3M has been one of the biggest examples of nepotism and favoritism in terms of career growth i have ever seen. How many cases are there of a vp’s nephew getting regular promotions or an execs son or family member becoming a vp? Too many to count!
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It was sad that I was forced to classify an improvement in Command as a Class 4, eventhough it was almost 90% cannibalization!
That was how ba----dized the NPVI metrics were.
Personally, my group developed a new to company and new to market Class 4, but that was ki-led super quickly, both my local country and by global. Oh well, they have made their bed and have to sleep in it.
I left 3M when they shipped me away with SOLV eventhough my background was with IBG/CBG, and am now totally out of the company when they decided that they no longer needed my function. Yes it was painful for a while, but me and my team have all gone to new roles at different companies. And we see SOLV in our countries losing sales, contracts and market share because no one is carrying out our responsibilities today.
Glad to have left the sinking ship.
Sack the CTO
Exactly. There are NTIs that incubated for DECADES in a vacuum in CRL that no one had the courage to ki-l and that lacked sensible business input. They then get force fed to divisions as if they’re ripe for commercialization, with the divisions gagging the whole way.
I agree, but with an additional factor.....No matter what CRL could produce, even if well-aligned with their business, many divisions just weren't interested. Their pressure to do Class 3 and similar improvements prevented their ability to innovate, whether internally or from CRL-developed tech.
Football analogy: If the quarterback (CRL) throws the football (technology) to where the receiver (division) isn't, no tech transfer can result. If the quarterback throws right to the receiver, but the receiver either isn't looking, or has hands full of other things, no tech transfer.
PRESENT LEADERSHIP JUST NOW REALIZING THE BABY WENT OUT WITH THE BATHWATER but Wall Street was happy for one quarter.
Hanson is a liar, that will be a risk to 3M if he does somehow get his next role back at Mother Mining. I'm not sure if McNerney or Hanson is worse. At least with McNerney, he said what he was going to do and implement. You knew he-l was approaching. Hanson is an outright liar. I'm out now, so I am not invested. But if Hanson ever gets into 3M after Solventum, please be very careful. A liar is worse than someone who states their evil intentions!
@16m thank you! No truer words could be said about 3Ms CRL and what gave this company competitive advantage for decades.
Up thru Desi, 3M refused to let Wall Street dictate its cost structure relative to R & D. Desi was adamant about investing a certain percent of sales into innovation. At times, the MBAs on Wall Street revolted and bashed 3M stock. Look at the stock performance during the bubble of the late 90s vs SP500.
Turns out Desi was right. Then enter the GE plague and Mcnerney. Research was now a cost not an asset. CRL was starved of resources unless Jimbo felt it was "the in thing" like Aldara wart creme. Or laughable HighJump Software. The decline of this once great American icon began some 25 years ago.
Now BB is here to collect his 20 million and finish the lobotomy of dissecting and dissolving what is left. A very sad ending to a beautiful story.
Maybe when Bryan Hanson is done making 40 million dissolving SOLV, he will get the assignment to decimate one of the spins from 3M.
What once was Minnesota Nice has turned into an ugly Minnesota Nasty.
As an outsider now, the strength of 3M was the ability for CRL to focus on 10-20 year horizon projects. NTD which the market does not know they need today, and basically filling up the glass jars on the shelf with new to world technologies which may be useful in 10-20 years time.
The issue here is not just 3M, but so many posters in this thread are questioning what JB has done for sales growth as CTO. The answer is that 3M CRL was differentiated from many other companies in the same industry by having a CRL which were protected and could develop NTDs which then became true Class 5 NPIs.
When I was with 3M, I saw product manufacturing improvements get classed as Class 4's. Simple Class 3's with high self-cannibalization get called Class 4. There weren't many Class 5's because it was difficult to fake that one. But with the annual focus for NPIs and the decimation of CRL in the past 3-4 years, it is unlikely for 3M to recover from this travesty. Without their true roots as a material science development company, they are no different to other me-too industrial supply company out there in the market.
Varys and @v3 both spot on. Has JB delivered in business at least …. Nooo. So no business or R&D deliverance so what got him this level of promotion. MK I understand, black belt so got a jump then good friend lifted him further. His speech is so monotonous … yeah literally soft spoken :) Well, take the other SVPs and VPs. Same stories. If you don’t do anything you get promoted.
@v3 I have known MK throughout most of his career at 3M. I can't point to one thing he accomplished. Nice smile, soft spoken, Minnesota nice, but no results, unless you count promoting his friends from the old boys club.
CTO folding is a great way to put it.
JB could never, not even from the beginning of his tenure do the two things a 3M CTO has to be. That is a cheerleader for the R&D organization in public and a strong, pragmatic defender of R&D in private. That isn't to say R&D is perfect and everything would be solved if CRL gets more money, it just that there are already plenty of people to be negative on the labs, so the CTO must absolutely be constructively and realistically positive.
