#leadership

Finance employee. It is breaking us. Leadership knows and doesn’t care. Time to jump ship? Anyone else feel the same?

I think one of Nike’s biggest problems is that we’ve been so dominant for so long that we became too self serving. At some point, we stopped listening enough to what’s happening outside of Beaverton. We became too confident that we knew the consumer and that what worked for us before would continue to work.

Meanwhile, a lot of other brands were actually listening. They were closer to consumers, closer to culture, and quicker to understand how the market was changing. Especially with Gen Z and now Gen Alpha, the way people discover brands, connect with products, and decide what to buy has changed dramatically. I don’t think we changed fast enough with them.

And now we’re trying to fix it, but we’re already playing catch-up.

I think that’s partly a Nike problem, but I also think it’s an EH problem. When he came back, there was a real opportunity to challenge how we operate and change the way we think. But a lot of what I’ve seen feels like we’re trying to bring back the same Nike playbook that worked a few years ago. There’s nothing wrong with going back to some of our strengths, but the world we’re operating in today isn’t the same world.

There’s also an irony to Nike being an American company. Being American was a huge part of why Nike became what it became. American sports, athletes, and pop culture had enormous influence around the world. But I think that can also be one of our weaknesses today because we still tend to look at the world through a very US centric lens.

The world doesn’t work that way anymore. People aren’t only looking up to the US to tell them what’s cool or what’s next. Sport, fahsion and culture are coming from everywhere now and sometimes I feel like there is so much happening out there that we’re simply missing because we’re too busy talking to ourselves.

That’s the part that worries me the most. I don’t think the answer is just to get Nike back to what it used to be. We need to keep what made Nike special, but also become much better at listening again. We need to get outside of Beaverton, be closer to what’s actually happening in the world, and let the world influence us as much as we want to influence the world.

But I’m also afraid this isn’t something that will change overnight. And honestly, I’m not even sure it will change at all unless there is enough pain to force real change.

That’s probably the hardest part. Big organizations don’t fundamentally change just because people know they should. They change when the cost of staying the same becomes greater than the pain of changing.

And when you’ve been successful for this long, there are a lot of people in senior positions who grew up in the existing system and benefited from it. Asking them to think differently isn’t just asking them to change how they work. In some cases, you’re asking them to question the structure, the roles, and even the way their own value has been defined for years.

That’s why I’m not sure the people sitting in those high chairs will naturally want to step outside of their comfort zone. Because real transformation could also mean changing their own role, reducing their influence, or even questioning whether some of those roles need to exist in the same way anymore. That’s a very difficult thing for any leader to voluntarily do.

So maybe Nike needs to feel significantly more pain before we see the level of change that’s actually required. I hope that’s not the case, but I worry that small fixes, reorganizations, and bringing back pieces of the old playbook won’t be enough.

Because the problem isn’t just the playbook. It’s the mindset and the system behind it.

And unless we’re willing to challenge that, we may keep changing things around the edges while protecting the very structure that got us here.

If people are eventually going to g to be laid off for any number of ridiculous reasons. Shouldn’t every exiting person get on record .. the question and answer as to why others like TK or BE still keep their jobs when they are a does not meet. I mean if there is an increase in the numbers of do’s called mediocre people then that means mediocre results. And who sits at the top of the mediocre organization? What do any of us have to lose.

Street is predicting Centene to make 70B with a huge B and yet, we have senior leadership team laying off people.

I’m new to the company, and I’ve already had two project managers tell me they’ve been told they have “VP potential.” One has only been here three years. I’m trying to understand how anyone can be identified that early, and realistically, how many VP roles ExxonMobil even needs. Based on what I’ve read and with the current low CLS structure and retirements, it doesn’t seem possible.

