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Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

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Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#31

Post by jrockway »

nixgeek wrote: post #25

I’ve noticed that in larger technology companies there has also been a trend towards getting a “Manager” title but leading a team of 1-2 people. Maybe there will be intent to grow this to 3-4 people or more in future years, but that hinders giving others a title and their own small team (which can be considered career progression). Then you might see another leader (Manager of Managers, or “MoM”) who has 5 of these s…

I don't really have a problem with this. The best organizations lean into the fact that an organization needs to do more than just make a product, they also need to help their employees "grow" in their career. For those interested in the management track, starting small with a small "blast radius" makes a lot of sense. The organization isn't saying that having managers for every 2 people is the best way to allocate management resources, it's saying that it's the best way to train new managers.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#32

Post by throwanem »

Hermitian909 wrote: post #24
nowherebeen wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People outside the finance industry really buy it too. I think it's because in most companies, VPs are above director. Only in finance, is it below.

> I think it's because in most companies, VPs are above director. Every now and again someone whose spent a career exclusively in finance gets bitten by this when transitioning into the business world. A friend once told me a story about a deal with Amazon nearly getting tanked when I coworker chewed out an Amazon VP, saying they wanted to "talk to someone who could make decisions". Took a lot of massaging to salvage…

That must've been a fun wall to be a fly on.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#33

Post by jrockway »

A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #15
bombcar wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Banks hand out VP titles like candy so that the customers think they're hot stuff and being treated well.

Ahh, but those are not real VPs. Those are likely all AVPs ( less power, less money ) and not VPs or SVPs. Naturally, all the customer sees is a vice-president, but for HR purposes they are 'only' AVPs. I kinda hate it, because I have ridiculous title for HR purposes now myself and I am 'just' IC in real life. edit: added quotation marks to just. I like being an IC.

I think it depends on the bank. I worked at Bank of America and random mid-career programmers were legitimately VPs. Officer -> AVP -> VP -> Director was the title progression at the time.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#34

Post by devnull3 »

Some of these companies have "code-of-ethics" document which is mandatory for every employee to read. I had to read & acknowledge as a freshman software engineer at a firm which abused visa-on-arrival for work purposes.

The sheer hypocrisy is mind-blowing!

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#35

Post by ThinkingGuy »

A very large company I worked for did something similar..

They ran a call center for merchant credit cards. Every associate on the floor had the title of "account manager." That way, when a customer whose request for a credit limit increase was declined or who had some other complaint asked to "speak to a manger," the low-wage associate could reply "Sir/Ma'am, I AM a manager."

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#36

Post by Idk__Throwaway »

hourago wrote: post #26
pxue wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a small government advocate, i have no issue with labor boards. the alternative is violence or unionization, neither of which are optimal in resolving disputes like these in a civilized and efficient manner.

> the alternative is violence or unionization, neither of which are optimal in resolving disputes like these in a civilized and efficient manner. Unionization is a great way of solving disputes. Many big corporations need to be counter-weight with some other big organization. To put violence and unions at the same level seems uncalled for.

> Many big corporations need to be counter-weight with some other big organization.

Such as labor boards, or rather the government that gives them power.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#38

Post by adrr »

Start sending manager and hr to jail for wage theft. If an employee falsified timesheets they can and have been convicted of theft. Why isn’t the reverse true?

Jail is a huge motivating factor and why you don’t see wide spread accounting fraud in public companies.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#39

Post by bmitc »

hourago wrote: post #26
pxue wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a small government advocate, i have no issue with labor boards. the alternative is violence or unionization, neither of which are optimal in resolving disputes like these in a civilized and efficient manner.

> the alternative is violence or unionization, neither of which are optimal in resolving disputes like these in a civilized and efficient manner. Unionization is a great way of solving disputes. Many big corporations need to be counter-weight with some other big organization. To put violence and unions at the same level seems uncalled for.

A lot of unions directly block solving disputes, choosing instead to deny all disputes. I know one union that was perfectly happy letting government workers make sox figures while "working" from home, while they produced objectively zero work over a period of months. These were the type of workers that would keep government equipment after retiring, quitting, or rarely being fired, requiring the government to send officers to collect. Any movement towards trying to get the workers to do literally anything or simply rating them low was met with vehement pushback. Like a union representative storming into you're office and yelling.

In this case, the union was a giant ball of mud whose only existence was to hold the government hostage.

As much as I dislike Thune power corporations can hold, unions are not a fix all and can become the same overlords.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#40

Post by nixgeek »

jrockway wrote: post #31
nixgeek wrote: post #25

I’ve noticed that in larger technology companies there has also been a trend towards getting a “Manager” title but leading a team of 1-2 people. Maybe there will be intent to grow this to 3-4 people or more in future years, but that hinders giving others a title and their own small team (which can be considered career progression). Then you might see another leader (Manager of Managers, or “MoM”) who has 5 of these s…

I don't really have a problem with this. The best organizations lean into the fact that an organization needs to do more than just make a product, they also need to help their employees "grow" in their career. For those interested in the management track, starting small with a small "blast radius" makes a lot of sense. The organization isn't saying that having managers for every 2 people is the best way to allocate m…

No disagreement on blast radius and the point on training new managers, instead what I find less logical is when a 50+ person organization has 25-30% of people as manager roles, meaning this isn’t an exceptional or temporary situation (i.e. training one or a small number of new managers), it’s actually a core part of organizational design.
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