My experience in the Navy was good preparation for a career in a giant corporation. That’s because both government and corporate bureaucracies do well-intentioned things that turn out to be idiotic and comical.
The Dilbert comic strip has a big following among corporate employees who are convinced that cartoonist Scott Adams worked for their company. (Actually, he worked for a unit of my company.)
The telephone company where I worked was well managed and did most things right, but perpetrated occasional nonsense when earnest ideas had unintended consequences. To encourage employees to show up for work, the company gave awards for perfect attendance. One of my people was a week away from a five-year attendance award when she came down with the flu. She dragged herself into work nevertheless, was awarded her pen-and-pencil set and infected several co-workers. My group’s attendance went to hell that month.
One year the company launched a massive employee suggestion program and, to encourage participation, awarded a prize to every employee who submitted a suggestion. So there were LOTS of suggestions, most of which were ill informed and utterly useless. As the publisher of the employee magazine, I had to respond to scores of suggestions claiming that some backwoods printer could print 50,000 copies of the magazine at lower cost than my high-volume supplier in Chicago. Then I started getting calls from printers — we just talked to your new purchasing agent – who quickly backed off when I explained our requirements.
When I was the project manager of a departmental computer system, I was dismayed to learn that my modest array of off-the-shelf servers and word processors required the same approval process as a custom-built mainframe mega-system. The Kafkaesque labyrinth of reviews and approvals took a solid year and involved surreal conversations such as: Q- Why does the network planning department require two months to sign off on the project? A- They have to log it.
Bureaucratic procedures can be an excuse for merriment. A factory where I worked distributed a safety bulletin on every on-the-job injury and included a photo of the accident scene. Most of us didn’t read these bulletins. Then a hapless employee was injured in the washroom when he got up from the toilet and somehow bumped his head on the toilet paper dispenser. The safety guys were unable to resist issuing a bulletin on the freak accident with an obligatory photo of the toilet stall. Everybody read it.
In my post-corporate career as a freelancer my old company was one of my clients. One day I got a form letter from the accounting department announcing that all suppliers would be paid in 90 days instead of the customary 30 days. My first call was to the company’s local telephone office to ask if their new accounts payable policy meant I could pay my phone bill in 90 days. The service rep and I had a good laugh. I maintained my cash flow by raising my rates and offering a discount for payment in 30 days. I’ll bet most of the company’s suppliers did likewise.