Fire these azzholes involved in the cover up immediately. Name them and shame them.

https://www.kgw.com/article/news/crime/nike-staff-accused-trying-to-cover-up-teen-athletes-s-xual-as--ult/283-c10bc24d-7da8-49bf-94ec-c17ec19dc5cb?utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook_KGW-TV&fbclid=IwdGRzaAUbihRjbGNrBRuJVXBkb2YBZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQMMzUwNjg1NTMxNzI4AAEePNDyBX_EiIz16nJAmm6W8UA225MLvyYZtaFD-FiI4c_JSBTGXhI_sV-9g4k_aem_Qb6FZrLlvcrEQYBnhypWhA

I wanted to share a serious concern regarding the toxic work culture and ongoing mismanagement within our organization.
Over the past three years, we have been trapped in an unsustainable cycle. Leadership consistently chooses underperforming vendors who fail to deliver on their commitments. It is an open secret that these vendors are missing deadlines because they lack the capability, and many suspect that commissions are being funneled behind the scenes while the internal team is forced to pick up the slack.
Because of these poor strategic choices and mismanaged feature implementations, we are constantly being thrown under the bus. We are forced to work consecutive weekdays and weekends to cover for failing vendor deliverables. Specifically, leadership figures like sen*il, SD OMR, Rjt, SD Arn, and their directors foster an unreasonable environment where everything is expected immediately, with zero regard for employee burnout or the root causes of failure. It is the same cycle across the board—giving contracts to vendors who will later benefit them personally.
This mismanagement is now severely impacting our products. Visible is one of the best digital prepaid brands we have, but as part of the NSA migration, they are currently migrating the legacy Visible system to postpaid NSA. That system is fundamentally flawed; if it goes to production, heaven knows how many customers will face issues. Additionally, our VXP platform system is also flawed, and provisions are not even working.

I hope Dan see this post many because all of theses fat leadership our VZ brand losing the market share

When you tie executive compensation to a goal like this, you get results that we have today.

2025 Targets - 50 percent representation of women in global corporate workforce and 45 percent in leadership positions.

Leaders hired on on basis of their gender are spread through the org from SLT to first level managers. The cancer has spread throughout the org. WON won, NKE lost.

We need large layoffs every year and need to hire back based on merit.

So vp’s don’t touch their sr directors or directors but layoff all the Nike engineers.
The systems are unstable as Accenture did a sh---y job and know nothing.
Big issues occur and vps hammer down on why things are not fixed.
Directors and sr directors are trying to fix but have no tech knowledge or background and Accenture is clueless.
Sorry vps, but you’re lying in the bed you made.
We should be fine….

Leadership has been quiet and no where to be seen the last two weeks. No travel. They are heads down for what is to come. Expected changes coming soon.

... Cleaning up on DVN talent. The really good talent. Folks have more faith in Kate and Justin, which is saying something after the Hager years.

Everyone will be a VP soon. The org chart is bloated with VP's and the VP's themselves are bloated. Talent gets you nowhere in Telecom management especially in Uniti/Windstream culture. About 75% of all VP's are crony appointments and the others are Telecom lifers with talent but waiting for their severance package.

VP's! It's VP's ALL THE WAY DOWN! The job title bloat is unreal but what do you do in a shrinking industry full of telecom lifers.

You know you work for a bottom feeder when:

1) SVPs of finance confidently says we always go down x%/year (instead of a one-time restructure like a normal company to align capital allocation with market opportunity)
2) SVPs of Print still think they 'run the company' despite secular market decline
3) An interim CEO for 9mo+ and no permanent in sight

I understand there have already been many posts about the VSP and involuntary separations (layoffs). Some posts provide information people need at the moment, while others are more focused on sharing opinions or experiences. Either way, there was a post some time ago about SIU suggesting that the changes there might only be the beginning, and that the broader Compliance & Ethics organization may need to be reevaluated, reorganized, and reassessed to ensure its policies, procedures, and processes are current and effective.

I don't want to beat a dead horse, but recent departures within Compliance & Ethics caught my attention.

