People are not stupid.
But sometimes they manage to say or do extremely stupid things. For my own
amusement I collect those pearls of stupidity for my amusement and future
memories.
While doing my job I
collected one of my treasured pearls; after so long time this pearl still stands
definitely out.
Few years ago I joined
a company that for a while did not have a CFO . A director, whose focus was not to create transparency and give input to the rest
of the management, but rather to embellish numbers and hide negative trends,
was in charge of the process and task of budgeting and controlling.
When I started
regaining control of the process and was providing the management with a more
realistic view of the situation, as you can imagine, the outcry was very loud.
I offered to manage the processes together and to accompany him to visit the
subsidiaries, but the guy declined, saying that I would have disturbed a smooth
budgeting process.
More amused than annoyed,
I asked why should I not join the process and support it.
The answer was
striking: “because the sales and marketing functions are the enemy of
finance, it has always been like that”.
This statement stands
definitely out as one of the marvelous pearls of my stupidarium and makes top
of my list.
I like to think of
companies as human bodies. Each organ in the body represents a function:
·
Sales are the feet and
legs of the companies
·
Operations digests
·
The CEO is the brain
·
Marketing is the
complexion and the general look
·
Finance is the eyes and
nervous system
·
The blood is the
liquidity
·
Audit is the liver
·
Compliance is the
kidneys
Thinking that one organ
is an enemy of the other organ or that an organ rules over the others makes top of the stupidarium list. There is a
famous joke, which for obvious reason I cannot directly report but you can find
by yourself by clicking the link below:
Companies where a
single function prevails are monsters. The bestiarium is very rich.
Monster companies with a very small head and large
feet. They are pale
(liquidity is tight), incapable to respond to the challenges of the market and
of the competition. In these companies the sales function prevails.
Monster companies with big head. They know exactly where to go but they cannot go
there. They are ruddy (plenty of liquidity), their pulse is high as it is the
blood pressure. In these companies the finance function prevails.
Monster companies with big breasts and B side. They do not know where to go and cannot go there. But
they look good. In these companies the marketing function clearly prevails.
No matter how absurd it
may sound, the attitude to let one function prevail is quite common in the
corporate world; I can name a few CEOs with a sales background which take as
mission of their job the one of keeping finance down, hiding the messages of
the numbers, to the great disadvantage of the company and its shareholder. They
are like drivers who want to run a car by listening to the directions of people
seating in the back seats. They refuse to look through the windshield and
sooner or later they will crash.
In an ideal company no
function prevails over the others. All give their inputs, the head decides and
most importantly takes responsibility, for the present, the future decisions,
and most importantly for the past. Yes, because every CEO should own also the
past: the fact that someone else created
an issue, does not diminish the responsibility of taking care of problems.
If you want to assess how
good or bad a company is (about to be) run, ask about his or her background and
the importance he or she assign to finance or to any other functions for that
matter.
If you are lucky your
stupidarium and bestiarium collection will not get any further addition.
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