Tag: CFOs

More on Nepotism (The Moviemaking)


In my earlier post The Curse of Private Business: Nepotism, I have touched on the damage this phenomenon affects on commercial enterprises and its unfairness to people who still believe in the power of merit-based rewards. It is a complicated topic, though, because when it comes to our own kids we are dedicated to their support. And we would like to believe, of course, they deserve it. It’s the undeserving support that’s problematic?

At the end, to underscore the pervasiveness of this issue I pointed the readers to the familiar territory of pop culture:

“… the industry where nepotism is the most prevalent is the one that suffers the most from lack of fresh talent is the entertainment business.”

Last week, I was told that an IMDb community’s member (Feodor8, I believe) contributed to this very topic. I only had time for a quick look and now the disucssion has been removed. Even without the original material at hand, I would like to comment on few aspects of the “article.”

I hope that the piece was deleted due to the author’s aggressive attitude, which irked me as well, and not because the topic was deemed too sensitive. The contributor didn’t need to resort to offensive tirades and bickering with the commenters.

Considering how intensely he feels about this issue, I found this movie fan’s list of Hollywood players with family connections under-researched. Let me visualize it from my memory… Talia Shire was there, but strangely her son, the adorable and talented Jason Schwartzman was not. Futher into the Coppola clan, Sophia was present, but her brother, director Roman was not. Was Nick Cage (born Coppola) there? None of the three younger Balwin brothers who followed Alec into the acting trade, were mentioned. Alexis Arquette got on the list, but her immensly talented sisters Rosanna and Patricia did not (I don’t remember whether David was there)… And I could go on and on…

Why do it at all, if you do it half-assed? This is so typical – people complain about quality, but cannot live up to their own standards. The same goes for the general public’s opinion-forming process: the prevailing tendency is just to scrape the surface without looking into the root of a problem. The “article’s” author blamed the plunging quality of the entire American cinema on people with family ties, even the talented and hard-working. That’s just superficial.

Remember, this is a CFO’s blog. Filmmaking is commercial enterprising and like any business it abides by basic economic law of supply and demand. The power is with the movie-going audience. If they did not pay their hard-earned money to see the movies feodor8 rightfully condemned, the studios wouldn’t finance them.

In the past 5 years Angelina Jolie (Midnight Cowboy Jon Voight’ daughter) starred in 7 feature movies. How many of them did I see? None. Yet, in the US alone they earned $440 million in the box office; all commercial successes!!! That’s the demand—and the supply follows. The quality of filmmaking is in your hands, dear audience. As long as you are willing to pay for crap, it will be made.

Job Search: Napoleon Bonaparte Is Hiring


This is a story my friend shared with me.  It just happened.

A headhunter, with whom she worked in the past has contacted her.  He has a client looking for someone with her qualifications.   She is always interested to hear about new opportunities, especially those with potential to expand her CFO expertise.

Surprisingly, the urgency in the headhunter’s voice was incredible.  He sounded like a 911 caller witnessing an explosion.  He rushed through the sentences, jumped from one point to another like a mad frog, even forgot to tell her what was the client’s business .  Somewhere in the middle of it,  my friend has realized that she was somewhat overqualified for the job.  Moreover,  the title and the compensation weren’t defined.  That should have alarmed her.  Yet in her vanity, and she knows it, she decided that all the hurriedness was fueled by the headhunter’s worries of her not being interested.

Actually, there were a few aspects of the job that sparked her interest.  My friend relayed this to the headhunter.   He was very excited and went about contacting the client on the next step. 

Oh, my God!  Within a couple of hours, he called her eleven times: “Setting up a phone interview; no, they are foregoing the phone interview and want to meet you in person straight away; you will meet four different people; no, just two; no, it will be two separate interviews back to back – first with the HR Manager and then with the Owner.  Please, pleeeeese, can we do it tomorrow?” 

And so, the next day my firiend went to the company’s offices and met with the HR Manager.  Talking to him, she was wondering if he would be able to make it through the meeting without falling into a panic attack.  Eventually,  he led her through the hallway to meet with the Owner/CEO.   His agitation escalated in alarming stages.  It was like playing a Liszt’s Etude, which calls for “fast” on the first page, then for “faster” on the second, “as fast as possible” on the third, and still “faster” on the next.