I understand that the Vice President overseeing the Conflict of Interest (COI) team and Compliance Investigations Unit (CIU) is no longer with the company. I also understand that certain management personnel within Special Investigations Unit (SIU) are no longer there, and that the former Chief Risk & Compliance Officer, is no longer with Centene.

Any one departure can happen for many different reasons, and I don't think it would be appropriate to speculate about why individuals have left. However, when there are multiple departures across different levels of a Compliance organization, I think it is reasonable to ask whether the organization itself should be taking a closer look at its structure, processes, and leadership.

Perhaps this is an opportunity for Centene to take a step back and conduct a comprehensive review of Compliance & Ethics before simply continuing with business as usual.

Some questions worth asking:
• Are the policies and procedures current, comprehensive, and consistently applied?
• Are there clear guidelines and quick-reference resources for investigators and management?
• Are investigations being conducted and closed using consistent and documented standards?
• Are employees given clear and consistent expectations for handling cases?
• Are investigators receiving the appropriate training and qualifications for the responsibilities they are performing?
• Are compliance standards being applied consistently within Compliance & Ethics itself?
• Are management decisions consistently supported by established policies and procedures?

If Compliance & Ethics is responsible for ensuring that other departments follow policies, regulations, and established standards, shouldn't the same level of scrutiny be applied internally?

This isn't about pointing fingers at individual employees. It's about asking whether the organization has the right structure, leadership, policies, procedures, training, and oversight in place to effectively perform one of the most important functions within the company.

When there are departures at different levels of Compliance & Ethics, perhaps the appropriate response isn't simply to fill the vacancies and move forward. Perhaps it's time to stop, look at the bigger picture, and ask whether there is something within the organization that needs to be addressed.

Before Compliance can effectively hold the rest of the organization accountable, Compliance should be willing to hold itself accountable as well.

Ok, time to get real.

What career objective really matters? Is it only Senior Leader and Corp Leader? How can you tell who is on what path? Any milestones or roles vs age that people would look for? Any examples?

Does Executive Leader matter anymore? Is Career Objective of Chief and Sr Principal still around? Is it worth anything?

What CLs are each of these?

We need their present here to answer about layoff question

Welcome to the new age. Dinosaurs are having increased bumps in pay checks and bonus eating the dinner of G4's and G5's. These dinosaurs are ruthless and shameless. While principal, directors and VP's are claiming the credit of the work done by G4's and G5's.

Wow, here in Switzerland, the word is that with the recent setbacks in clinical trials and abandoned dr-g candidates, leadership needs to save more money. Well, one site that could be jeopardized is the one in San Diego. Expect serious reductions in footprint and headcount!!

Seeing sudden manager calibrations and stack-ranking across ESG. Word is that notifications are hitting the first Wednesday of October to kick off Q4. Anyone else seeing this behavior or heard anything concrete from leadership?

Just look how critical LeBron has been of Nike‘s innovation. Mbappé didn’t wait around. He peaced out. Others are going to do the same. We are now the next Under Armour. A future case study for decades to come on the collapse and failure of this company.

I used to be on board with no matter what tough times comes Nike‘s way that we will find a path to compete and overcome. That’s not the case anymore. We failed at our own Maxim of figuring out how to evolve immediately. We don’t know how to innovate. We don’t know how to inspire anymore. Everything they do is based on hope. Hope is not a plan or a strategy.

It’s unfortunate that Nike put themselves in this position when the Board of Directors hired JD. It only takes one mistake. Doubling down on that mistake compounds your problem.

Nike made a lot of people rich. Sent a lot of people into a comfortable retirement. Anybody with Nike stock will now have to work for many years to overcome the losses. This will also keep NIKE from attracting great talent, cause great talent to leave Nike, and continue the overall collapse of the brand.

I hate it because I’ve been a Nike fan all of my life. It has just become the inevitable fate. One that nobody wants to take responsibility for despite the obvious failures. Nike was never a tech company. Nike was a company by athletes for athletes.

