"Pizza" Management

[Farfinator]

In the past 10 years, I have been associated with 9 different dealerships in Connecticut all suffering from the same plight:"Pizza" management. Here's how it works:
A meeting is called for Friday at lunch.At 12:00 sharp(ha,ha),everyone trickles into the lunch room and dives into the complimentary pizza and soda. A speech is made. Several disgruntled employees capitalize on their opportunity to spout off smart as@ comments which are brushed aside. Points are made. Some listen, some hear, some not. At 12:55, the meeting adjourns. One of the new guys whispers "thank you for lunch", ashamed that he might be heard. Monday comes...Status quo! That's it. How inspiring! This is an absurd way to manage and your employees know it. It does not generate respect or loyalty or even commitment, if fact in most cases it is perceived as a farce before it even is executed. Get a clue, leadership by example and genuine involvement instead of token displays would be far more effective!

[partstom]

10 years and 9 dealerships??? Perhaps if the
managers involved really did listen the meetings would be more productive. Our service team has monthly meetings and they work well. You will always have some who don't want to speak or hear, but most utilize the meetings as they are intended.To share info.

[Paradise]

Farf:
Can relate totally to your frustration with the token meetings you're enduring. Prepare for rant . You touched a common nerve.
The only reason most meetings take place is somewhere in some unwritten manual..someone mandated that part of a managers job validation is to hold meetings.
Regardless if they are productive, meaningful, creative, incite people to brainstorm , vent real frustrations, resolve real problems... bring real working solutions to the table.
One organization had the monthly morning meeting where everyone gathered together..ties straining necks, donuts gluing fingers together, everyone jockeys to sit in furthermost corner of room assuming invisibility. Lead managers stride in....capes flapping..a few jokes crack..then numbers are rolled off lips locked into Billy Idol snarls
while respective targeted managers become the size of pencil erasers as they shrink in their chairs. Butts are kicked, adults publicly humiliated within their peer group. Speeches are made..but not a solution proffered within the tirade. Just a lot of stern looks and straining neck veins.
Meeting dismissed and everyone disperses to jump in cars to roar off to lunch..to bond ,
lick wounds before heading back to the dealership. In short, Mission Nothing
accomplished.
In the background, crisis abound. One facility, for months..had been having a silent truckload sale of transmissions out their back door < theft unawares under a chronically golfing managers non-managing nose>, the warranty repairs look like a Zone Warranty administrators audit dream , sales have dropped ..coffee drinking /smoking is up around
outside ashtrays, customer complaints have risen through staff apathy and at months end
the numbers across the board are dripping off financial statements like a bad Salvador Dali print.The proverbial collection of mass mis-management hits the fan and the Big Guy
sweeps into next meeting..heads roll..frantic calls to the really big guy that it's
"handled"..and the beat continues..problems continue. They morph a little..but still exist.
Pepsid stocks rise.
One can only assume that Fire-Fighting management is still the management mentality Du Jour. One popular solution is to add another title, another manager to oversee the existing manager and hold more meetings. Kinda like layering a five year old to go play in the snow. What is accomplished is now there are more people to point fingers at others and deflect responsibility for the company maintaining their title of Mal Function Junction Motors.
Instead of dialing the dot smaller, going back to basic business roots...re-adopting
strategies that made businesses strong..we keep re-creating the wheel and thrive in the
turmoil it creates. The popular mentality is the Big Guy who expounds the.."My door is
always open" theology really only wants one person to talk to. He loses touch. His
primary working managers become invisible. Their needs, their problems come to him
through a game of telephone. By the time they reach him..they have shape shifted , filtered and are reflected via the mentality of the person doing the reporting. At times, the concerns become minimized or completely unmentioned because they may truly reflect thelack of control abounding at the hand of the lead manager who has the ear of the owner.

