When overpaid corporate boneheads substitute slogans and computer metrics for real solutions, they're admitting that they are the problem.
JIM HIGHTOWER for Creators.com
Called "digital productivity monitoring," it's an integrated computer system including a real-time clock, camera, keyboard tracker and algorithms to provide a second-by-second record of what each employee is doing.
Jeff Bezos, boss of
Amazon, pioneered use of this ticking electronic eye in his monstrous
warehouses, forcing hapless, low-paid "pickers" to sprint down
cavernous stacks of consumer stuff to fill online orders, pronto — beat the
clock, or be fired.
"Terrific policy!" exclaimed taskmasters at hospital chains, banks, tech giants, newspapers, colleges and other outfits employing millions of midlevel professionals. So, they've been installing these unblinking digital snoops to watch their employees, even timing bathroom breaks and constantly eyeing each worker's job performance.
New software with such Orwellian names as WorkSmart and Time Doctor has been plugged in to count worker's keystrokes and — every 10 minutes — to snap pictures of workers' faces and screens, recording all on individual scoreboards. You are paid only for the minutes the computers "see" you in action.
Bosses hail the electronic minders as
"Fitbits" of productivity, spurring workers to keep noses to the
grindstone, and instilling workplace honesty.
Only...
the whole scheme is dishonest. No employee's worthiness can be measured in
keystrokes and 10-minute snapshots! What about thinking, conferring with
colleagues, listening to customers, etc.? Nope — zero "productivity
points" are awarded for that work. For example, The New York Times reports
that the multibillion-dollar United Health Group marks its drug-addiction
therapists "idle" if they are conversing offline with patients,
leaving their keyboards inactive.
Employees
mostly call this digital management "demoralizing," "toxic"
and "just wrong." But corporate investors are pouring billions into
it. Which group do you trust to shape America's workplace?
What
makes a newspaper great? Many say it's having fearless, street-savvy reporters.
Some say it's having owners and top editors with the integrity to shine the
light of investigative journalism on the power structure's avarice and abuses.
But, no, says Fred Ryan, top executive of The Washington Post. The secret to greatness, he barks to the Post's journalists, is attendance. A right-wing political functionary, Ryan was handpicked to be CEO of the legendary paper by Jeff Bezos in 2014, when the Amazon billionaire bought the Post.
But under
Ryan's stewardship, readership is in decline, which the former staff director
for Ronald Reagan blames on sluggards who don't spend enough time in the
newsroom. So, he's become the hall monitor, keeping tabs each morning on which
reporters come to the office, measuring their productivity by attendance.
Having
only been a corporate bean counter, never a journalist, Fred seems unaware that
a good reporter's real work is out on the beat, not sitting in front of a
computer. No doubt he would've fired Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein for being
out of the office so often to meet with Deep Throat to uncover Nixon's
Watergate scandal. In fairness, though, he apparently has a two-part plan to
boost team spirit: (1) Eliminate 100 reporters, and (2) judge the output of the
remaining staff by counting the number of video conferences they attend each
week.
But
that's hardly the totality of Ryan's journalistic innovations. The big news is
that, to boost readership, he's hired not one, but two high-dollar public
relations firms to create a cutting-edge "branding strategy" and
advertising campaign for the Post. Already they've come up with a spiffy new
corporate slogan: "We don't just break news. We break ground." Wow —
how great is that? (Never mind that some wags have changed the second line to,
"We break wind").
When
overpaid corporate boneheads like Ryan substitute slogans and computer metrics
for real solutions, they're admitting that they are the
problem; they simply don't know how to motivate and manage a creative
workforce. They should resign in shame.
©
2021 Creators Syndicate
Jim Hightower is
a national radio commentator, writer, public speaker, and author of the books
"Swim Against The
Current: Even A Dead Fish Can Go With The Flow" (2008)
and "There's Nothing
in the Middle of the Road But Yellow Stripes and Dead Armadillos: A Work of
Political Subversion" (1998). Hightower has spent three
decades battling the Powers That Be on behalf of the Powers That Ought To Be -
consumers, working families, environmentalists, small businesses, and
just-plain-folks.