Does anybody know what NIKE is anymore? No. That’s the problem and that’s what ki-led this great company.

…and with that, just like Shark Tank…I’m out

Heard he crawled back under a rock

It started with a letter from Elliott. Maybe it ends with a letter from the people still in the Tower.
From: The People Still in the Tower
Next stop: stability.

Removing two EMT members is not a cultural reset. What leadership does next determines whether this is actually one.

For years, employees have absorbed the consequences of strategy whiplash, expensive mistakes, consultant spending, restructurings, repeated cuts and leadership decisions they were directed to execute—even when the people closest to the work knew better.

The people making those decisions were compensated extraordinarily well. The people underneath them often paid the real price: jobs, careers, financial security, morale and trust.

That can’t simply be filed under “new leadership, moving forward.”

Leadership owns what leadership allowed.

The fiber chapter is over. The boardroom battles and proxy fights are behind us. The constant strategy pivots need to end. Crown Castle now has an opportunity to get back to basics: operate exceptionally well, generate sustainable organic growth, invest intelligently, execute consistently and rebuild the workforce that actually makes the company run.

And that means investing in people—not another round of cuts disguised as transformation.

Commit to a meaningful layoff freeze and give employees room to work without constantly wondering who’s next. Stop replacing institutional knowledge with consultants. Before launching another giant technology transformation, fix what is actually broken. Rebuild the expertise that repeated reductions stripped out. Invest heavily in cross-training and upskilling. Create career paths employees can actually see. Make mental wellness and psychological safety more than HR language.

And perhaps most importantly: stop treating people who identify problems as the problem.

Listen to them. Protect them. Thank them. Fix what they identified.

TA and KH are now part of the leadership team carrying this company forward. By many accounts, they are capable leaders. Now comes the harder part: demonstrate that the next chapter will be different. Acknowledge what employees have endured, establish clear expectations for how people will be treated, and rebuild trust through actions rather than another mission statement.

Crown Castle is an enormous enterprise supported by a remarkably small workforce. Its people should feel like an extraordinary asset—not an expense line perpetually waiting for another reduction.

Employees have survived the fiber bet, activist battles, reorganizations, leadership turnover, strategy reversals and repeated workforce reductions.

They’ve done their part.

Now it’s leadership’s turn.

Stability. Accountability. Respect. Career development. Operational discipline. Sustainable growth. No more whiplash.

And if the remaining EMT can’t commit to that, then on this casual ride we’ve apparently been taking for years, can someone please announce the new riders and the next stop?

—— And yes, AI helped mask the writers. We’re not d-mb, we’re survivalists. We’ve learned a few things around here.

Momentum is everything.

Watch the people who moved fast. VP to CEO. VP to President in under five years. Then watch what happened to the people who were "doing great work" and stayed at level.

If you're being told how good you are but you can't get out of L09–L11, LG1–LG3, or LG5 — you're keeping a seat warm. Praise is what they give you instead of a promotion, not on the way to one.

And levels move both directions. Look at how many presidents from five years ago aren't presidents now. Special assignment. Retitled to SVP. Moved to the franchise team. Out. Some of them got jumped by people they used to sit above.

Nobody is going to tell you which side of that you're on. The climbers compound. So does standing still.

History repeats. Pay attention.

Listening to Emily Elswick discuss her faith this morning and then walk through an entire slide dedicated to her personal travel and work trips was certainly a choice. Given that our MIP was 70%, I’m not sure this was the moment for a personal highlight reel. Also genuinely curious how she ended up in this role. What experience or qualifications actually supported putting her in this position?

Imagine, if you will, a world where a survey can give a clear view of improvement or decline in how employees view leadership and the overall health of a company.

Imagine that the survey responses are collected by Gallup, who has been in business since 1935 and is widely recognized as one of the most credible analytics and advisory firms in the world. A company that tracks individual survey links or access codes on the backend to prevent duplicate submissions and route data correctly and any identifying data is permanently walled off from the submitter's employer. That company's reputation would be destroyed if they identified who submitted the surveys.

