Precision needs help from the past
–Moderator edit July 2 to provide link instead of full text.
Lots of savings by spending money to shut down some operation and then spend money to restart it. I am sure the investors are quite happy with the expenditures.
Throughout my career I can’t count the number of times I have seen a terminal ‘closed’ to save $X millions and a year or so later have it be reopened to save $X millions - over and over again whenever the winds of management changed.
Of course during my career I never had to work with a Hedge Fund directed management that has been tasked to bring EVERY $ possible to the Hedge Fund’s coffers - sell locomotives, sell equipment, sell buildings, sell rights of way, eliminate employees - do it all - do it now and never mind the repercussions that it has on the operations.
Who will get the booby prize for the next hump reopening ? NS or CSX ? With these reopenings will there be a shortage of hump equipment ? Would we expect CSX and NS to have cancelled parts orders or even worse transferred compatible equipment to other humps ?
Where I worked they had “initiatives” (or whatever you might want to call them!)
One was a culture of “CHANGE!”… “We won’t survive if we don’t change!”… Being in the radio/avionics industry, I asked where we were going to put the sugarbeet vats? If we must “change”, then I can’t think of a greater change than to become a sugarbeet factory instead of avionics.
Then there was the “You work for the investors!”. My reply was that investors do not pay my salary. I am paid by the customers, so that is who I work for. If they ain’t buying, the investors will go elsewhere.
Thankfully, both of those initiatives didn’t last long.
There is nothing quite like the Buzz Word BS that companies throw at employees and ask them to accept as gospel - without giving them the time to think through the pile of crap they are trying to sell. Just how dumb to they think employees are?
One of the guys I worked with started in the signal dept. His first job was installing signals on the Wynne Sub and his last job in the signal department a few years later, was removing the signals on the Wynne Sub.
Good point. The many companies that try to call their employees “associates” is a prime example. Really grates our minds to hear that twist on good English .
When I first heard that word applied to people working in a store, I wondered what such an employee did. Then I realized that it is a catch-all term applied to the people who interfaced with the public.
I still have not figured out why the word is used so.
Of course, most of you know I am a dinosaur.
They use “associate” because it sounds so much better than “peon”.
Save $Millions to close the hump and then save $Millions to reopen it. Do that a few times and the darn thing will be free to operate.
My daughter got her first job and was quite proud when, after only 2 weeks of work, she was made an “associate”. It sounded so good!
I was reminded of an old comic joke book my brother had. Single panel showed a man hanging his hat on a hall tree while being greeted by what was obviously his wife (holding a rolling pin and with a scowl on her face). He was smiling big as he said, “Well, I didn’t get the raise, but they did move my desk closer to the wastebasket!”
You misspelled ‘peon’ - it is more properly pee on
When everybody’s somebody, nobody’s anybody.
Ah, yes; with whom do these “associates” associate? Certainly not the salaried people.
Kind of a modification of Laurence Peter’s “Lateral Arabesque,” wherein an employee gets a new title that sounds like a promotion, but in reality, it isn’t…
And, as Backshop alludes, it makes it sound like they are somehow a partner in the business, instead of an employee/slave…
As for the hump - just another indication that many cuts were made without consideration of the potential implications.
Cripes! What a load of BS corporate double-speak equivocation!
Translation: We fuppeduck but will not admit it.
Ahh yes,…the “Dynamic” style of management, better known as “chaos”.
While working in the same place for several years, at one time or another I had several different titles; the last one was "materials handler,’ or something like that. At one time or another, I had limited purchasing authority, maintained the stock of chemicals and cylinder gases used in our process (this included returning empties), handled the raw material (silicon wafers), took care of the items sent to other companies for repair, and continually interfaced with people in other areas concerning their needs. Other people with the same title shipped our product, took care of general shipping, received; one was our traffic expert. At one time I had both purchasing and receiving authority–which is generally frowned upon.
I remember when “Personnel Department” became “Human Resources.” I thought it sounded like I was a tree in a forest of people.