At the very moment she got to shake the hand of the tiny man behind the huge desk, it finally dawned on her.  It had nothing to do with my friend and her qualifications.  This miniature boss of an interesting, but relatively tiny company ($30M) exuded a sense of grandeur of Napoleonic proportions.  He had everyone scurrying like scared mice.  Even those who were not employed by him; including the headhunter, who works for one of the top 3 international recruitment houses.

The first thing he told her was, “I need a second in command who can keep the troops under control.  There were two before you, who were dismissed.”  Funny guy!

What is Frustration?


Well, what kind of a psychological animal is Frustration? Is it a cognitive and somatic ailment such as anxiety or a mental disorder such as depression? 

Those exposed to your expressing the frustration would like you to think that there is definitely something wrong with you.  But no, feeling frustrated because of legitimate agitating factors doesn’t mean that you are ill and need to seek medical attention. 

As the matter of fact Frustration is nothing more than a normal emotional reaction to opposition, restriction, obstacles – anything that we perceive to contradict with our will, goals, purpose, plans, schedules, etc.  It is sometimes referred to as problem-response behavior.  There is a problem and the frustration is the first-response signal.  

Sometimes we are frustrated with ourselves.  Procrastination and indecisiveness are the biggest causes of self-dissatisfaction for most people.  However, overachievers who reach top level positions in corporate finance and accounting, the CFOs, Controllers, VPs, Directors, especially in smaller companies, are unlikely candidates for lazy postponements.  And even if, for whatever reason, it happens to us, we are usually capable to control it and use the frustration with ourselves as a motivational tool.

No, our causes of frustration are primarily external.  When you have allocated your already extended working hours to 10 urgent tasks that must be tackled today, and then your Boss wanders into your office and you have to listen for 2 hours to his blubbering about his workout regimen, the time loss is beyond your control and the frustration is further intensified by your inability to throw him out.

When you give an urgent assignment to your employee, explaining its importance and value to the company’s big picture, and  an hour later come over to check the progress and provide further advice only to see her scrolling through boots on Zappos.com, the frustration makes your blood boil in your veins.

When you schedule a meeting with the VP of Sales to discuss the failure to meet volume targets for four months in a row and he is not there 30 minutes past the appointment, evil scenarios invade your frustrated mind.

So, feeling frustrated is natural.  However, the way we act while frustrated depends on our personality, self-awareness, self-control and our psychological makeup. 

The most frequent reactive mechanism is aggression.  Whether we immediately explode at the source of frustration, or wait until we are alone and transfer our anger on an inanimate object, or  get home and take it out on the innocent members of our families – it’s pretty much the same response.

In some cases frustrated people engage in a passive-aggressive behavior.  You’ve seen it many times over: a person puts on a sullen expression and starts procrastinating, obstructing, failing to meet the expectations, etc.  I am sure most of us not only observed it, but also had an episode or two ourselves.

It takes a lot of experience, self-control and tremendous will power to resist this behavioral patterns related to frustration and force yourself instead into constructive removal of the obstacle or resolution of the irritating circumstances.  And, unfortunately, even if we can function reasonably on the outside, it doesn’t mean that the psychological disturbance inside goes away.

In the next couple of posts I hope to share with you few coping devices that I have accumulated over the years myself as well as discuss the relation of frustration to anxiety and stress conditions.   

 

      


One CFO’s Personal Tools for Frustration Relief


So, my fellow CFO’s and Controllers, as promised in my previous post, here are the few tricks I use to privately release my frustration after calmly presenting the composed image to the rest of the world.  They are in no specific order.  I pick whichever feels right at a particular moment.

(1.)  Go to the washroom, enter a stall, close your eyes and start cursing.  Five minutes of swearing usually gives a tremendous relief.  The volume doesn’t really matter.  If raising your voice helps you personally and you are sure nobody is around, go ahead.  For me, however, loud whispering (the way actors whisper on stage, so that everyone can hear them), works the best.  The dirtier the better.  Just pretend that you are in a Martin Scorsese or Quentin Tarantino movie.  If you know other languages, use all of them.  Remember, don’t call the objects of your frustration by their names, but keep their faces in front of you mentally.

