Three Drawer Management
Victor Benjee got an offer of appointment from Traditions Galore Ltd. The offer was undeniably very attractive in terms of money and position offered. He started contemplating in terms of the change. However he was not very sure whether the change would be a right move in his career growth.
He was quite in friendly terms with his existing boss Jawahar Kurios in his present company Genuine Systemic Ltd. So he could discuss his personal matters with Jawahar Kurios. While generally changing a job is kept quite a secret by almost all the people, Victor found it OK to confide such things in Jawahar. He trusted Jawahar fully in such matters too.
Therefore, one evening when Jawahar was quite free from his work and was resting in his cabin, Victor dropped in.
He asked, “Jawahar, do you have about an hour to spend with me? I wish to discuss something personal. Do you remember that you had given me a good reference while I was applying for a senior position in your previous company Traditions Galore? I want your advice in that connection?”
Jawahar got curious, “Can I congratulate you? I guess they have offered you a job.”
Victor said, “Yes, they have. And the offer is brilliant. I will get some 55% more money than what you give me here. The designation is more appealing and I stand to get a bigger house, car and cabin.”
Jawahar laughed, “Then where is the problem? Jump in.”
Victor said, “But I am not sure about the culture of Traditions Galore Ltd. They say that it’s quite different from Genuine Systemic Ltd. One could find it difficult to work in this new company after having worked for a more professional company like Genuine Systemic. Now you have worked for Traditions Galore for quite some years and you have the first hand information about it. Then who could be a better person than you to guide me on this change?”
Jawahar replied, “OK. OK. I will tell you all. But that’s based purely on my observations and experience. I will not tell you whether you should leave Genuine Systemic and join Traditions Galore. That will be strictly your decision. But surely, I will fill you with some data.”
Then Jawahar went on to elaborate, “What you heard is correct. Though it’s huge company by all standards but it is one of those family owned types where family members or their inner circle people have strict controls over all the company activities. In nutshell, Traditions Galore’s Culture is almost opposite of what we do here. For example, our company believes lots in processes and systems where as in Traditions Galore most of the decisions are discretionary. While we have at least some semblance of delegation of power and one can take decisions at different levels, in Traditions Galore the decision making is highly centralized. We are more transparent here but Traditions Galore is full of secrecy. Yet let me hurriedly say that they have their own brand of systems too and they too make huge profits.”
Victor interrupted, “Jawahar, can you give me some examples from your own experience?”
Jawahar said, “OK. I will tell you this one experience and you may get a lot of insight. I had joined Traditions Galore after working for a good length of time in a professional multinational company. This multinational company had everything defined on paper and things went strictly in accordance with those things. For example, if I wanted to buy some material or some equipment, the system was very transparent. If I gave convincing justifications for the purchase, I was sure to get it or the sanctioning authority will seek further clarifications from me. And timeline for this type of decision-making and execution was clearly defined. So it was that simple and straight forward.”
Jawahar took a pause and then continued, “So after joining Traditions Galore, I tried to follow the same system in absence of any systems manual telling me what to do. The CEO of the company had given me a mandate to improve the efficiency of the manufacturing departments by a certain percentage within an year’s period. For achieving this, I needed to induct some specific equipment of the latest technology in the organization. So I made a justification note, attached it to the purchase requisition form and sent it to the CEO. After a week or so, the justification note with the purchase requisition was returned to me via company’s finance department.”
Victor asked, “Why, did not you have an approved budget for it?”
Jawahar replied, “I had made provision for it in my budget but finance people used to revisit the budget provision once more on case to case basis when the actual purchase was about to be made. As per them the budget was just a rough guideline. Now this was quite different from my previous organization. In my previous company once a budget was sanctioned, it became sacrosanct for all purposes. But here the CEO passed on my requisition to finance department without even informing me. It was quite strange for me. I had to spend many hours spread over many days to satisfy finance chief. Finally he signed on the dotted line. After this I sent the whole thing once again to my CEO. I waited for almost two weeks but I did not get any approval of the CEO.”
Victor was surprised, “Then, when did you get the approval?”
Jawahar replied, “I did not get it. Couple of times I reminded him about my requisition but he posed very busy. Then after repeated follow up from me, he asked me to meet him and explain my plans on how I aimed at increasing the plant efficiency with the new equipment. But every time I requested for his time to do so, he made some excuse or the other and kept on postponing our meeting. Then I got fed up. I was already running out of time and being the first year of my employment I could not risk not achieving the mandate given to me. So I worked out some alternate plans without this technologically advanced equipment and somehow started implementing efficiency improvements.
Victor got puzzled, “You mean to say that you stopped sending all of your proposal to your CEO and still worked.”
Jawahar replied, “No, later on I knew the trick of how to get my proposals passed. Somehow with my keen observations I came to know about my CEO’s "Three Drawer System" which in fact was a top secret. Only intelligent people like me could decipher it. I told you earlier that even companies like Traditions Galore have their own brand of systems. My CEO there had a system which I branded as “Three Drawer System”.