@z5 The fanatical obsession with meeting next quarter's numbers to mollify Wall Street is diametrically opposed to being a strong innovation company. The linkage between end customers and CRL and Divisions was very strong for decades. It covered all businesses. Major advances in road sign and road paint to improve nighttime visibility was a classic win-win. Think how many lives have been saved. Just pulled my winter gloves out for the first real cold blast of early Winter and love seeing Thinsulate.
Desi may have been a so-so CEO and perhaps a good example of Peter Principle, but the innovation didn't die with him. The problem began with James McNerney. He's the one who decided the penny-wise pound-foolish strategy of starving CRL to pay for bigger dividends or buying back shares was a winning strategy. WS loved the guy. Employees not so. Other than a 20% boost in 3M share price the week he was announced in 2000, the share price didn't beat the SP500 by much for the rest of his failed tenure. Inge borrowing billions to buyback shares and scare off activist investors saved his and Mike's job but left the company starved of new blockbusters.
Like Field of Dreams (build it and he will come), for CRL is needs to be "invent it and customers will come" - BBs obsession with NPIs only breeds game-playing (how about a peach colored sticky note, any one?). When Desi pushed for 30% of sales from new products, he at least fully funded CRL. BB, nope!
Just happy I somehow made it to the right age/experience to get pension and retiree medical support (although BB is sc--wing people over to be "competitive"). I see no future left with this place. Just pump it full of painkiller and break it off into pieces and hope the divisions don't end up with a Bryan Hanson 40 million dollar man doing what he's doing to wreck SOLV.
@z5 the answer to your question, life is easy for him and that is why he still there and will not go get another job as he has to work and deliver. Same with the SVPs R&D and the other one you mentioned in your section. Big salaries for 6 of these people and no innovation… minting millions and flying on corporate jets to countries and enjoying life.
@vr Agreed, though it has struck me as more complicated.
Starting with the CTO, what power does he actually have? He doesn't oversee any businesses, just CRL. Now, freeing up CRL from the circlej--kof "accelerating NPIs" would be nice (which amounts to taking the people that should be making new technologies and forcing them to serve as helping hands for division Class 2-3 projects). In other words, f*ck the divisions, as they can't see more than 2 years in the future. Have some awesome technologies in the toolbox for when divisions realize they need them.
That said, CRL can also be totally isolated from customers. The businesses will regularly fire back that CRL is working on things no one needs. Fair point. A great solution would be to take some initiative and get CRL seeing customers' needs. I mean, wouldn't that be something worthy of CTO? Orchestrate customer visits for CRL employees at least 1-2x/year in the industries where their technology could be most relevant?
Then on the business side, it's too crazy. I don't know how it happened, but no one can break the quarterly cycle to actually make anything new. Everyone is on cost down stuff. Just go ask people "do you work on something new to your customer, or like a line extension/cost down?" and see what answers you get.
To your point on NPIs, Gae Sch**r made a presentation showing how there were all these world-known brand platforms created through like the 50s-90s and then it just stopped. There had been like 2 in 20-30 years (I think Command and maybe one other). The divisions are perpetually looking to innovate "next year." Let's just get through this tough time first.
In my opinion, if you can't carve out for innovation now, no matter what, you never will. It's no different than saying "I'll start saving for retirement next year when things are better." Somehow 3M stopped doing that, and I don't see how they get back to it to be honest.
Long a** rant, but it beats me what in the world the CTO has done that has kept him in that role for so long. Like literally what in the world. Personal connections? I feel like other non-deliverers get an announcement written that "so and so has decided to pursue other opportunities; we thank them for their service and wish them the best." Why is he still perched up there?
@tg
I fully agree with this comment. CTO, while a pretty nice guy, seems to have completely folded (to me at least) when faced with former CFO's push to cut costs. A forceful pushback might have save the innovation pipeline. He did spend a lot of time on PFAS matters, but clearly neglected his duty to drive innovation.
Remember, new product launches dropped from 999 in 2015 to just above 100 in 2020 or so (I forget the exact year). Just think of that - from roughly 1000 to 100! Divisions just weren't commercializing new stuff at the same levels due to CFO's cost saving measures. And, there was the horrendously misguided approach of focusing on a few programs that would be big payoffs. We know how well their crystal ball worked out.
So yes, CTO (but along with others) should have done things differently.
I am sure B was not part of the decision committee. Only recommendation and left. The decision to his close friends. On that note, not just B but even K has not done anything important in that position. The other 3 SVPs the same. Outcome is no innovation.
@gm Yes, that was the point of the post, hence citing the initials and hoping B recused himself from K's hiring decision.
