Would You Lie for Him?
David Sanford
Retired Marine and former Corporate leader. I tell stories of my corporate life to help others better understand the true culture of large corporations.
So, You Think You Wouldn’t Lie?
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You Can’t Make This Up. Episode 9
When I was in training in corporate America, one of the company metrics was, “clocked out on time.” The metric was devised to track hourly employees clocking out more than 5 minutes past their scheduled departure time. In order to satisfy this metric, managers were expected to change the time employees were scheduled to leave work at the end of the day. In other words, if someone was scheduled to leave at 5 pm and they clocked out at 5:10 pm, a manager would change their scheduled end of work time to 5:10 pm. Naturally, as a retired Marine officer, I swore to myself I would not lie and cheat by changing scheduled end of work times.
When I got my own business line, I told my logistics manager that we would not be changing end of work times to meet a metric. We weren’t going to lie just to meet any metric. My logistics manager was a former Air Force Explosive Ordinance Disposal enlisted guy who had been in corporate America for 5 years, so he took me to school.
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He said the following and veterans take heed:
?? “I understand how you feel, and when I first started, I felt the same way, but you have to understand what that means for everyone else. First of all, everyone in the company is changing the out times, and cheating just like you were trained. When you go to the big annual company meeting, someone will get called on stage to accept an award for the highest percentage of out on times in the region, and all of you will clap away. What’s sad is everyone there including the executives handing out the award knows it’s a lie. Someone in the region will get the award, someone in the district, and some manager in every business line will get the award. Me not changing the out times impacts my end of year raise, my bonus, and most importantly, my promotion potential. Your boss expects you to change the out times because it’s a metric that his boss tracks. Half the metrics in the company are made up of lies, and everyone is in on it. So, are we going to be honest and lose money and promotions, or are we going to lie on a metric that everyone else is lying about and therefore, has zero meaning except it makes you feel good inside telling the truth?”
This guy was the best mentor I’ve had in corporate America, because he cut to the chase and was honest about the culture in corporate America.
And yes, I lied.