Category: Respect

How Far Can They Push Us?


The post about infringement of freedom in the workplace generated further discussions among my peers. 

Some people actually said that I made them very depressed by putting into words realizations they try to avoid.  I would like to remind these people that the Welcome page of this blog, Reason to Share, clearly expresses my belief that sharing frustration gives us therapeutic relief.

Others felt that my "uplifting" statement that one can always quit was clouded by the suggestion that most CFOs and Controllers cannot afford to do so.  Indeed, I keep talking about how difficult it is to find a CFO/Controller level job nowadays.  That's why I don't suggest quitting without lining something else up or having sufficient funds to keep yourself afloat during the job search.  The truth is, you need to establish an emergency fund anyway – as I always say, there is no such thing as job security for anyone in this new world.

But let me tell you from my own experience, there comes the time when you just know you cannot deal anymore.  You are so frustrated, anxious, depressed, angry and hopeless, you cannot breath.  No matter what you do to get a grip, it feels like your balance is slipping away.  If that's the case, it is time to make your move, because otherwise the suffering is going to destroy you either psychologically, or physically, or both.

I have many stories about people pushed too far and, hopefully, I will be able to tell them here at one or another point.  However, for this particular post I decided to use, as means of a more familiar illustration, a Hollywood classic by Billy Wilder – "The Apartment" (1960). 

The main character (forever great Jack Lemmon) is not a CFO or a Controller, but he is an ambitious person and the gist of the story is very relatable to subordinate employees on all levels.  You see, he really wants to climb the career ladder.  So, he lets the VPs to use his apartment for their extramarital encounters.  He even lays out snacks and liquor for them to enjoy. 

When he allows himself to be convinced by his boss to leave his apartment on  a rainy Christmas Eve, he is angry and frustrated, but he keeps his mouth shut.  And finally he gets that "big promotion" he'd wanted.



Jack's character falls in love with the elevator girl.  He doesn't know that she has been to his apartment with one of his bosses as well.  When the moment of truth finally comes, he feels so overwhelmed, he realizes that he cannot be a doormat anymore.  The time has come to be a human being.



So, gives up his job.  Of course, as in all Hollywood fairy tales, he gets the girl (an adorable Shirley MacLaine) as a reward for his courage.  But it does not matter: rewards or not, everyone has their own threshold of pain tolerance.





 

The Frustration Release Hero


The US Open, tennis’s most visited Grand Slam, is in its second week now and I cannot pass on the opportunity to pay homage to my favorite Champion.  He had never had anything to do with the financial profession (even though he possesses remarkable financial savvy that allowed him to preserve and expand his wealth), but what fits him perfectly into this blog’s context is his special relationship with Frustration.

I am talking, of course, about John McEnroe.  The majority of his critics wrote off his tantrums, consistently displayed on and off the court, as uncontrolled bad temper.  As if he just had bad manners and didn’t know how to carry himself properly in accordance with the “proper” police.

The truth is that the great tennis misbehaving hero has an incredible sense of what’s right and what’s not.  He gets frustrated when things are not the way they are supposed to be.  And, as we discussed before, in What is Frustration? , that’s a normal reaction.  

If you recall, his most famous outbursts were never random – they were directed at chair umpires’ questionable calls, rude audiences, trash-talking opponents, his own errors, etc.  Unfortunately, he didn’t have an ability to keep it inside until the end of the match and then let it out some place private (like I advise you, or like Roger Federer does).  Instead……

Watch this: “You cannot be serious!!!” 

Talking about the frustration release…   However, he also capitalized on his frustration.  He elevated his game and thus silenced and destroyed his critics, he created shots still remembered by connoisseurs, he won 7 Grand Slams and ranked Number One in the World.

The reason to address the problems that we face everyday in our working environment is not just to release our frustrations, but to to be able to get over them, to continue doing your job the best you can, to carry on.

Why Are Ex-Bosses Mad at Us?


Daruma People complain to me about not being able to get in touch with their old bosses.  This means they are talking about business owners. 

I have not heard of anybody having problems like that with their former supervisors from large companies.  After all, those people are subordinates of their own bosses too.  Unless you have spat into his coffee mug or slept with his wife, the two of you should still be on good terms.

It's a different story with Owners/CEOs.  Some may ask, why do you want to be in touch with them?  As the matter of fact, for many reasons.  I've already addressed the references issue (see my post from a month ago CFO's References Trap).  He (I am talking about an archetypal boss now) may have a networking connection you crave.  He may know someone you need to contact for your new business.  You liked his attorney and now you need one.

There could be a million reasons.  But you cannot reach him.  You emailed, you left messages with his assistant and/or wife, you tried to contact him via mutual relation…  No response!  And that fucking hurts! 

You have toiled 60-hours a week for him, you grew his business, you made him richer, you saved his ass from troubles numerous times.  Hey, you pulled him from the verge of bankruptcy and complete destruction!  Hell, it's his fault you are not his CFO/Controller anymore.  You are the one who should be mad at him!

