There is no doubt that Ford has become a very toxic workplace. I think the management is responsible for that, because employees who spread bad vibes, who are prone to backstabbing and taking other people's credit, continue to thrive in this place.
Now that I'm leaving, I wonder if there was any lesson to be learned here. Were the rest of you able to learn anything from working in such a toxic environment?
8 replies (most recent on top)
Yes, I learned never to work for a company with such a toxic environment again. I will find the right job, or even volunteer for something worthwhile. Be careful biting and devouring one another, you might just be consumed by one another. I wish you all the best, I really do.
@1keo+1jRZ1Md8 I hear ya on the competency issue. It is exhausting dragging others along and continually explaining basic stuff. Seven years ago our new LL5 had the entire department go thru 3 days of evaluation and training. At the end the report the LL5 was given stated that only 2 in the department had aptitude and skills for the job. This was in IT. The two that were identified were both non-supervisory LL6 (technical specialists) both highly effective and skilled. The LL5 used this as justification to go on a hiring spree as they had the wrong skillsets in the department. Oddly enough the two people identified by consultants training as the only two with aptitude for the job were the only two people our LL5 cut in 2019. All the people with inadequate/non-existent skillsets are still in the department. It is a very strange world at Ford. When you are a PM it is easy to see who produces and who doesn’t.
@1gfi+1jRZ1Md8 I believe in a balance between effort and compensation for that effort. I don't need a ping pong table, nor a gym, nor avocado toast, nor grilled shrimp. I can have all that and more on my own.
If it matters, I don't even need the medical plan either because I can pay for mine with my own money. I need just a good salary like the one in Twitter ($160K+), with OT if needed, good bonuses/increases for performance, and competent teammates.
If Twitter can provide me with those, I have no problem working for them, even long hours. In my experience, the learning curve and the mess last just a few months. After 6 months, I already have at least 85% of the know how, I already adapted myself to use the tools provided by the company, and I started solving all the root causes of the most grinding issues. In time, I can stabilize my side, and regain some work-life balance, with enough $$$ in the bank.
I cannot stress the competency part enough. Dealing with competent people saves so much time, and can deliver so much quality work. Have you had to explain something technical to someone in a meeting at Ford, just to repeat it again every time someone joins the meeting? Because I have. Then wait for the meeting participants to understand the issues and agree with the solution, or at least reach for the same conclusions I did in the first 5 minutes of the meeting, but 40 minutes later.
When I deal with competent people at Ford (everyday there are less of them), everything flows rapidly. We understand each other perfectly. The knowledge of the others complements mine, providing me with alternate use cases or possible pitfalls, ensuring the solution is as good as we can produce. Dealing with the rest, is just a struggle, waiting for them to understand or at least approve it.
There is always something to be learned.
You learn to spot the toxic people early and inoculate yourself.
You learn to spot the managers who know and do diddly squat in interviews, and decline job offers.
You learn to spot misalignment between practiced corporate values and stated corporate values and avoid those companies. (Tip - the more a company and/or CEO brags about good deeds/values the worse their practiced values are)
You learn to only give your all when you are appreciated and valued.
You learn to cut ties with Ford coworkers who continue to try to use and abuse you after leaving Ford.
One of the sad things you learn as you mature is how many so-called friends are really users/abusers. You can be kind and empathic to the users, but kick them to the curb all the same. They will continue with their behaviors post-Ford and you don’t need that in your life.
One of the queen bee manipulative LL6s who was canned in 2019 is still gossiping, manipulating, pot stirring, backstabbing Ford employees past and present. She spends her whole day on the phone stirring pots. She was unable to find another job and has gained at least 50 lbs. Her entire career she mercilessly made fun of and tormented women on our team who were a little pudgy, Karma baby.
General opinion question: would any of you work for a Musk company at this stage of your career?
Opinions of him aside, it seems like an enormous amount of hours. Would you be willing to take that role today?
Musk is great in being upfront
No shady stuff like jf or that douggie guy thinking himself smart.
@OP. The lesson is always be ready to move, hone your skills, and don't be afraid of looking for better opportunities. I've been around, and even the best places, in time, go through changes where all the good is gone.
@sbf+1jRZ1Md8 I don't like or dislike Elon Musk per se, but at least he was upfront with the Twitter employees. They could agree to work harder or take a severance package. At FMC, the "low performers" are the ones getting the severance packages, the managers keep saying we are a "family", but they push the workers to work over 40 hours a week with NO compensation.
Personally, I'd like to be a Twitter employee, to push myself to excellence, to compete with the best, to actually deliver something useful. That was how I felt when I started at FMC.
Little by little, the most competent employees left, I went under awful managers, the red tape just increased tenfold in the last 3-4 years, and now most of the work I do makes no sense: endless meetings where nobody wants to be responsible of anything and we always need another meeting because nothing was solved; spending more time documenting what I am going to do next, and chasing people around, than actually doing the work.
Then I have managers that don't listen to the technical advice because it conflicts with their own political games. There are always reorgs and layoffs that break existing processes, with no KT, so now all takes longer to be done. The moral is in the floor, and many people are NOT working. I am not talking about the deadwood, because they never did. I am talking about hard working employees, who now just do barely a minimum to get by.
TBH, I get bored. Rarely I am actually engaged at work lately. The last project where I was actually engaged ended not happening, after I delivered my side of it. So why bother anymore? So now I am just "being", whenever my work is required of me, I deliver it while waiting for the company to kick me to the curb. Any moment now.
In the meantime, I have been looking around, seeing some job postings, updating my resume, feeling the market, but nothing yet that I like. Too bad my experience doesn't fit in Twitter, because that would be a challenging place to work.
Don't put up with it. The more folks tolerate a toxic environment, the worst it gets. It becomes a race to the bottom with the all competent folks leaving and only the least competent and toxic characters staying behind. Twitter was a good example, Musk fires half the workforce and expects the remaining half to work twice as hard and bend to his will. Fortunately most of the Twitter staff are smarter than that and resigned in protest. If the same thing had happened at Ford, JF would be out of a job as well.