Corporate Hypocrisy

[dannyboy]

If you want a good education in overwhelming idiocy, start your own business. Then you get to deal with no less than 35-50 layers of gooberment, each one telling you something different than the other, but each has the power to close you down, bankrupt you, clean out your banking, savings accounts without notice, impound your equipment, fine you to hell and back.......

And all that before breakfast. Think of all your worst managers having spawned, and now these little brainless bureaucrats are like flies and maggots, not contributing anything, but instead, trying to put you out of business instead of letting you grow.

There are many times that being a driver at ups would be much simpler. The stupidity and hypocrisy is not exclusive to ups. Trust me.

d

 

[soberups]

The right 85% in trace AND the right 85% pickup comliance AND packages delivered by commit time AND no seat belt violations AND minimized idle time is the job.....

Oftentimes, an expectation that seems simple and straightforward from behind a desk gets a bit more complicated when you are the one who is stuck with trying to implement it in the real world.

It would be a great thing for our company if the people who come up with all these metrics could brown up one day and come out and experience first hand the reality of what it is they are trying to implement.

The BS stops when the load hits the road.

 

[pretzel_man]

Oftentimes, an expectation that seems simple and straightforward from behind a desk gets a bit more complicated when you are the one who is stuck with trying to implement it in the real world.

It would be a great thing for our company if the people who come up with all these metrics could brown up one day and come out and experience first hand the reality of what it is they are trying to implement.

The BS stops when the load hits the road.

What makes you think I spend all my time behind a desk?

I'm in operations all the time. So are people that report to me.

Yes, we do experience it first hand. As I said before, I do not like this metric a lot. I just accept that 100% is not reasonable. I usually am happy with about 80% to 85% (but the right 80% to 85%)

P-Man

 

[tieguy]

I take from the majority of what you write, that is who you are.
Unfortunately your kind is a dying breed within our company.
The "Great Casey" is dead and unfortunately it would seem most of his ideals are as well.
It would be nice to think that we could somehow return to some of these core values but as I've seen you post, "we sold our soul" when we went public.
It's a shame as the vast majority are just trying to survive rather than excell.

not all managment have the genetics that allow optomism. I won't lie . The journey has been a long one and when I get ready to retire I'll be glad to be away from the BS. With that said its my job to be an optomist. I watch a lot of college basketball this time of the year. I have yet to see a basketball coach hang his head and sulk on the sidelines.

 

[soberups]

Mutually exlcusive?

Jim Casey's motto was Best Service, Lowest Cost. When I started, the answer to whether service or cost was more important was BOTH must be made.

Jim Casey was smart enough to delegate. He was smart enough to empower his people to make intelligent decisions for themselves, rather than grabbing them by the throat and drowning them in a swamp of petty, irrelevant, metrics-obsessed micromanagement.

Jim Casey believed in "best service, lowest cost". I dont think he would have spent his time hiding behind Dumpsters and spying on people. I dont think he would have spent all day feverishly trying to manipulate dozens of conflicting, irrelevant metrics. I dont think he would have sat behind a desk and busted peoples balls over idle time, % on trace, AM time, pickup compliance, Telematics data, SPORH, over/under, or any of the other myriad of statistics that we are slowly suffocating in.

But then again, I never knew the man personally so maybe I am wrong.

 

[soberups]

As I said before, I do not like this metric a lot. I just accept that 100% is not reasonable. I usually am happy with about 80% to 85% (but the right 80% to 85%)

P-Man

Translation; "I am a reasonable person who will look at the entire situation before deciding whether or not a particular metric is appropriate to expect."

I believe you. Unfortunately, your attitude is the exception rather than the rule.

The average sup who is getting his balls busted over pickup compliance or whatever other metric is the current flavor of the week...doesnt care whether or not it is "the right 80 to 85%"

He/she doesnt have the luxury of caring, because their survival depends strictly upon generating that number. Common sense and logic have no place in the equation. Whether or not the expectation is realistic means nothing.

85% is acceptable. 84% isnt. If you dont make the number, you will be replaced by someone who can.

 

[tieguy]

Translation; "I am a reasonable person who will look at the entire situation before deciding whether or not a particular metric is appropriate to expect."