If Gallup didn't know who you were then people could put as many surveys in as they want and stuff the ballot box like mail-in votes. Oops... better stop there. They have to be able to tell the company that an entire organization or department has so little care that they haven't submitted 7 out of 10 possible surveys. How would they know that? Because the employer says here is our email list and the departments they work for, please tell us the percentage of surveys submitted so we will know by their silence if there are leadership issues.

If Gallup exposed the individuals then a nearly 100 year old company's reputation would be ruined.

The work around is for an employer is to ask for optional long form answers that are only shown to managers with more than 10 direct reports.

But who do those managers show it to? I have been personally asked if I submitted certain answers. It has also been suggested that I submitted answers over the years that I would think I had submitted because they sounded like something I would have written.

Oh, did I forget to mention that some of the directors have read the long form answers on All Hands calls? I don't think I'm the only one who had slack and jabber start pinging with people claiming to know who the submitter was.

And Gallup has formatted the survey to isolate questions to each level of management to target which levels are declining and which are in improving.

They also group good and bad responses by organizations. So bad customer service managers don't affect good supply chain managers and vice versa.

If I am a manager at any level, I want you to think we know who you are and that "straight fives will keep you alive" and other BS answers to dupe you into thinking you're saving yourself.

Wake up!! Straight fives saves the leadership that needs to be gone.

And if I am a company sycophant then I am going to go on every forum and tell everybody that "straight fives will keep you alive".

I have given honest detailed surveys for years. I know there is a character count in the long form because others have said in meetings that they had too carefully edit them to get under the limit. And I am still here and they are still here. But all of our managers at the top are gone or moved and the direct manager, who is good, is still there.

That rips apart any of the claims that people are posting right now to the contrary. You don't have to believe it but it's a fact.

Think about it. Do they need a survey to get rid of you? They don't need any reason other than your name came up in the layoff lottery. And because they get a chance to review and provide feedback on the list, if you are kissing your boss's Southern Ring, they will make sure your name is removed from that list. Or will they?

They are afraid you will answer in a way that exposes them for the shams they are.

So remember:
"Straight fives keeps leadership alive"

MVGA

Recently several exec's have explained the importance of being well rounded in many aspects of the company. To do so they mentioned how they would make as many lateral moves in order to learn holistically. Do these same leaders support us if we have the same desire. Will management support us if we have the same desire? How to be well rounded the execs?

Okay Target you still su-k and majority of your team members are overworked and over all the racism however you ki-led it this Target Together. The content from the leaders was the same old same old but the performances were a home run. How did everyone else feel?

33 Directors + 3 VPs + 2 SVPs = A tone-deaf waste of time and money.

The math is hard to ignore - between flights, lodging, meals, and lost working hours, this easily represents close to a half-million dollar investment. For that expense, I'd expect a concrete deliverable: a roadmap, reorg decision, or a prioritized set of initiatives with owners and dates. As far as I can tell, none of that has materialized - nor will it. No memo, no readout, no change in direction.

This seems like a good moment to ask a harder question: why does IT currently support a director population this large relative to its actual scope of delivery? A retreat of this size implies a leadership bench that, on paper, should be shaping strategy, but the day-to-day experience for most of the org is that priorities shift reactively, tickets sit unworked, and nobody below the director layer can point to what these roles are actually accountable for.

If 39 directors and above can be pulled out of the building for a week with no discernible business impact, it's evidence the roles themselves may be over-provisioned.

So Dan's been here a Year... can anyone provide top 3 goals/strategies that is being implemented for Culture change?

I sit through All Hands and leave clueless.

Sampath at least repeated each session.

Strayer University must not of taught that to Directors.

Any managers in the leadership summit today? I can only take so much corporate word salad and patting each other on the back. Trust, communication, listening, making healthcare affordable. Great talk. Thanks.

