in companies to keep ideas fresh that turnover needs to happen in senior management who set direction and policy, not in the people who actually do the work. Manager's should be free to criticize policy.
Nice going Steve
Francis
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In management field, there are generally two ways to encourage people to work harder: 1. Punish people for not doing well 2. Reward people for doing well. It seems Peoplesoft put more weight on "punishment" than "reward".
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I have to agree - Wow, and my hat's off to you Steve!
Not only are the rankings forced in a situation like this, but if your rankings are then subject to change by upper management, they are by definition also artificial. In that case, the survival of the fittest argument goes right out the window. In any event, I'm not convinced that business is the best place to apply Darwinian principles. What if we applied the same principles to people that need medical treatment? A scary thought. Yet it's being done with people's livelihoods all the time.
Unfortunately I think this example reflects a lot of what is wrong with business in the world today. If I can borrow from a previous brilliant post, we no longer have capitalism in the US, or even in the Western world for that matter, we now have Corporatism and this is a perfect example of the result.
It's a law in business that things happen in cycles, and I've been around long enough to know that what goes around comes around. I can only hope for all of our sakes that this cycle starts on the upswing again before too much longer. All that talk about 'employee empowerment' a decade or so ago seems like nothing but a cruel joke today.
My hovercraft is full of eels.
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The beatings will continue until morale improves!
The problem with such corporate eugenics is that when encouraging survival of the fittest no-one has the wit to ask "fittest at what"? It strikes me as a system to generate the ultimate back-stabbers, well as ye sow so shall ye reap. The big fish are paid to think ahead but this reeks of short sightedness.
I would hate to be a senior manager past his prime with a bunch of scheming sharks waiting to throw me on the scrap heap.
I read a presentation book called "I can see you naked" where the question of smoking when giving a presentation was brought up. This was in the days when smoking was acceptable. The conclussion was, no you shouldn't because not smoking won't alienate either the non-smokers or smokers but smoking would alienate the non-smokers. So should you build an environment that encourages teams? Well a good team environment won't alienate the loners but it will encourage the team players.
The military analogy is a bit off-the-wall. As far as I am concerned political correctness should have no place in the military. Yes the military does wash out the failures but encouraging esprit de corps is paramount. None team players are dead, literally.
What is interesting is that a place of work can go from being a joy to work for, to being an armpit in no time with only minor changes.
In Britain we had a TV program called back-to-the-floor where the big bosses had to pose incognito as ordinary workers and work on the shop floor. Some of them had the shock of their lives and a few came near to being fired for incompetence whilst in their assumed role.
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I have seen otherwise capable people (of being on a team not the team leader) getting bad reviews and bottom 10% reviews when asked to do jobs they were ill-suited for. You don't put the loner in a position where he has to be a major outspoken team player and you don't put the obsessive people person in an office with a closed door to work on a project alone for months. I think all companies go through the diversity training where your taught how not to get in legal trouble over government regulations, but real diversity - personalities, work habits, and interest are ignored instead of capitalized on. I see management promoting people just like themselves which in my opinion fosters the environment Steve speaks off . I loved that Dilbert back several years ago that the jist of it went something like this: The pointy haired boss is in a bind and is looking for someone to fill a position where he needs an out of the box thinker and is told he doesn't have anymore of them, the last ones were fired for wearing shorts on casual day. Now, in most places, shorts are not allowed as business attire, but the point is well taken. If you want everyone to be just like you, then their thought is going to be just like you.
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First of all bravo for this thread. Second of all WOW for that line : "If you want everyone to be just like you, then their thought is going to be just like you. " I think that it sums it up pretty good.
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Personally I think officespace said it best...
Peter Gibbons: You see Bob, it's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care.
Bob Porter: Don't... don't care?
Peter Gibbons: It's a problem of motivation, all right? Now if I work my ass off and Initech ships a few extra units, I don't see another dime, so where's the motivation? And here's another thing, I have eight different bosses right now.
Bob Porter: Eight?
Peter Gibbons: Eight, Bob. So that means when I make a mistake, I have eight different people coming by to tell me about it. That's my only real motivation is not to be hassled, that, and the fear of losing my job. But you know, Bob, that will only make someone work just hard enough not to get fired.
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That's the problem in our society. We all want more for less work... We can't have it both ways. But I see how that is a big problems for big companies.
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