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| NEW at least, it was in January 2003.... The babbling brilliance heard around bubblers and at barstools...
Have you ever listened to someone go on and on about something that you knew was idiotic, and yet, these folks have used this weird twist to create a hell for those around them???? Well every so often, stop by this page and check out the "They Just Don't Get It" award of the moment. (Oh, and email me any you want to nominate, okay?) Let's start with the braintrusts that helped destroy the lives of nearly every human being who went to school so that they could have steady careers... the VC's who helped provide outlandish amounts of money to the Dot.gones. First of all... if I had a few million dollars to invest, I would certainly think twice about handing it to a pair of dweebs who lived with their moms until last April, and who have had ZERO training in business. Nor would I hand over gobs of moulah to the brainiest programmer in the world no matter how brilliant his or her ideas were. The problem with these guys, the thing that the VC planet didn't get is that a business born from a simple idea is only going to fail miserably as long as the people behind these ideas have no clue as to how to run a business. A well crafted wordsmith can really put on a show when it comes to sucking up to the folks handing over cash. But, there if is no proof, (meaning months or years of evidence that a company would actually thrive), That brings me to the second member of the "They Just Don't Get It!" hall of fame. Hi, my name is Amir Trujan. (Fictitious name to annoy the innocent who may think this is about them.) I used to tie shoes by hand. BUT, in 1994 I invented the automatic online shoe-tier! Over the next eight months, I accumulated the online wealth of a mini Bill Gates, and hired nearly 60 employees to spread the magnitude of this knowledge at $19.95 subscriptions rate. In fact, fourteen of my engineers invented even better products and ideas, which I fully took credit for! For two weeks, we had a steady flow of subscribers, and then for some reason, they stopped! So, I asked my angels to hand me another 42 million dollars. The bastards refused!!! I had no choice but to send my wife to Milan to study poetry, and my children had to be all prepaid in Oxford University. For some reason, the company just isn't turning a profit. SOOO, this month, I hired a marketing director! Suddenly I have sixteen new subscribers, and I have three major corporations fighting to buy me out!! I'm happy! But, if they buy me out, they want to see that I'm profitable. Since I don't have 75 million coming in to cover the grants and free money I've spent, I think I'm going to lay off all of the engineers, the marketing department, and oh, I guess anyone who makes decisions about human resources. IF that doesn't work, I'll cut my $350,000 a year salary by .003 percent, to please the board of directors. And for some reason, the money just isn't coming in anymore! I know, I'll open an office in Mexico! Cheaper labor! First I need to fire anyone who could possibly know anything about the products I've taken credit for. Then I am going to blame the lack of quality on the poor workmanship of our Naftra workers. Then I'm going to fire the rest of my staff here in the States! That will please the board! (and it goes ad nauseum until Amir is left in an alley in San Jose airport asking for PDA's.) Do we get the pattern here? VC's aren't the only, or the primary reason why we have lost nearly a million jobs in the land of high technology. A company needs to value its employees. A company needs to establish itself in baby steps. A company is not supposed to be made of one megalamaniac who needs to eat caviar on his bagel every morning. But, this is exactly who have been placed in charge of companies, exactly the type of leader who has been dominating the land of the internet. Lack of common sense, lack of business sense, and lack of human resource training has completely created a land of laid off employees. The worst kind of of employer is one who lays off staff, and then expects ten people who are left behind to do the work of 40 people who are now hustling to collect unemployment while begging for jobs at even a Walmart. An employer that doesn't understand that a ten hour work day isn't fruitful for morale isn't going to get the employee excited about getting to work the next morning..for another ten hour day. This kind of employer doesn't get that the "unnecessary personell" of today may be the next potential client of tomorrow. This kind of employer doesn't get that laying off the one person who had the largest amount of "team spirit" isn't a catalyst to get others to jump on the company bandwagon in his place. Adding yet one more layer of upper management isn't going to help anyone at all. Why do you think bees only have one queen in the hive? Because effective work is done by everyone else! And neither the VC's nor the Idiot Employer understand that a failing economy can't be solved by cutting jobs. A failing economy can only be solved by the creation of jobs, which means investment and development of solid businesses based on solid business plans and models. If they need to gamble, there's a state called Nevada which would welcome the cash flow. (I know, I live in Vegas.) If there was a true push for investment in the United States, it would start with ensuring that the cutting back of jobs would be the LAST and unheard of option, and that the reduction of a bloated salary, the reconstruction of a business model, and any positive approach to morale building would be the first step. IF the VC's and Angels were smart they would have mandated that every dot com which had been on the quick money list HAD to have at least three MBA's and CFO's in management positions, and that both of these would have had to have been part of long standing, successful organizations prior to jumping into the land of internetia. (Inertia of madness of the internet...don't look it up, it's just what I call it.) It's great that you're developing super duper products to show at comdex, the toy shows, and C.E.S. It's too bad you fired everyone who could possibly buy these products. Oh, wait, you didn't think that waitress was important to you? Guess what, she used to be your VP of Sales. See you in the bread lines!! Next time... let's chat about the politics, shall we?? |
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