I believe you. Unfortunately, your attitude is the exception rather than the rule.

The average sup who is getting his balls busted over pickup compliance or whatever other metric is the current flavor of the week...doesnt care whether or not it is "the right 80 to 85%"

He/she doesnt have the luxury of caring, because their survival depends strictly upon generating that number. Common sense and logic have no place in the equation. Whether or not the expectation is realistic means nothing.

85% is acceptable. 84% isnt. If you dont make the number, you will be replaced by someone who can.

its not the first measurement that may have been unrealistic , it won't be the last. Its the sups job to know why he is not hitting the number they want and to fix those he can control.

 

[ddomino]

I now say "managements genius is only overshadowed but their stupidity" It fits all the time

 

[tieguy]

I now say "managements genius is only overshadowed but their stupidity" It fits all the time

Its important to ensure your intelligent post rises above the stupidity you criticize.

 

[soberups]

The best way to sum it all up is this;

We used to service the customer.

Now, we only service the metric.

 

[slantnosechevy]

not all managment have the genetics that allow optomism. I won't lie . The journey has been a long one and when I get ready to retire I'll be glad to be away from the BS. With that said its my job to be an optomist. I watch a lot of college basketball this time of the year. I have yet to see a basketball coach hang his head and sulk on the sidelines.

You obviously didn't see Matt Painter of Purdue when he lost Robbie Hummel due to a torn ACL.

 

[pretzel_man]

The best way to sum it all up is this;

We used to service the customer.

Now, we only service the metric.

Blindly pursuing a metric is bad. No doubt.

So is blindly disrrgarding the importance of metrics and assuming they are all bad.

By the way, service is at an all time high. That metric is based on evaluating every single package and determining whether it made service or not and calculating which operation and even employee caused the defect. There is a metric for a "no excuses" end to end service.

Its the analysis of the defects and use of those metrics that have improved our service.

P-Man

 

[JustTired]

By the way, service is at an all time high. That metric is based on evaluating every single package and determining whether it made service or not and calculating which operation and even employee caused the defect. There is a metric for a "no excuses" end to end service.

P-Man

End to end (point A to point B) service is definitely an important part of the equation. But there are other aspects of service. Most don't have a metric attached.

How many pkgs never get a chance to make it into the system because of shoddy service? By that, I mean not being attentive to the needs and concerns of the customer. Not responding in a timely manner if a reponse is made at all.

It's easy to measure end to end service with a metric. But that is only part of the picture. You can't assume that a customer is happy just by looking at the metrics.

As I've stated many times over the years......you can't run a company by numbers alone and expect to survive. Of course this is just an opinion. Maybe the numbers will prove me wrong.

 

[iowa boy]

End to end (point A to point B) service is definitely an important part of the equation. But there are other aspects of service. Most don't have a metric attached.

How many pkgs never get a chance to make it into the system because of shoddy service? By that, I mean not being attentive to the needs and concerns of the customer. Not responding in a timely manner if a reponse is made at all.

It's easy to measure end to end service with a metric. But that is only part of the picture. You can't assume that a customer is happy just by looking at the metrics.

As I've stated many times over the years......you can't run a company by numbers alone and expect to survive. Of course this is just an opinion. Maybe the numbers will prove me wrong.

Talk about ringing a bell with me. Listening to fellow drivers talk last night, the cover driver assigned to a specific route was told not to service the pickups on this route as mgmt. would have another driver drive 40 miles one way to service these pickup accounts.

Mgmt neglected, (forgot, you choose the word), to inform the second driver to service these pickup accounts and thusly these accounts never received the service they payed for. As these are customers, how does this reflect on that metric of end to end service when no customer service was provided to these clients?

Metrics are good for certain aspects of running a business, but without providing excellent service to our customers first, all the other metrics seem like a moot point to me. If end to end service is more important than making sure our customers are happy, I forsee huge huge problems for this company.

 

[tieguy]

End to end (point A to point B) service is definitely an important part of the equation. But there are other aspects of service. Most don't have a metric attached.

