Two things
happened recently which struck me:
1. The Wells Fargo scandal in America:
a fest of fake and unapproved accounts were set up by employees who
had apparently been set ridiculous targets under threat of firing.
2. Ad giant Dentsu was found to have
massively over-estimated / over-charged multiple clients for digital
marketing. The agency’s apparent response: to broadly blame
overworked employees for the 'mistakes'. This in itself a curious
choice of damage limitation – admission that you both overwork your
staff to the point where they lose competence, then dishonourably
blame them for the company’s wrongs as well? (Where is the
management responsibility in this?) I know that Japanese cultural
workplace expectations differ from the West's, and overwork is seen
as less unacceptable - but Dentsu is a global player, and surely this
statement was still a giant blunder of the comms kind too? [Though
possibly judged as less damning than a more obvious statement:
‘We’ve been cooking the books!']
I don't know much about retail banking
in the USA. If similar to the UK, it's unlikely it would be like
investment banking, where there is a high-risk-high-reward parcel to the job. Retail banking employees might be on a far more modest
outlook, and adrenalin stress not what they signed up for. I know for
a fact that the advertising gals and guys below senior management
would not be getting handsome remuneration for long hours.
But what connects the two stories is
this: you can’t poop on your staff. High pressure environments with
low trust cultures (as both these stories’ outcomes point to) will
eventually lead to something coming unstuck. And both these examples
show how damaging on a large scale THAT can be!
These news stories are a hard business
case for what is often viewed as ‘fluffy-softie’ management
practice. And by fluffy-softie, I mean human. Having worked across a
number of companies, of varying sizes and profitability, what has
stood out is that most outfits are comprised of the sum of their
people. Who (even in marketing) are mostly humans. The culture might
be high-win, or not, but if your people can’t trust the management
/ machine, and can’t feel part of the team, what incentive is there
for them to be conscientious, give extra, or – if it's really bad -
even uphold good practice in return? And in the majority of sectors, if your people aren't on
board, what do you actually have left? Business leadership is not just about
cash or bluster (or ego) but a respect for your people, their time,
their health, and right to function with a sound moral compass.
FYI it is also interesting to note that
Wells Fargo's first response was to fire a tranche of 'rogue' middle
management and teams. But not senior management, who were ultimately
accountable. More quick blame on the employee, without responsibility
taken higher up! Surely if internal company investigations needed to
be done, all levels should have been afforded the same time and
consideration?
Even as recently as a decade ago, it
was a not-uncommon view held by some colleagues at my business school
that including a human approach to business was silly, weak,
and female (the very word 'female' implying useless). Which is
worrying from many angles. This article is not gender related. But
really, THESE men were potentially today's business leaders??
Thankfully the CEOs and other more experienced adults on the course
did not think this way. And our textbooks didn't either. But the
point is, a crucial factor was discounted by a group of
on-paper-intelligent people - you can't actually run a good business
focused on profits alone, any more than you can on people-wellbeing
alone. The leadership thing is by nature multi-faceted, which is
presumably why top management are paid so much.
Anyway, perhaps the positive value of
Dentsu and Wells Fargo's huge, public, falls from grace (and yep,
consequent losses in profits) is their stark illustration of the
importance of decent people management in the overall business mix.
Since I wrote this article (on a
bus, in September, when these stories were both hitting the news)
Dentsu has been in the press again. This for a far more tragic
situation – investigations into the 2015 death of a young advertising
employee, possibly from overwork. This raises a whole bundle of other
questions about employment, and possibly Asian cultural practice too.
Another aritcle. But this sad incident had actually taken place
before the company cited overworked staff as an explanation for their
billing errors. Not sure what that says. But it doesn't sound too
good right now.
