Monday, May 3, 2010

Working in a Call Center

If you work in a telemarketing / call center, you have lots of time to:
1. Make up fictitious company slogans:
Blah Blah the call center company that lowers your expectations one call at
a time.
Blah Blah the call center company that lowers the service bar one call at a time.
2. You also have time to call people you who actually want to know if they are on candid camera?

Call center employees are minor executives in minor corporations.

Sunday, May 2, 2010

The Beginning of the End

I firmly believe that when Microsoft created the Excel spreadsheet program, most middle managers lost their minds. What I mean is managers actually believe that if they can put some figures and some words into a spreadsheet they must be true. Somehow spreadsheets have come to mean credibility. And what is even is spreadsheets have became invincible. Whatever an off the wall manager puts into a spreadsheet must be doable, and once something is supposedly doable, in this economy the downstream workers can't say no to doing it. No matter how outrageous or impossible to accomplish the goals are, as set forth in any spreadsheet the worker bees must agree to actually trying to reach these ridiculous goals. Goals used to be attainable and mutually agreed on. Today all middle management has to do is create a spreadsheet or a Word document and all of a sudden all the worker bees have to line up and agree to march into the sunset and commit suicide if they don't reach the absurd middle management goals.