When the economy turns dismal..the meetings turn into fist pounding sessions resulting in
regurgitating the old tired TV ads with voices booming price cuts that sound more like ads for a WWW wrestling match coming to town. Any mention in the meetings of how to get masses of people into the facility via other means? Fishing and hunting experts invited to speak? Art shows on the grounds? Car collector shows on the grounds? People afraid to travel via air right now..anyone creating brochures to take to businesses illustrating and marketing the benefits of purchasing small vehicle fleets for their regionally traveling employees?
Run a spiff for ALL employees..porters to office personnel..for the best new marketing
idea among the staff. You never know what great talents lie within your staff if you barely know their name.. nod as you breeze past with cup of coffee...year after year. You never know what organizations or hobbies they enjoy connected to mass groups you could
entertain in your facility. Sell trucks? Maybe your porter is the guru of the local Bass Fishing club.
Result? People within the community who may have never given the dealership or product
a sideways glance.. walking in the door..being exposed to the facility..the vehicle brands.
All employees dedicated to making the business successful..creating excitement..feeling an active part of their job security. No matter what crisis or economy exists. Your involved in
creating new markets.
Fixed operations chronic problems? Consider shifting the position of in-house Fixed Ops
manager away from the expensive redundancy over already competent Service and Parts
managers to more of a Fixed Financial Operations Manager. A Co-Comptroller.. making
that person an actual money producing, focused manager handling all facets of the paper that flows from back to front. Someone who sees the whole connected picture
consistently..instead of a multitude of $8 an hour people handling fractured pieces of the large picture. People who have no clear position of responsibility to exact real
change.Someone who is not only able to catch and recognize small problems before they
become another chronic crisis to resolve in another meeting... someone trained in parts
and service technical operations who can see the dots materialize, armed with the
knowledge to actually connect them and see negative trends develop. Armed with the
responsibility to exact immediate resolution before profit losses. Result? The death of
crisis/ firefighting management. The rise of profits, a drop in the chronic sloppy monthly
policy losses .The money you have started making through creative marketing.. you get to stuff into your bottom line pocket. Capes packed away. Silent, well-oiled functioning in place.
Meetings should be held for specific reasons to provoke real solutions...or to share
pertinent new information. What I have shared here are solutions borne from proactive,creative meetings I was involved with over the years. Primarily within one facility.
Meetings should invoke creativity within management.
Monthly number meetings held with the individual management disciplines/failings kept behind door ..one on one professional meetings. Public peer humiliation breeds one thing.
Everyone clams up...no one respects the humiliator... managers keep their real problems and concerns close to the vest because everyone fears becoming an example. Trust within management is dead. Problems fester and grow until they explode into losses. Mass management morale drops below radar.
I personally love pizza meetings...however...washing it down with a good dose of energy within open, active..all voices heard equally ..respected equally ..discussion goes a long
way to differentiate a successful organization consistently growing and profiting from one who simply keeps their revolving doors open limping from one crisis to another.

[FARFINATOR]

Paridise;
You have quite neatly and accurately capsulized 10 years of frustration. I might only add the following:
I am a hugh proponent of adopting the "Big Picture" approach, but it is nearly impossible to implement. In stripping away the "proprietary" control of issues and information and unveiling the problems previously masked by time tested excuses, you ruffle some feathers. Most of these managers, despite their claims to the contrary, don't want to learn new tricks and certainly don't appreciate their ego's bruised, no matter how tactful and fairly the matters are approached. If the information makes them look bad, regardless of the truth, they resist and often retaliate! It sucks to be me.
So, here I sit on Sunday morning mired in a sea of futility(as many are), desperate to find that Import oasis where the Big Picture is revered.

[Eric the Red]

Every meeting should have a "facilitator", who has the function of keeping things on track and on time. Every meeting should have an agenda. Everything demanding action should be assigned with a due date. Everything else, no matter what you call it, is nothing more than free lunch with a lot of shop talk. Why not print these posts and distribute them anonymously to the senior people in your company so that they may have an opportunity to get a clue. If they don't, at least you will know that you are there only for lunch and maybe the frustrations will not be as great.
Change demands conflict. Status quo demands nothing.

[sallen1]

We have several types of meetings. First, there is a regular management meeting every week where we go over each section of the DOC. There is no table pounding. Each manager must live up to their performance in front of their peers, not their own staff.

We also have full staff meetings to hand out awards and bonuses. I'd never use these meetings to yell at people. How unproductive!

It is up to the individual dept. managers to meet with their staff on a regular basis, i.e. at least once a month.

I'm not saying my process works the best, but we have little turnover.

s

[This message has been edited by sallen1 (edited 10-23-2001).]

[mark vandersteeg]

#1 have the meeting agenda written out and stick to it.

#2 for each topic that needs action or change, assign a facilitator for it and write out an action plan that includes a time line, costs, WHO, WHAT, WHERE, WHEN, with SPECIFICS. (if you delegate and allow some freedom here by empowering those under you, you would be suprised by the result, ALLOW FOR SOME MINOR MISTAKES!!!).

#3 follow up on the action plans and hold accountable those involved. (make sure you have the backing of your dealer for each action plan written.


sounds simple, too good to be true? since when did you (or the dealer) think our job was easy?

good luck,