Am I right? Ironically, those who are the prized above others for reasons we cannot fathom, have almost no stress.
21 replies (most recent on top)
@Shiva
Calm down... your slip is showing.
It should be obvious that 3M is a slow motion train wreck. I didn't want to see it that way, but I have a new reality now... Regardless of your job grade and tenure, you will just be one of the new guys from the company that was acquired,,, after the fire sale,,, if you make it through the coming rounds.
- "I'm a middle manager at JG 14, and I report to a VP.
I won't give my exact job grade, but I've been over JG14 longer than you have been at 3M.
- "If you get laid off, it's because your boss couldn't convince their boss that you were with your paycheck."
Tell me you have never made a 3M layoff decision without telling me you have never made a 3M layoff decision.
On the whole, non-HR JG14s are not going to be making many, if any, decisions on who actually is laid off. Especially in a non-production environment They might chime in on a tie-breaker between two employees, but that is it. Your VP boss made those decisions - sorry. Just how many code-name CDAs have you had to sign anyway?
- "Most of my time is spent in meetings. Specifically, meetings that highlight what my team does and how we're vital to 3M."
This is why you fail. If you are doing it right, your teams indispensability should be blindingly obvious to all, no sales pitch required. It won't protect all of them from layoff, but it will soften the blow in this environment.
@Lowly I have a few. That’s called texting while driving your kids to the park. Keep at it. Maybe you will get your own cube one day. Keep dreaming.
A point of clarification, many times if not always, it is the middle management that is doing the VP’s job. Protecting the VP’s position while they just attend meetings but don’t actually do anything. Employees are so tired at middle management of being the ones to figure out the priorities and manage their team but also do the work as well so the VP can pretend to know what is going on. And if you have to spend countless meetings showing why the team has value then maybe they don’t actually have real value. If you aren’t selling something and contributing to a P&L no one is actually growing the company to line or bottom line. Just a bunch of VP’s playing “business”. Oh how was executive conference by the way last week? How many flew in? How much did hotels cost? Oh you all went to watch the golf at 3M Open? Great. How many jobs could have been saved? Is golf the only way to “entertain” our customers ? Maybe if we actually had new products or a strategy to help our customers we could get meetings on calendars instead of luring them to Saint Paul with golf celebrities. What’s the ROI on that?
35 years here, fired 2 days before layoffs, so SIBG did not have to pay an additional two months severance. But that's the 3M Leadership Values at SIBG. Which one were we using then guys, I forget?
Termination after 30+ years is disgraceful. No one should be treated that way. Sadly it is how American CEOs react when they themselves have failed. Self preservation is a CEOs number one rule and that virus is rampant throughout the United States. I wish you the very best.
@shiva I thought 3M required college degrees for higher jobs. You write like you've never opened a book.
Dear JG14, come back after you have 30+ years in, 5 years from retirement and they kick your can out the door after watching many more rounds of layoffs. You'll feel much different. If all you do is meetings and talk about how great your team is, you're not doing enough for your team. You are not a leader and this has what has lead to many of the problems. Everyone wants to brag about how important they are without showing the actual impact AND how to push people's buttons. The founders of 3M were all about pushing, pushing to think different. All that is done know is CYA and anything that pleases wall street. Nothing for the employees, nothing for product growth. The last rounds of layoffs (20,000 last year, and lost track of this year, we at 8,000 yet?) cut so significantly that it's going to be next to impossible to recover.
The swamp needs to be drained and it's people like you who are part of the problem, not the solution.
This last post from a JG14 sounds like he has almost no experience from any company. They are not choosing random performance related cuts, they are gouging giant portfolios, they are gutting supply chain structures where it will be impossible to satisfy the customer, the have installed and the deinstalled so many ridiculous structures and systems like GSC, A3M that make it impossible to execute a business plan. So, it is not guys who don't have buddies in management; it is a leadership team that shows the only way they can improve margins is to cut thousands of employees irrespective of the impact. Get back to me after you see the carnage in a year. JG17 here.
I can tell nobody commenting here has a double-digit job grade because there's a lot of hate for management with very little understanding of how the company operates.