And the funny things is – other people who worked there adore you.  They tell you how great and important you were to the entire company, how much they've learned from you.  Yet, the person who benefited the most from it, doesn't even want to acknowledge your existence.

Now, let's put emotions aside and think about it with our cool, rational financial minds.  There are obvious reasons for your ex-boss to be mad at you:

1.  You warned him about troubles that may befall his business and did your best trying to cover the risks, but he didn't listen to you.  Now, history proved you right.  Do you really expect him to talk to you and acknowledge that?

2.  Even before your ways parted, subconsciously he knew your were the smarter one.  Secretly he hated you for that.

3.  In his mind he expects to hear, "I told you so."  He has no clue that your decency would never let you do that.

4.  If he contracted and managed to save the smaller version of his business, in his head he probably blames your absence for his inability to grow back. 

5.  He had to hire three people to replace you and still they cannot keep up.  Whose fault is that?  Yours.

6.  And that secretary of his…  Well, let's not go there.

If any of these scenarios apply to your case, I guarantee, he will never talk to you, even if he needs you desperately.  He is the BOSS – he cannot put the ego aside the way we always do.     

CFO’s and Controller’s Many Hats: Etiology of Afflication, Part II.


So, let's take a closer look at the reasons why CFO's and Controllers end up with more responsibilities and a larger hat collections than other members of senior managerial staff, and why we should be proud of it.

First of all, it's responsibility by association.  Human resources are related to payroll and that is a monetary subject and frequently the largest budgetary constrain.  Accounting modules usually outnumber all other types in the IT systems, hence we have vested interests in their adequate development.  Business strategies are fueled by cash flow, investments and lending.  It is frequently up to us to determine whether the business has an ability to expand or needs to contract immediately.  In other words, we are far closer to these issues than anyone else.  That is why in the businesses where products have dollar signs in front of them (such as assets management, or commodities trading), Operations end up to be under CFOs and Controllers as well.

Secondly, in the eyes of our bosses and peers, we are the natural choice to undertake any responsibility because we usually possess broader work expertise, eduction covering both fundamental and specialize knowledge, and far more diversified industry exposure.  A capable Controller with good commercial acumen and working knowledge of fundamental accounting   principles is able to apply them to any business model, whether it is manufacturing, import/export, consumer products, services, or E-Trade.  I frequently say that it makes no difference for me what to finance, safeguard ad record: tons of chemicals, gold futures, multimillion mortgage packages, women underwear, or paper clips.  On the other hand, try to transplant a VP of Marketing into home insurance after he has spent 10 years in cosmetics, and he will be lost.  And how many VP of Sales you have met who could understand a legal contract?

The third force comes from within.  It has to do with our tendency of relying only on ourselves.  yes, we complain about our hectic schedules and inability to relax, but if we didn't take these multitude of tasks under our control we would be worrying sick about things going wrong: strategic initiatives taken that we are not able to support financially, software packages bough that cannot reflect the commercial activities properly, contracts signed with terms paralyzing our cash flows, etc. etc.  And we need to be on top of everything, because every commercial happening needs to be translated into an accounting event and reflected in our books.  Face it, my fellow financial professionals, we would not want it any other way.

In the future, with your valuable input we will address the issues of multifunctional optimization and the way to avoid being crashed under the burden of responsibilities.


 

CFO’s and Controllers’ Many Hats: Etiology of Affliction, Part I.


Many people tell me about their overwhelming span of control – the numerous responsibilities they have to attend to on daily basis.

It is not a secret that all CFO's and Controllers in small and mid-size companies store hatboxes under their desks and change on hat after another as daily needs require: just an hour ago you sat down at our desk in your business clothes attending to the natural responsibilities of finance and accounting, but here you are in the police chief hat enforcing civility of human relations, and there you are in a Napoleonic bicorn developing global expansion strategies, in a deerstalker applying forensics in search of a lost container, in a backwards baseball cap discussing with laidback computer geeks the requirement for IT upgarde, in a wig reading a legal brief, etc. etc.

The smaller the company, the larger the hat collection.  Just look at the job listings for our positions – usually it is a laundry list of duties frequently broken down into up to ten sections, each covering separate group of functionality.  Your scope of control is expected to encompass at least 30 diverse responsibilities. It is an established fact and we don’t need an evidentiary hearing to prove it.

Clearly this wide repertoire of roles is a major source of pressure and frustration we experience.  So, as the fist step on the road of improving our wellbeing, I thought it would be healthy to look at the etiology of this issue, i.e. to understand how we ended up in this state of affairs.  

Why other execs stick to their narrow niches of know-how? Why it is not a VP of Sales who is responsible for strategic planning? Why we are expected to be chief administrative and information officers, human resources managers and legal liaisons?  The answers actually may help us to look at this boatload of duties not as a punishment of fate, but rather as a source of pride and positive reinforcement.

The way I see it, there are three major forces pushing us into the realm of endless tasks.   I will describe them in my next post.