Microsoft has been taken over by the MBAs too

[mbpark]

Heya,

I posed this for TW. He's been talking about this since The Cellar ran on Waffle. I took his advice about bad MBAs ruining businesses since 1994-1995, and he's been entirely right. This article talks about how they're running Microsoft into the ground.

http://www.betanews.com/joewilcox/ar...ams/1262204767

Short-term profits at the expense of long-term success does not a business make. Wall Street is paranoid about the former, and it's turned many businesses from focusing on nothing more than the upcoming quarterly results.

[dar512]

TW is master of the obvious. Anyone who works in corporate America can see what the tyranny of the quarterly earnings report is doing to publicly owned companies.

But MBAs are just the agents. The deeper problem is how the dysfunctional stock market twists American businesses.

[SamIam]

No worries. They have to act inept so that the government will take them over and give them all the big bucks.

[Shawnee123]

Sometimes the bigwigs do what's good for the company. We just don't hear about it as much. That is the case in my place of work. They make sure we're sustainable.

[tw]

Originally Posted by dar512

TW is master of the obvious. Anyone who works in corporate America can see what the tyranny of the quarterly earnings report is doing to publicly owned companies.

If it was so obvious, then why did so many Cellar dwellers buy General Motors cars (Chevys, Oldsmobiles, Pontiacs, Saturns, etc) even 30 years ago? Why did they want to harm America? No, not obvious until the MBA has created damage by mortgaging the future. Not obvious for typically a decade later.

Did you see the massive mortgaging of America when a majority were seething (with veins hanging from their teeth) because 'Saddam was evil'? It was obvious (for same reasons) that Saddam did not have WMDs. And now obvious because we are just beginning to pay for that intentional lie. Warnings of that obvious mistake (including the inevitable economic damage) were posted here by me - vehemently. The expression Deja Vue Nam routinely posted because that was a lesson from Vietnam.

How many realize we are just beginning to pay for those lies? That GM uses accounting tricks to avoid the same bankruptcy in 1991. How many realized we had serious problems when nothing was done to address the problems - Long Term Capital Management and Enron? It was obvious. What was not obvious was when we would have to pay for all this.

14% of this nation's mortgages are in default. A number reportedly increasing by a new quarter million every month. Do you realize that accounting is still not reporting MBA lies? However other facts do report problems. The majority of designers now in the Silicon Valley are Chinese or Indian immigrants. Another symptom - most every computer repairman does not even know how electricity works. Why did Eastman Kodak just sell off its organic transistor group (ie electronic paper) to the South Koreans? Why do the French own the Bell Labs?

Of course, everyone always knew this because it is obvious? Yes, obvious. But not well known when information comes from a political agenda rather than from reality. It was also obvious that the Saddam WMD threat was a complete myth. Obvious and a majority even here (where the facts could be read), instead, denied reality.

[tw]

Originally Posted by SamIam

No worries. They have to act inept so that the government will take them over and give them all the big bucks.

Worst performing companies are typically the ones that pay top management the most. Best performing companies instead channel that money to the little people - the employees - who are the source of success. IOW the difference between communism and capitalism.

[skysidhe]

Originally Posted by tw

If it was so obvious, then why did so many Cellar dwellers buy General Motors cars (Chevys, Oldsmobiles, Pontiacs, Saturns, etc) even 30 years ago?

I think you are being called out.

Out of curiosity I personally would like to know whom is driving a 9 year old pontiac or a olds or sometimes better known as a banana boat?

I think the olds phases out years ago. Like maybe you scarred TW and he can't forget.

[Shawnee123]

Originally Posted by skysidhe

I think you are being called out.

Out of curiosity I personally would like to know whom is driving a 9 year old pontiac or a olds or sometimes better known as a banana boat?

I think the olds phases out years ago. Like maybe you scarred TW and he can't forget.

Well, I drove a 96 Olds up until this (I mean last) year!

[skysidhe]

The 96 is not a bad looking car.

The olds did have some nice sporty muscle cars.

I think my grandmother had a 55 or something like that. It was black with red interior and in mint condition. She drove it with gloves on. So proper.



I drove a Bonneville when I was 16. I bought it cash and it was a great boat.

[Shawnee123]

My olds had seen better days, having over 200,000 miles on it! She was tired.

My Daisy is young and zippy!

[wolf]

Okay, I admit it. I drove a Chevrolet Spectrum from 88-94. But I only bought it from Chevrolet. Isuzu lovingly hand-crafted it in Japan for me.

That's the only GM car I have owned.

[skysidhe]

It sort of looks like a 80s Volkswagen Rabbit. I had one of those.

[dar512]

Originally Posted by tw

If it was so obvious, then why did so many Cellar dwellers buy General Motors cars (Chevys, Oldsmobiles, Pontiacs, Saturns, etc) even 30 years ago?

I don't speak for the rest of the dwellars, but Mrs. dar and I bought a brand new Honda Accord in 1987. We donated it in January 2009; 22 yrs with the same car. It just refused to die.

I dunno. Maybe it was more obvious in the software industry than elsewhere, but every major decision made at public companies I have worked has been made with an eye toward the quarterly report. It often makes for some fairly stupid short-sighted decisions.

And I still maintain that the proliferation of MBAs is just the symptom. The illness is the way the current stock market works.

[tw]

Originally Posted by dar512

I don't speak for the rest of the dwellars, but Mrs. dar and I bought a brand new Honda Accord in 1987.

Of all my Accords, my 1986 ranks as one of the best. Had both a 1980 and a 1986 even in the mid 1990s when I drove a less than one year old Pontiac down the expressway. About every third tar strip, I had to adjust that Pontiac steering to keep it in the lane. Even my 1980 Accord in the mid 1990s did not wander about the highway.

No innovation existed in a GM car in the past 30 years - except those required by Federal regulations. GM products were designed in the accounting department. Then MBAs blamed union workers for their problems. GM products costs more to build than comparatively equipped Mercedes Benz - because cost controls increase costs. Because GM products are designed by business school graduates (and people like my friend who is also a lawyer).

[glatt]

I've only owned GM cars. The first was an '82 Buick Century that my grandfather passed down to me. It had lots of problems but was great on road trips. Very comfortable. Had it for around 5 years.

The next and last car I've owned is a '96 Geo Prizm we bought brand new. GM discontinued the Geo brand several years ago. It's a great car. My only complaint is that some of the plastic climate control knobs broke. Plastic fatigue. Other than that, this 14 year old car is going as strong at the day we bought it.