We complain about political rhetoric, but we fall for a lot of it too (Part Two)

Yesterday we established that Democrats don't talk about the poor because they think it depresses people, and depressed people don't vote.

Meanwhile, Republicans pull another trick that we often fall for, for no good reason. They glorify small businesses. Why? So they don’t have to glorify big businesses, which fund all their campaigns, but which people don’t like.

But if you're quantifying the qualities of businesses in general—well then, small businesses in general are as bad or worse than big businesses in general.

You call the small firm plucky; I call it underinsured. You like the small company’s hustle; I’m a little afraid of being hustled. You like that you can deal with a human being; I often don’t like the human being I’m dealing with, because I can hear in her voice the thinly veiled self-pity. She wishes she were somewhere else. She wishes she worked for what she refers to in happy-hour gripe sessions as a “real” company.

Small businesses—I’m talking 20 or fewer—are often Satanic places to work: Boring, because unless the joint is on a massive growth binge, there’s no place to go. Limited, because there isn’t enough new blood to come up with new ideas, and not enough capital to spend on them anyway. (I remember a weekly meeting at one employer where I worked. It was called the “flowers meeting,” and people were supposed to bring nifty ideas for new products or promotions. But everyone sat there saying nothing while the CEO described his midnight hallucinations.)

The main problem with small businesses is that the boss has too much power. He or she constructs reality—a mythological history of the company, a fanciful description of the culture, an often paranoid view of the marketplace, a sense of urgency wholly adjustable to his or her own anxiety level—and employees have to live in this world as if it is the actual world.

And there’s nobody—as there is in larger organizations where various departments and divisions work cheek to jowl—to tell the boss his world is warped. There's no other frame of reference immediately available. Even when the boss suddenly changes the world—declares that the sky is falling, the competitor is eating our lunch, or my problem is that I’m too nice—it happens too fast for everyone to say, Hold on one motherfucking minute! That’s not what you said last week! That’s not what we signed on for! That’s not TRUE!

By the time everyone in a small business has their wits back about them, the whim is already being followed. But by now the whim has passed!

I’m sure there are great small businesses to work in and unbelievably wise and thoughtful small business owners to work for. But in general, a small business is too much power concentrated in the restless and distracted mind of someone driven and egotistical enough to reject all the world’s employers in order to become one.

Now, sometimes these entrepreneurs build bigger companies, and those companies become great places to work—until they go public, and financial analysts become new the erratic and irrational boss.

We want to do meaningful work for reasonable people with interesting colleagues and for good pay. It is a lot to ask. And it’s far too much to ask of most of these small businesses the Republicans are always praising.

Like Democrats, Republicans will bullshit us just as much as we let them.

Let's stop letting them.

Comments

[bb]

I trust you include the small business you run among the Satanic.

[David Murray]

Oh, definitely.

[David Murray]

Working here would be a nightmare for anybody else. Just the other day I got so mad at my non-existent IT department and my perpetually out-to-lunch secretary that I gathered up every one of the papers on my desk and threw them into the air. It's an abusive work environment!

[Kent]

Whose job is it exactly in a larger organization to tell the boss his world is warped? And how do I apply for such a position? "Hold on one motherfucking minute!" is a phrase I'd dearly love to use in the workplace, but I'm afraid my current boss wouldn't see the charm.

[David Murray]

No doubt a boss can make a pretty cozy pocket of hell inside a large organization.

But a big organization DOES have higher authorities, other departments/department heads/broader cultural norms to provide some contrast and a normative influence on WHATEVER IS GOING ON IN THE BOSS'S HEAD.

And, in extreme cases of managerial madness—the horror! the horror!—they have a professionalized HR department to appeal too.

I'm not glamorizing life in big companies; just objecting to the glorification of life in small outfits.

[bb]

"But a big organization DOES have higher authorities, other departments/department heads/broader cultural norms to provide some contrast and a normative influence on WHATEVER IS GOING ON IN THE BOSS'S HEAD."

Yer outta yer mind, Murray. Most bigwigs are just as scared of losing their jobs as the peons are. If anything, they're less likely to express a contrary opinion or take action because they have very few cohorts and can't trust them not to snitch.

[David Murray]

"less likely to express a contrary opinion or take action"

Well, yes, double-b-lowercase: And if you'd like me to write a post, or a week of posts, on how stifling and stupid and crazy big corporations are, I can do that. But I think it's been done.

This post is about how stifling and stupid and crazy small companies also are. Have you ever worked in a small company?

[bb]

Other than my own, no. But all the employee satisfaction surveys I send to myself come back with + + + ratings.

My point is that all companies, big and small, are run by people. Some of those people are stinkers and some are gems. And if you don't like where you are, get out and try to choose more wisely next time.