Earlier this week, we received what seems to be a legitimate email supposedly written by the president/CEO of a “mid-level agency” who’s not quite happy with his or her team’s recent work — or their habit of leaving the office at 5 every day.
We can’t confirm that it’s real, but it certainly reads like something a flustered boss would write. (Surely no one would create such a message for his or her own pleasure.)
Good Morning
I want to change how we manage our employees at the beginning and end of the day.
In the morning you should meet with your team and you should cover what is due that day and who it is do too.
At the end of the day you were responsible for checking the work of your employees or having the project manager of a specific client check the work and the deliverables due that day. If the work is not completed or there is a problem with the work, The employee does not go home until it is fixed or unless the project manager says it’s okay for them to go home.
We are getting busier and more and more projects are coming into the pipeline. I always preach the worklife balance and I believe we can still have a very good worklife balance, but our clients come first. I’ve always made commitments to hiring and easing schedules so out employees have that worklife balance because I want that same balance too. Many of our employees are just leaving at 4, 4:30 or 5 o’clock and the work is not getting done and more importantly, the work is not perfect.
You are going to see me start to push you harder and harder to make sure that our work is perfect, on time and on budget.
I’m not happy with the email exchanges that I saw throughout the company yesterday nor am I happy that some are just leaving with the work not done or not perfect leaving others to correct it or smooth it over with the client.
We will not have a managers meeting this week. I will work to schedule one on Wednesday of next week. I expect to see some changes made by each manager this week. Please implement these changes by the close of business tomorrow. If you don’t like it, that’s your opinion. I don’t have to be physically present to notice that our urgency of pleasing our clients is declining. It is very evident in the emails and the feedback from our clients.
We need to step it up as a management team I intend on bringing more Business to the agency but we cannot grow unless our systems are in place and I don’t think that all of our systems are in place.
I only have one interview on my schedule and it’s from L. There are other positions that we are trying to find and hire for there’s been no progress made. Where is my writer for case studies? Employees for design and development? Business development? Start looking and interviewing. I have been looking and connecting with people. I’m trying to make it your decision on who you hire but if I have to hire the I will?
Clients come first, please serve them employees come second. We are in the service business please remember that!
Is this a real email? And which agency did it come from? We hope they pay overtime.
(For the record, we were just happy for the opportunity to search for a terrible stock photo.)