We’re a complete financial disaster, yet we’re building a new multi-billion dollar campus nobody wants, and this leadership actually thinks the Street isn’t going to react??

The fact that Stink sits in his office talking about and arguing over the number of bowling alley lanes and golf simulators rather than figuring out how to set this company up for financial success is actually fu--ing insane.

These guys have completely lost their minds.

We’re dealing with massive financial pressure, a rapidly changing industry, growing competition and serious threats to the business, and somehow the priority is building a giant corporate playground???

Nobody wants your stupid new HQ. Nobody cares about your bowling alleys. Nobody gives a sh-t about your golf simulators. This was clearly stated in the survey last year. NO OFFICE not new office.

We need leadership focused on making this company financially successful, not designing the fu--ing employee country club.

And the only silver lining is that this guy has already been involved in enough disastrous strategic decisions like TMO, DTV, Time Warner Xandr, etc. etc. etc. that there is absolutely no reason to believe this one will somehow be different.

Undoubtedly, this will prove to be the wrong decision yet again and set this company back decades further than he already has.

At this point, the only question is how much more damage these guys can do before the Street and the board finally says enough is enough. The sound financial decision here is to short the stock before everyone else does.

Nobody wants or cares about your stupid new HQ. Retire and let us go back to the way it was before Covid. Everyone hates you.

At what point does leadership admit the entertainment strategy isn’t working?

CP keeps getting squeezed while resources continue going toward chasing another Barbie movie moment. Barbie was lightning in a bottle. Instead of strengthening the businesses that actually generate consistent revenue, leadership seems determined to recreate something that may not be repeatable.

Then come the layoffs, reorganization and promotions at the top, while everyone else is expected to do more with less.

“Toy to Joy” sounds great in a presentation. Employees are still waiting to see the Joy part.

It’s interesting that leadership continues to allow BH to operate under a hybrid model due to parking concerns, while the rest of the company has moved to full RTO, particularly when flexibility appears to be based on individual manager discretion.

Isn’t parking being an issue essentially the same as someone having a long commute or another employee working very long, nontraditional hours? All of these circumstances can create challenges or inconveniences for employees. If parking concerns are a valid reason for providing hybrid flexibility, it raises the question of why similar flexibility couldn’t be extended across the company rather than being determined by individual circumstances or manager discretion.

Just heard we got a new director and she is from there. Why is all senior management affiliated with this school?

wow the new CEO did a glossy magazine photo shoot, even involving a "groomer"/makeup artist: https://www.fastcompany.com/91587895/walmart-ceo-john-furner-ai-revolution. Things are changing that's for sure

Takis mentioned promotions are there this year but Tech FIG hugely impacted this year no merit or Promotion cycles despite of many concerns raised to Sr Leadership! Looks like FIG co head blocked that and Takis isn’t aware?

Takis posed the following in the townhall regarding this topic:

Do you enjoy coming to work every day?
Do you enjoy the people you are working with?
Do you feel that you have a future here?
Does the company value subject matter expertise?
Am I getting paid fairly?

The answer to all of these for me is a resounding NO! What about the rest of you?

To be fair to the people I work with… it’s a small handful of peers that are impossible to work with, a few that aren’t contributing nearly enough, and the VP and up leadership chain that is making work life miserable for everyone

Not OP of orginal post but that post maybe me realize:

IMAPS Corporation Award to IBM?

How? That department was completely destroyed and disbanded by the leadership of their last management chain. Their buffoonery bungled, fumbled, and mismanaged, driving the department straight into the ground by people who clearly had no idea what they were doing. In fact the only thing those guys were good at was destroying and ending other projects and programs. How can IBM win this when it literally no longer exists internally at IBM. How exactly does a team that's been wiped off the org chart win an award for work it can no longer even claim credit for?

Watch Charlie Youakim’s latest post on LinkedIn about Sezzle’s growth. This is the sort of leader employees rally behind. Warm, grounded, respected. A unique subscription model to BNPL - a new p2p offering that’s unique.