While JB might be a genuine MN nice person, what exactly has be achieved as a CTO in the past 8 or so years that he has been the CTO for so long?
What value does he bring to the table while earning millions over the years ?
Isn't it still a meritocracy?
...then there's the case of the third generation 3Mer who made it all the way to TSD VP, was banished to Austin, later resurrected to be VP again, and was finally fired for cause.
@gs 3M has four SVPs for R&D. One for Corporate and one for each of its three businesses in addition to about two dozen VPs of R&D for each division.
Does 3M, which has shrunk, need both a SVP R&D abd a CTO. That’s a lot of money
@ed 3M is an Old Boys Network. If you are not part of “the club”, are not willing to consistently praise your manager or ignore poor leadership decisions by your manager you will face much hostility. The “club” will find ways to sabotage your career or make life at 3M so toxic you leave.
@e5 The names on the basketball players list are the sons of the SVP and CTO. They are best friends.
@e8 this person talks a lot out of nervousness, know- it -all types, and again basket ball player - but not a leader for sure- doesn’t build but destroys
@ed
could also be that he's well qualified too, you know.
glaring example: the SVP of CRL who is the best friend of the CTO since their college days.
Did their Phd at Stanford under the same advisor as well!
It is all about Old Boys Network at Mining, it has been a while like that. If you are not in the club, you are not going anywhere, esp. in management ranks.
After all, it is not about what you do in 3M, it is about whom you know in 3M!
@e5
To be honest, that individual is one of the best leaders, I believe. Your point stands, but in this case it worked out well. In the other similar case, as has been noted on this overall board, not well at all.....
@c1 That is the glaring example for sure. Are there others that bad?
One that stood out to me: SIBG R&D Manager > TSD Tech Director, then when TSD converted to a "department" (I want to say within a couple months), this TD was suddenly given TD of CRPL. Others wanted that position. Why an immediate re-appointment vs. "Oh, sorry, wrong place wrong time" for him?
Still, nothing is nearly at the level of B & K, and hopefully B recused himself from that decision. Otherwise HR really is purely for show, and conflict of interest is "rules for thee and not for me."
Interesting names on this list of high school basketball records... probably a coincidence.
https://stats.mnbasketballhub.com/stats/print/3803882?subseason=598679&tab=team_instance_player_stats
Never saw any from executives but saw a few from managers kids. Those were trained technical jobs and the kids held their own pretty well. Saw what appeared to be favoritism / nepotism when trying to help my own kids get summer help jobs.
There is nepotism with friends - ATC folks then OSD folks then PSD folks then basket ball players….
It does happen. I cringe when I think of some of the talentless families I've known throughout the years that have harvested millions from 3M by having the dad, mom, one of the kids, and the son in law/daughter in law all working for 3M, and none of them ever seeming to add any real value. They always seemed to work a bit less hard than those that were there without any family connections. Won't name names to protect the "innocent"
Saw it multiple times over the years. Someone in a management position had their spouse or other family member (sibling, child, cousin) get hired into the same division/business as them. Of course, the management person conveniently worked alongside their relative's boss. There's no way that didn't have an impact on their spouse or relative's raises and promotions but no one seemed to blink an eye about it.
TBF if you come from the outside you quickly realize what a sorry state this company is in. Only natural to want to bring in people you know and trust to try to solve all the existential 3M issues. The unfortunate bias is that those new outsiders all believe it’s the remaining 3Mers that created the issues when in reality it was 3M executives that have long since fled the company with their millions in hand.
Not saying it's right, but it unfortunately happens everywhere. It shouldn't be that way, we should all aspire to live in a true meritocracy where one's own talent and contributions determined promotions/outcomes in life, but, the reality is mixed. Some leaders are there due to merit, others are not (well connected, nepotism, the right DEI check boxes, etc.)
I spent 32 years at 3M and watched the change. In the early 2000's, it switched from what you know to who you know. You are forgetting about the DEI hires and promotions all throughout the command structure. It's a mess!
Nepotism has been a staple mark even back in the days of Desi in the 1990s. Maybe even back into the 70s and 80s. Back then it was mostly family ties. How many sons in law got hired because dad in law was a VP. Marry my daughter. Get a cushy job at the Center.
These days it's most BB and his yacht club cronies and families. Get a huge signing bonus. Order people around. Demonstrate Attila the Hun style command and control leadership. BB will love you because you'll drive away people who will quit without a severance. Then BB rewards himself with a bigger bonus.
Oh and don't even think of calling Ethics hotline about it. You will feel as rewarded as those who opposed Saddam Hussain.
@c1 the former SVP of CRL managed to get his son a job at 3M.
@OP glaring example: the SVP of CRL who is the best friend of the CTO since their college days.