I cycled through five Fortune 500 companies in the 1980’s before quitting for good in 1994 at age 38.
I expected to be immediately productive the first week on the job.
Cut my actual working time to 20 hours/week within 6 months by optimizing my workflow, and limiting my attendance at meetings. (I still had to sit in the office for 40 hours/week, but I did a lot of reading and research on topics that interested me. You could make an appointment to see me during office hours, but I was on my way out the door 5 minutes before quitting time, to beat the rush hour traffic home.)
And if I didn’t get at least a 30% raise after one year or an interesting promotion offer, I sent my resume out again.
Like LTB&H, this behavior is better understood today, but was considered to be reckless and risky in the 70’s and 80’s.
{{ In a study of 8,700 employees, Cornell and Rutgers researchers find “job hoppers” have an edge over other new hires, getting up to speed more than twice as fast. }}
If you’re a worker bee then it probably isn’t a big issue.
If you are a manager, then the higher up you go the most important it becomes (unless you have the very top job, in which case you run the joint.)
When you come in you have no institutional knowledge. That can be an advantage, but usually isn’t.
You have no established power base, and it takes time to gain the trust of people who are already there.
You don’t know what solutions have already been tried - and failed.- to solve the problems presented.
You don’t know where the land mines are, or who is incompetent and must be worked around.
Some things are advantages, occasionally the staff will just think “Oh we can’t do that”, when “that” is exactly what you should do. But unless you’re taking over a decrepit, failing business, mostly what needs to be done is keep the machine running, albeit a little better, grease the wheels, and keep your head down.
In 1979 I was promoted from underling to Program Director at a historical radio station, a 50,000 watt blowtorch with a 20-share. The outgoing PD took me aside and said one thing: “Don’t **** it up.”
Good advice.
A couple years later I was transferred to another heavy hitter, but we got a new CEO - and instead of broadcasting he came from (I swear, I am not making this up) the marketing end of a nationally known potato chip company. I remember one of his first interviews with trade publications was interrupted by the head of PR saying something to the effect of “We’re going to end this now and give Mr. XXXxxx some time to learn the business.”
We did not see eye to eye, and he made several classic blunders and was cashiered.
He was followed by a fellow from within the business, and it ran acceptably well for another decade.
I am reminded of Bob Nardelli, who came from the right hand of Jack Welch and took over Home Depot and almost ran the mother ship into the ground while he went on an acquisition spree of related, but industrial firms. To fund them he ground down on the stores, to the point where they had no inventory and no help in the aisles. The rising tide carried him and his philosophy for a while, but suddenly it all came crashing down and he was booted. Wound up with a job at Chrysler, as I recall. His experience at GE didn’t seem to help them much either.
If an applicant had 5 jobs in 5 years, I usually didn’t hire them. The odds were good that I would be their 6th job in 6 years.
It was my experience that people that caught on quickly usually burned out quickly too. I was a supervisor before I became a Production Manager. I was having a difficult time with a couple of new employees and my PM gave me some advice that proved to be true most of the time. He told me to have patience and work with the people that are trying their best but coming up short of expectations. He said as frustrating as it is for me, it’s equally as frustrating for the employees. Work with them until they master the skill. The reward comes in that the employee will probably stay with you for a long time. They don’t want to repeat the frustration of learning a new job somewhere else.
I have buddy who is a robotics engineer who retired early in his mid-40s. His last job was at Amazon. In the job interview, he told them that all he cared about was his one year total comp. They didn’t blink and gave him the job.
I agree if your goal is a 30 year career. Obviously, my career objective was very unique for the times.
The Reagan revolution and death of any company loyalty to the employee, or any obligation to the community in which the firm did business, took time to be understood.
If you studied the work of conservative economist Milton Friedman, you were forewarned. The Corporation’s only duty was to its shareholders, and later, to its managers collecting the excessive Executive Compensation.
I always love the Jack Welch stories - especially the Gary Wendt ones.
I first came across Gary in a Fortune magazine article about some GE retreat for top executives and their wives which was led by Jack himself. One of the executives in attendance told the reporter that, “Gary is the only one who doesn’t kiss Jack’s behind”. Gary ran GE Capital, which at the time produced 46% of the corporation’s profit, and nobody understood how he was doing it. Welch understood that he didn’t want to do anything to irritate Gary, because he was going to be impossible to replace.
Was Gary a math major, or rocket scientist? No. A Civil & Environmental Engineering graduate of the University of Wisconsin.