Victor mentioned, “Jawahar, can you throw light on this ‘Three Drawer System’ please?”
Jawahar said, “I am coming to that. After getting clearance from finance your proposal goes to CEO. The scrutiny by finance itself is the first step of control on the expenditure proposed by you and wasting a couple of weeks. You have to explain a lot to finance people. Only if you are serious about your plan, you will take pains to convince finance department or else you will give up. So finance tests your patience and your seriousness about your proposal. Then your proposal goes to the CEO. Immediately on receiving the proposal, without even looking at it (forget about reading it), he shoves it into the top drawer of his table. Then as I did in my first encounter, you start reminding him about it. He tells you to meet him and explain the whole thing but for a few weeks or sometimes even for a few months he does not give you any time slot for the meeting. At this stage if you go slow on seeking his appointment, then after a few days he transfers your proposal papers to the second drawer (the middle drawer). Then he waits for you to push him for a meeting with him or convince him to give approval without the meeting. For some reason if you shy away from meeting him or you are incompetent to get his ears and convince him, he transfers your proposal to the third drawer (the bottom most one). In fact, since you have already waited all these days, weeks and months getting nothing, most people may totally give up. However few people still may try hard with him and in such a case the proposal papers may start a reverse journey through the drawers. However if you are not able to achieve this, you papers stay in the third drawer and soon find a way in the waste paper basket or the trash bin.”
Victor was amazed to hear this story, “My god, what an amazing control system! I could have never believed it unless it came from you. So, should I drop the idea of joining them?”
Jawahar said, “Why, are not they offering you 55% more salary; it’s quite high, one cannot ignore it. And what about the lucrative designation and bigger house, car and cabin? If you refuse, your wife and kids will miss all the fun. You already tasted this culture, why not taste the other culture too? Won’t it be fun for you too?”
Victor threw up his hands in desperation, “Jawahar, aren’t you joking? Damn it, I am totally confused.”
Victor Benjee got an offer of appointment from Traditions Galore Ltd. The offer was undeniably very attractive in terms of money and position offered. He started contemplating in terms of the change. However he was not very sure whether the change would be a right move in his career growth.
He was quite in friendly terms with his existing boss Jawahar Kurios in his present company Genuine Systemic Ltd. So he could discuss his personal matters with Jawahar Kurios. While generally changing a job is kept quite a secret by almost all the people, Victor found it OK to confide such things in Jawahar. He trusted Jawahar fully in such matters too.
Therefore, one evening when Jawahar was quite free from his work and was resting in his cabin, Victor dropped in.
He asked, “Jawahar, do you have about an hour to spend with me? I wish to discuss something personal. Do you remember that you had given me a good reference while I was applying for a senior position in your previous company Traditions Galore? I want your advice in that connection?”
Jawahar got curious, “Can I congratulate you? I guess they have offered you a job.”
Victor said, “Yes, they have. And the offer is brilliant. I will get some 55% more money than what you give me here. The designation is more appealing and I stand to get a bigger house, car and cabin.”
Jawahar laughed, “Then where is the problem? Jump in.”
Victor said, “But I am not sure about the culture of Traditions Galore Ltd. They say that it’s quite different from Genuine Systemic Ltd. One could find it difficult to work in this new company after having worked for a more professional company like Genuine Systemic. Now you have worked for Traditions Galore for quite some years and you have the first hand information about it. Then who could be a better person than you to guide me on this change?”
Jawahar replied, “OK. OK. I will tell you all. But that’s based purely on my observations and experience. I will not tell you whether you should leave Genuine Systemic and join Traditions Galore. That will be strictly your decision. But surely, I will fill you with some data.”
Then Jawahar went on to elaborate, “What you heard is correct. Though it’s huge company by all standards but it is one of those family owned types where family members or their inner circle people have strict controls over all the company activities. In nutshell, Traditions Galore’s Culture is almost opposite of what we do here. For example, our company believes lots in processes and systems where as in Traditions Galore most of the decisions are discretionary. While we have at least some semblance of delegation of power and one can take decisions at different levels, in Traditions Galore the decision making is highly centralized. We are more transparent here but Traditions Galore is full of secrecy. Yet let me hurriedly say that they have their own brand of systems too and they too make huge profits.”
Victor interrupted, “Jawahar, can you give me some examples from your own experience?”
Jawahar said, “OK. I will tell you this one experience and you may get a lot of insight. I had joined Traditions Galore after working for a good length of time in a professional multinational company. This multinational company had everything defined on paper and things went strictly in accordance with those things. For example, if I wanted to buy some material or some equipment, the system was very transparent. If I gave convincing justifications for the purchase, I was sure to get it or the sanctioning authority will seek further clarifications from me. And timeline for this type of decision-making and execution was clearly defined. So it was that simple and straight forward.”
