My Corporation's Horror Story

I work for a small to mid-sized corporation that has been slowly spiraling downward financially, even in the midst of the current economic recovery, because a previous exec got rid of the top sales people over personal differences and because other execs carelessly burned bridges with top distributors and clients.

They are starting to make the sort of decisions in their death throes that a drowning person makes when they pull a would-be rescuer under.

The owner, panicking, just hired a new President. The President, still in his honeymoon period, just demoted the V.P. of Sales and Marketing. The V.P. had been in his position for only 6 months and had rebuilt a sales force decimated by his predecessor. He's a well-regarded man with 30 years of sales and management experience who had rebuilt bridges to some of the distributors and clients mentioned above, he'd inspired confidence in the employees; he seemed to have turned the corner.

The new President replaced him with (drumroll please)...

...an ex-Kirby vacuum cleaner salesman in his early 20s sans college education or managerial experience!

The young fellow's qualifications to take over as V.P. of Sales and Marketing? He's the son of the new President's boating buddy.

It sounds too absurd to be true, a plot right out of Lewis Carroll, Monty Python. And yet, it's true, all true!

Me thinks I may have to look for a new job, as this company can't lurch along much longer.

My sole purpose for writing this is to vent; it's just all so ridiculous. I wanted to see it in print, to behold the absurdity of it all.

 

That Suuuuuuuuuuucks!!



Abner

 

Great! The executives screw the company up and good people like you get to pounding the pavement looking for new jobs. Do you suppose you could do a leveraged buyout?

 

Get out now Little. You are intelligent enough to see the writing on the wall. It is easier to get a new job if you already have one and you are in a better position for negotiation.

I work for a manager who hired his buddy he knew from another company and he hired his line maintenance buddies. Usually EE's design, project manage, and take care of critical down problems (as well as train). Unfortunately, these "senior" tech's cannot be given a simple electrical schematic and fix a chiller (works just like a fridge - most first year DeVry students should be able how to grasp a float, comparator circuit, and a contractor). Us EE's have to change our our toxic gasses as well (something that I haven't done since I was a tech in 1996).

Why do I stay? - money. I get paid a lot more than my previous job (semi's were way down from 2001-2004) I also like most of the people I work with. I fear that if one or more of the other EE's bail (we have 6), then I will be working 70 hours a week instead of the 60 now. But then again, if that happens, I will probably start looking as well.

Good luck Little Fauss!

 

Thanks for the complement!

Good thinking, but the catch is it's privately held. (It's a relatively small company--historically less than $10 million a year gross revenues).

I, another attorney (who manages sales for the North Central Region), and the ex-V.P. saw the handwriting on the wall and tried to line up some investors a couple months ago. We found one competitor who liked our product mix, knew about the quality (it's really outstanding, as good as the management is bad), and was willing to inject a lot of money into the corporation that would've enabled us to finish the manufacturing in progress (stalled due to credit holds on the part of most of our vendors--who have, of course, become our very frustrated creditors) and pay off a significant portion of the line of credit, which has been maxed out for a year now.

It would've likely saved the company.

But the owner would've had his share in the company (currently 100%) reduced to less than a controlling interest, and he nixed the deal and hired the aforementioned President.

Alas...

 

Thanks for the encouragement.

I'm thinking about starting a business. I've already been to the banker to see about a line of credit and contacted a couple manufacturers about carrying their line. I met recently with a landlord to look at commercial space.

I want to be--believe it or not--a motorcycle dealer.

I'm a third generation motorcyclist (grandpa rode dispatch in WWI, dad rode his first bike--a Harley--60 years ago at the ripe age of 13; I learned to ride a motorcycle before a bicycle (Absolutely true! The former was easier for me than the latter). And "Little Fauss" is a reference to my favorite motorcycling movie, a Redford-Lauren Hutton flick from the early 70s.

I've had this on the backburner for a few years, flitting about the edge of my thoughts. Now might be the time to put these online MBA studies to use. I don't have a lot of assets (other than a wife at least two points above me on the 1-10 scale and five beautiful children), but I'm going to give it a try, G-d willing.