I'm a middle manager at JG 14, and I report to a VP. I've been at the Mining for eight years now, and I've seen probably 7 serious rounds of layoffs, including two that impacted multiple people that I worked with on a daily basis.
Sure, from the simple-minded production standpoint that this board holds out as the gold standard, you'd probably consider a lot of what I do to be a waste of time -- I don't make or sell anything -- but I'm doing what my boss wants so he stays happy and I stay employed. I'm also doing a lot to keep the people who report to me employed.
Most of my time is spent in meetings. Specifically, meetings that highlight what my team does and how we're vital to 3M. I point out my team's accomplishments, what we're working on, what our plans are for the month/quarter/year, what progress we've made on those plans, and how those plans align with my boss' priorities and plans.
I also talk to a lot of other VPs and directors, to ensure that my team is part of important/high-visibility projects, that we're doing stuff that generates value, saves money, or makes other employees' jobs easier, because the quickest may to be made "redundant" is to have people unsure as to what it is you do.
Basically, if I'm doing a good job nobody below me notices anything; it just looks like all I really do is send the occasional "checking in" email.
But it's easy for my direct reports to know if I'm doing a good job: if they're still employed then I'm doing a good job. If they get laid off it's because I haven't been able to convince the higher-ups that we're worth what they're paying us.
If you get laid off, it's because your boss couldn't convince their boss that you were with your paycheck. That's always because of one of three things: 1) you're bad at your job; 2) your job isn't important; or 3) your boss is bad at their job.
So while you're busy badmouthing management on here and insisting we don't do anything, remember that if you're still employed it's because your boss is repeatedly and successfully convincing executive-level employees how important your work is, and they want you to keep doing it.
Morale is at all time low in our factory now. Ongoing furlough is crushing the working levels. Sad to say.
Quiet quit and coast to your hearts content ladies and gentleman! If you are receiving monthly pay doing minimal to no work your job ain't too bad!
Learn a musical instrument or read a book! Personally I have been improving my landscape painting skills by following along with Bob Ross on youtube while I WFH. The Joy of Painting is especially enjoyable knowing you getting paid by 3M.
@2vle+1nPXTk3C
Same here. I am a long timer with 3M. And somehow I am just waiting to collect my paycheck while waiting for direction from senior leaders (which is nothing). The latest restructuring is still as confusing.
I used to be burnt out, and then these layoffs happened. My new role is not defined properly, and at the moment, the only thing I am expected to do is - do nothing, conserve cash.
It feels like I am somehow being paid a salary to do nothing. It's good to get some downtime but my job feels meaningless now. :(
Just practice quiet quitting if overwhelmed at work. Leave it to the VPs or Directors. It works.
Senior manager (I.e.15 I suppose) is not considered high flyer at any means. There are tons of directors, VPs, and SVPs sitting in this corporation.
Disagree. I would be termed a high flyer as a senior manager and I have a lot of stress. I have to work from home in a global role and there is far too much to do. The dog needs walking for at least 2 hours; I m leaning to play guitar; I help out with grandchildren etc etc. but the hierarchy are trying to find people like me and make us redundant. So that stressful. I have to allocate at least 1 hour a day to 3m activities to look busy; keep the salary coming in etc etc. so that’s stressful right ?
Oh and 1 more thing…can the worker bees just work a bit harder please? If blue collar team pulled their fingers out and stopped whinging then I could probably get down to 30 minutes a day…that the aim; and that can be stressful to
People need to realize that while your career may fund your life, there are many other aspects to life than a job. Our society has risen money to the heavens and people introduce themselves as their job title.
Set boundaries. Log on at 8, have lunch with family, log off at 4, enjoy your life until 8 the next morning. Block your calendar to ensure meetings aren’t scheduled outside of these hours. Don’t have a company phone, or turn it off at 4 if you do. Your email does not need to be refreshed every 15 minutes.
People think “I couldn’t do that, no way.” “I’d get fired” Don’t believe me? Try it for a month and see what happens.
You choose how to live your life. Are you going to be dictated by your boss every day? Follow rules that everyone else decided are “right”?
Set rules for yourself that you want to follow, that resonate with you, and that make you happier. Over time, you’ll actually be happier. And guess what? Happier employees produce better work. And no boss complains about better work.
Definitely an outrage.
Constantly!