The Ax Men

I came into work late this morning. It turned out just in time to make a mandatory company meeting at 10:00. I didn’t have time to speculate on what was going on.

We all shuffled into the cafeteria/auditorium on the first floor. Everyone was wondering what was up. Rumors were running rampant. The company president introduced 2 guys who were now going to be running this division. (Editor’s note: Since I need to keep this anonymous, and these guys are pretty famous and I work for a publicly traded company - I am going to call them H. and K. - OK I'm just too lazy to make up names for them now - and I don't think they'll be in my life too much longer) H. and K. gave us some background on themselves. They said that they were silicon valley turn-around experts, and talked about the plans that they have for us. They painted a really optimistic picture of what we can expect from them and how our lives – professionally and personally – will be better once they are in charge. This was really slickly done and reassuring. I’m guessing this was not the first time they have done this.

After we went back to our offices, some quick googling on these guys showed that these guys usually leave wreckage and devastation in their wake – for the employees, anyway. They usually try to extract “shareholder value” for the parent company or owners of the company as they try to turn the business around. It usually results in a lot of layoffs, breaking up divisions and selling off parts of them, asset sales, shorter vacations, pay cuts, salary freezes, outsourcing, you get the idea. One blog called these guys “The Ax Men”.

K. just really looks sinister to me.

I spent most of the day in Lynn’s office, with lots of folks stopping by and wondering what’s next. A bunch of us went out for a late lunch to our favorite watering hole (or, really early cocktails) and had a liquid lunch.

Whatever their intentions, good old H. and K. have shot productivity to hell.

New Year's resolution: new job.