One last thing: I really appreciate the encouragement and advice from each of you. And some of you are those with whom I've jousted rather vigorously in the past. G-d bless you.

 

Wow, your post made me cringe. I know it goes on -- my husband is in business, but it always amazes me at the stupid things people do. But to be honest, it goes on in education too.

Good luck as you make some tough decisions.

 

Or you could buy the damn thing from the bank when it goes totally broke.

 

Yeah, I am going out to a company today whose higher ups screwed around, and now about a hundred employees are going to lose their jobs! I can't give out the details as far as what company.

Keep your chin up Little Fauss. You are highly educated and intelligent. You also mentioned a line of credit so I assume you have ample equity in a home (tax write off too). I think you would be good at running/owning a motorcycle shop. I also know you would treat your workers well also.


Abner

 

My father-in-law, an accounting professor, made that suggestion to me as well. Always a possibility.

 

That's roughly the size of my company (though it's been gradually declining for obvious reasons).

Don't know about "ample equity", but I've got some equity and I pay my bills on time. We'll see what the banker says, I'm not approved yet.

Anyway, thanks for the kind words.

 

Well, since the current owner is too damn dumb to realize that owning leaa than 50% of something is a whole hell of a lot better than owning 100% of nothing, he'll keep clutching on to the whole damn thing as it falls down and goes boom boom and you and your buddy the other lawyer can keep in contact with your investor group and buy the damn thing from the bank ... and for a lot less money, too.

 

Well, little fauss, maybe you need to dust off the old shingle! After all, it's not like you don't have a marketable profession; despite decades of doom and gloom, there's no nationwide surplus of competent lawyers.

Now you WILL have to vacuum up the Scalia cobwebs that are clogging up your brain...

Seriously, have you considered working for the federal government? They are pricing themselves out of the new graduate market but older, less indebited folks like us can still extort a reasonable living from the citizenry. The state might also be a possibility?

 

No No No! Not the practice of law!

I've been trying to free myself from that tangled web for years (if not from the Scalia web, in which I delight )

This is my chance, counselor, to break free once and for all time. I'm still relatively young, I've only been doing this off-and-on for a decade. There's still hope. Don't encourage me back into that morass. I never made all that much money at it (I've made more over the years in other envdeavors), and I never had all that much fun doing it.

I feel like Jimmy Stewart in "It's a Wonderful Life" on the bridge in which he sobs: "Please G-d, I wanna live...please."


Please, let me break free!

 

Got that one covered, Steve, been doing it at a CC for two years, and have even taught a biz law course for a small B&M university.

But the problem is, they don't even pay enough for someone to starve in style.

I've thought about doing the FT tenure-track biz law route, but nobody falling over themselves to hire me, that's why I'm doing the UMass MBA online. Now, I just might apply the MBA knowledge (what there is of it) to a real entrep situation rather than just academic career. I'm taking a course in developing a marketing plan this semester and I've taken classes in accounting and the like. Maybe I'll try to get some value out of that education and put the prof thing on hold for a while.

 

little fauss: "I want to be--believe it or not--a motorcycle dealer."

John: I did that once. Selling something you love is often a great career move.

At the time, we had brought two Solex mopeds back from France, and absolutely loved them. When I read that they were selling franchises in America, I bought the Berkeley one. It was a huge success for a while, rentals and sales. And then the Feds marched in and issued a ruling that all motorized vehicles, however small (this was 49cc), must have sealed beam headlights. The company said they could not or would not do this. And that effectively put us (and dozens of other successful dealers) out of business.

The company is still going strong. Nothing whatever seems to have changed, except they're made in Hungary instead of France. And I guess they either added the sealed beam or the law was changed. http://www.greenvilledealers.com/VeloSolexMoped.htm

 

That's funny!

I've been thinking that I'd LOVE the chance to sell domestic water softeners and other treatment systems.

Not as exciting as mopeds but then I'm a boring guy!

 

It sounds like the good ole boy network is alive and kicking.