(2.) This release method is not my original.  It was shared with me by one of my European colleagues and she has learned it from someone else – I am sure it’s been passed on from one generation to another.  I can vouch that it works like a charm.  You have to create a “Page of Frustration.”  Draw some monster on it, something absolutely revolting.  Your artistic abilities make no difference.  You can ask a child to draw it for you.  The most important thing is to write the title and the destruction instructions on the page.  For example:  “Page of Frustration.  In case of emergency, throw it on the floor and stomp it to shreds.”     For some people “viciously crumple and tear it into small pieces” seems to be more appealing.  Whatever works! Make yourself a stack of copies and keep them in your desk.  Make sure that you don’t run out!

(3.) Another useful inventory for a chronically frustrated CFO or Controller is a favorite treat.  Don’t get me wrong – the last thing I want is for anybody to become a closet eater, consuming large quantities of food in search of unattainable solace.  No!!!  That’s not what I am talking about.  I am talking about very small quantities of very small treats, eaten at a very slow pace: three of Godiva chocolate pearls, or five gummy bears, 1/2 oz of trail mix, etc.  Separate them into these small portions in advance, keep only few in your office and consume only as a release remedy.  It works more as a meditative solution than as aggression liberation, but sometimes that’s all you need.

(4.) On my Front Page Raison d’etre, I talk about the therapeutic effects of writing.  And I maintain that committing your grievance to paper is the best form of releasing frustration, tension, stress and anxiety.   You can do it in different ways.  You can pour your heart out in a diary.  You can pretend to write a letter or an email to the source of your pain (without sending them out, of course) describing the situation, verbalizing your feelings, expressing your concerns.  Or you can go a step further towards more satisfying resolution.  You can write that email and send it to me.  Not only that I will become the receptacle of your turmoil, but I will give it even bigger audience by sharing it with other CFO’s, Controllers, etc.

The Distortion of Bill of Rights in Small Business Environment


Regardless of your position – CFO, Controller, operational staff, CSR, janitor -when you accept “employment at will” arrangement in a privately-held company, you inadvertently give up the majority of your rights granted to you by the US Constitution.  Since the Bill of Rights is automatically presumed, it is not necessary to include freedom clauses into Employee Handbooks, Rules of Conduct and other such documents.  Look through them again whenever you have a chance:  they primarily describe what the company expects of you, not the other way around.

Closely-held companies are not democracies.  They are owners’ kingdoms, absolute monarchies.  And most of the time there is nothing you can do about it.  Let us look at some of the Amendments.

1.  Free Exercise of Beliefs.  Having been always based in NYC precluded me from ever witnessing open discrimination of employees for their religious believes.  At the same time on many occasions I’ve observed explicitly expressed irritation about people’s taking their PTO to celebrate religious holidays.  Quite a few times I saw the candidates being rejected based on the unspoken possibility  of their observance.

2.  We do not have Freedom of Speech as employees.  We try to keep our political, social and cultural opinions to ourselves if we know they contradict those of our bosses. Frequently we are not even given an opportunity to retort abusive, accusatory, or unfair verbiage directed at us or at our subordinates.

3.  We cannot exercise Right to Assembly.  I myself as a supervisor is pretty strict about people congregating for reasons not related to their jobs during work hours.  At the same time I am not as obsessive about it as some business-owners who throw tantrums every time they see people talking.

4.  The Protection from Unreasonable Search is violated time and again in the workplace.  The business files, emails, etc. are rightfully belong to the company you work for, and if you are openly asked to follow established policies of information sharing, files locations and full disclosure, you should willingly comply.  But many employers use System Administrators to secretly look through their employees’ emails, files, etc.  They open doors with spare keys and look into draws containing personal affects.  They use special programs to record IM communications, etc, etc.

5.  Not a single right guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment (due process, double jeopardy, self-incrimination) is considered when you are judged, persecuted and punished by your boss.  Fairness is laughed at in business environment.  A lot of CEO’s, with whom I dealt over the years either as an employee or through business and social networking, considered my personal determination to be as fair as possible and judge people on their merits in all situations as one of my “strange” qualities.  

One right we, as employees, can enjoy under “employment at will” arrangement is the very special freedom it guarantees you: just as your employer can fire you without warning, you can quit on a moment’s notice.   That, of course, if you can afford to do so.