How many pkgs never get a chance to make it into the system because of shoddy service? By that, I mean not being attentive to the needs and concerns of the customer. Not responding in a timely manner if a reponse is made at all.

It's easy to measure end to end service with a metric. But that is only part of the picture. You can't assume that a customer is happy just by looking at the metrics.

As I've stated many times over the years......you can't run a company by numbers alone and expect to survive. Of course this is just an opinion. Maybe the numbers will prove me wrong.

agreed. you do agree that we do have to find ways to meausure the service to ensure its improving along with or ahead of customer expectations?

 

[iowa boy]

By the way, service is at an all time high. That metric is based on evaluating every single package and determining whether it made service or not and calculating which operation and even employee caused the defect. There is a metric for a "no excuses" end to end service.

Its the analysis of the defects and use of those metrics that have improved our service.

P-Man

P-Man,

Using this part of your quote as a reference point, is it correct for me to assume that UPS expects 'no excuses' when is comes to package service? The reason for this question is that I do not understand how a company expects no mistakes from its employees, when we are all human beings.

You have been around long enough to know that we are all programmed to make mistakes, from the lowly part-timer making 8.50/hr, to you, to Scott Davis. Everyone screws up on occasion. Why does UPS not allow for this?

Documenting that preloader or the local sorter every time they have a misload when their specific misload frequencies are way over MAR is petty and assinine in my book. Giving a warning letter to a driver for not having his hands at the 10 and 2 position on the steering wheel, especially if he is driving a manual transmission, is assinine and petty. (Thanks for letting me use this reference Sober).

What happened to the pat on the back or the handshake and the words "good job today" or "how was your day"? Evidently this company doesn't believe positive recognition will work and instead has decided that negative recognition is the best way to handle all situations now.

I've been a working idiot for 27 years now, (not just at UPS), held a management position for 10 of those 27 years, and have found out that when you treat employees fairly and with a little respect, the respect and fairness are given back to you 10 fold. But yet UPS doesn't believe in this philosophy, why?

I guess I just don't get it.

 

[tieguy]

P-Man,

Using this part of your quote as a reference point, is it correct for me to assume that UPS expects 'no excuses' when is comes to package service? The reason for this question is that I do not understand how a company expects no mistakes from its employees, when we are all human beings.

You have been around long enough to know that we are all programmed to make mistakes, from the lowly part-timer making 8.50/hr, to you, to Scott Davis. Everyone screws up on occasion. Why does UPS not allow for this?

I guess I just don't get it.

You realize our tolerance for mistakes is often dictated by the customer?

 

[pretzel_man]

P-Man,

Using this part of your quote as a reference point, is it correct for me to assume that UPS expects 'no excuses' when is comes to package service? The reason for this question is that I do not understand how a company expects no mistakes from its employees, when we are all human beings.

You have been around long enough to know that we are all programmed to make mistakes, from the lowly part-timer making 8.50/hr, to you, to Scott Davis. Everyone screws up on occasion. Why does UPS not allow for this?

Documenting that preloader or the local sorter every time they have a misload when their specific misload frequencies are way over MAR is petty and assinine in my book. Giving a warning letter to a driver for not having his hands at the 10 and 2 position on the steering wheel, especially if he is driving a manual transmission, is assinine and petty. (Thanks for letting me use this reference Sober).

What happened to the pat on the back or the handshake and the words "good job today" or "how was your day"? Evidently this company doesn't believe positive recognition will work and instead has decided that negative recognition is the best way to handle all situations now.

I've been a working idiot for 27 years now, (not just at UPS), held a management position for 10 of those 27 years, and have found out that when you treat employees fairly and with a little respect, the respect and fairness are given back to you 10 fold. But yet UPS doesn't believe in this philosophy, why?

I guess I just don't get it.

IOWA,

Your question is a good and fair one. First, let me explain the "no excuses" portion of the measure.

It used to be that when we measured service with SEAS, we excluded many things from the measurement. If a customer was not in, or a bad address, or closed, or NSP, etc.... What happened is that our internal measures looked great, but the customer didn't get better service. We just thought up more ways to find an "excuse" by putting an exception on a package.