Jawahar took a pause and then continued, “So after joining Traditions Galore, I tried to follow the same system in absence of any systems manual telling me what to do. The CEO of the company had given me a mandate to improve the efficiency of the manufacturing departments by a certain percentage within an year’s period. For achieving this, I needed to induct some specific equipment of the latest technology in the organization. So I made a justification note, attached it to the purchase requisition form and sent it to the CEO. After a week or so, the justification note with the purchase requisition was returned to me via company’s finance department.”
Victor asked, “Why, did not you have an approved budget for it?”
Jawahar replied, “I had made provision for it in my budget but finance people used to revisit the budget provision once more on case to case basis when the actual purchase was about to be made. As per them the budget was just a rough guideline. Now this was quite different from my previous organization. In my previous company once a budget was sanctioned, it became sacrosanct for all purposes. But here the CEO passed on my requisition to finance department without even informing me. It was quite strange for me. I had to spend many hours spread over many days to satisfy finance chief. Finally he signed on the dotted line. After this I sent the whole thing once again to my CEO. I waited for almost two weeks but I did not get any approval of the CEO.”
Victor was surprised, “Then, when did you get the approval?”
Jawahar replied, “I did not get it. Couple of times I reminded him about my requisition but he posed very busy. Then after repeated follow up from me, he asked me to meet him and explain my plans on how I aimed at increasing the plant efficiency with the new equipment. But every time I requested for his time to do so, he made some excuse or the other and kept on postponing our meeting. Then I got fed up. I was already running out of time and being the first year of my employment I could not risk not achieving the mandate given to me. So I worked out some alternate plans without this technologically advanced equipment and somehow started implementing efficiency improvements.
Victor got puzzled, “You mean to say that you stopped sending all of your proposal to your CEO and still worked.”
Jawahar replied, “No, later on I knew the trick of how to get my proposals passed. Somehow with my keen observations I came to know about my CEO’s "Three Drawer System" which in fact was a top secret. Only intelligent people like me could decipher it. I told you earlier that even companies like Traditions Galore have their own brand of systems. My CEO there had a system which I branded as “Three Drawer System”.
Victor mentioned, “Jawahar, can you throw light on this ‘Three Drawer System’ please?”
Jawahar said, “I am coming to that. After getting clearance from finance your proposal goes to CEO. The scrutiny by finance itself is the first step of control on the expenditure proposed by you and wasting a couple of weeks. You have to explain a lot to finance people. Only if you are serious about your plan, you will take pains to convince finance department or else you will give up. So finance tests your patience and your seriousness about your proposal. Then your proposal goes to the CEO. Immediately on receiving the proposal, without even looking at it (forget about reading it), he shoves it into the top drawer of his table. Then as I did in my first encounter, you start reminding him about it. He tells you to meet him and explain the whole thing but for a few weeks or sometimes even for a few months he does not give you any time slot for the meeting. At this stage if you go slow on seeking his appointment, then after a few days he transfers your proposal papers to the second drawer (the middle drawer). Then he waits for you to push him for a meeting with him or convince him to give approval without the meeting. For some reason if you shy away from meeting him or you are incompetent to get his ears and convince him, he transfers your proposal to the third drawer (the bottom most one). In fact, since you have already waited all these days, weeks and months getting nothing, most people may totally give up. However few people still may try hard with him and in such a case the proposal papers may start a reverse journey through the drawers. However if you are not able to achieve this, you papers stay in the third drawer and soon find a way in the waste paper basket or the trash bin.”
Victor was amazed to hear this story, “My god, what an amazing control system! I could have never believed it unless it came from you. So, should I drop the idea of joining them?”
Jawahar said, “Why, are not they offering you 55% more salary; it’s quite high, one cannot ignore it. And what about the lucrative designation and bigger house, car and cabin? If you refuse, your wife and kids will miss all the fun. You already tasted this culture, why not taste the other culture too? Won’t it be fun for you too?”
Victor threw up his hands in desperation, “Jawahar, aren’t you joking? Damn it, I am totally confused.”
Related Book
"Sensitive Stories of Corporate World" (available from Amazon, get it online)
Read many more management anecdotes/management case studies in the eminent author Shyam Bhatawdekar's best selling book "Sensitive Stories of Corporate World" available online from Amazon as an eBook as well as a printed book.
For everything you wanted to know on building leadership and management, refer Shyam Bhatawdekar’s website: http://shyam.bhatawdekar.com/
(Also, refer our High Quality Management Encyclopedia at: http://management-universe.blogspot.com/)
For “out of box thinking” articles by Shyam Bhatawdekar, refer: (Out of Box Ideas) http://wow-idea.blogspot.com/
Read other blogs of Shyam Bhatawdekar at: (Home Page for Writings of Shyam Bhatawdekar) http://writings-of-shyam.blogspot.com
Novel "The Peace Crusaders" http://peacecrusaders.blogspot.com
Novels and Stories
Novel "The Peace Crusaders" http://peacecrusaders.blogspot.com
Stories Children Will Love http://stories-children.blogspot.com/
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