One of our leaders (Cal Darden I think) said that we need to measure ourselves closer to the way our customers see us, not how we see ourselves. He said our measurement had to include "no excuses". So we had a "no excuses" measure. Overnight, the metric plummeted. Over time however we started fixing real problems and now our service is at an all time high.

Does this mean that there is an expectation of no mistakes? I think not. By the way, here is a little trivia. Hub missort standards have been 1 in 2500 since before I started. That was calculated based on employees being 98% effective. It was based on a "double check". Out of 2500 packages, a pickoff put 98% of them in the right load. That meant the 50 potential missorts exist out of 2500. The loader catches 98% of those. That's leaves one in 2500.

I am very much against stupid warning letters. Always have been. Its a waste of time and paper. On the other hand, I'm also against a blanket statement that says never sign a warning letter.

P-Man

 

[iowa boy]

You realize our tolerance for mistakes is often dictated by the customer?

Come on Tie. You know as well as I do that 95% of our customers generally will accept it if we as a company make a mistake on occasion. They may get pissy or growly for a little while, but they generally will understand. Now I know this doesn't apply to all of our customers as the expectation is there for the service they pay for, but the majority of them realize that UPS is not perfect and will allow for that. Do this make it right, not by any means. But when our customers are more forgiving about human errors than UPS is, I am just lost. Now should UPS just overlook every mistake, no I'm not saying that at all, but to hold everyones feet to the fire for every little error, that is one of the most inefficient uses of company time I have ever seen.

 

[iowa boy]

IOWA,

Your question is a good and fair one. First, let me explain the "no excuses" portion of the measure.

It used to be that when we measured service with SEAS, we excluded many things from the measurement. If a customer was not in, or a bad address, or closed, or NSP, etc.... What happened is that our internal measures looked great, but the customer didn't get better service. We just thought up more ways to find an "excuse" by putting an exception on a package.

One of our leaders (Cal Darden I think) said that we need to measure ourselves closer to the way our customers see us, not how we see ourselves. He said our measurement had to include "no excuses". So we had a "no excuses" measure. Overnight, the metric plummeted. Over time however we started fixing real problems and now our service is at an all time high.

Does this mean that there is an expectation of no mistakes? I think not. By the way, here is a little trivia. Hub missort standards have been 1 in 2500 since before I started. That was calculated based on employees being 98% effective. It was based on a "double check". Out of 2500 packages, a pickoff put 98% of them in the right load. That meant the 50 potential missorts exist out of 2500. The loader catches 98% of those. That's leaves one in 2500.

I am very much against stupid warning letters. Always have been. Its a waste of time and paper. On the other hand, I'm also against a blanket statement that says never sign a warning letter.

P-Man

P-Man, let me say thanks for the honest reply to my questions.

But I must ask you though, how does this "no excuses" measurement allow for things that are out of our control. Weather will be the example I will use here. So far this winter we have received here 55+ inches of snow. That is from the first week in December til now. So we have had our share or snow. How does this measurement allow for the EC packages that we cannot honestly deliver due to conditions beyond our control. Sorry for the tangent here, but our district is nice enough now to let each center know how many actual packages were sheeted as EC on a daily basis and for how long they have been sheeted as such. Now I know you can't answer this, but what is the point of this?

I know the MAR for misloads is 1 for 2500 company wide, but why the emphasis on perfection when every one in this company is fallible? We have employees here who are currently being diciplined for each misload when their numbers are over the 1 for 7500 mark? What purpose is this serving? What happened to the "nice job, keep that streak going? I know you can't speak for where I am at, but hopefully you see my point that UPS seems to be wasting a lot of time on little things and bringing company morale down in the process.

Most of the current employees have enjoyed, (at company expense), at one point or another, food catered in or cooked for them for a job well done. Now I know I this isn't gonna happen for quite a while, and that is fine by me. But what happened to the pat on the back or the handshake and the "you did a good job today" or "I know your day sucked, but thanks for getting it done"? Most of us employees, and a lot of managment too, don't get this anymore? All we get is...well I'm sure you probably here it already, but why the change in attitude?

I apologize for the long winded rant, but in the last two years or so, this company has turned around 180 degrees when it comes to the treatment of its employees, both hourly and management?