This video describes perfectly the type of people who advance at 3M. Hint: not those who work the hardest neither the ones who deliver results.
Does the wolf remind you of any leaders?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=outRuy6jrKY
13 replies (most recent on top)
Our Chief Trademark Counsel tried to create a licensing program for 3M’s brands. I understand the plan met resistance from senior leadership and was never implemented.
It actually costs quite a bit to maintain a patent worldwide. So abandoning them when no longer worth it is actually a good move (obviously, when done rationally).
Also, the out-licensing thing was tried a number of years ago. Sounded great, but it failed big time. Surprisingly, there was minimal interest out there.
New strategy- abandon patents for cost cutting. Why not try to license them to bring money into the bottom line???
They abandon patents with a vengeance getting rid of patents of people that they don’t like or the project that is too complicated.
IP attorneys and R&D leaders you really have a lot of work to do.
Back in the good ol' days when we had patent liaisons, this sort of IP cr-p happened a lot less. The liaison worked closely with the inventing team to understand it and then write a draft. So the connection with who was on the patent app was much less prone to error - or manipulation. 3M lost a lot when we got rid of the liaison function.
@f4 I led a product development team, I invented solutions and wrote five invention submissions resulting in three patent applications. When the patents published, I discovered the director put his name as inventor and my name was nowhere on the patents. The patents were farmed out to an outside law firm and filed as provisional with no inventors listed, when the utility patents were filed a year later the 3M attorney took over and he had no idea I existed, he asked the director for a list of inventors and he put his name on the list and left me out! I considered complaining and invalidating the patents, but my manager (a nice person) told me that will derail my career since those patents protected valuable products. So, yes, it happens. At 3M anything goes.
No, not every company does this. I worked at several other places before 3M and this level of garbage didn't happen. Sure, there were some bad people -- they are everywhere -- but in some places, they are pushed out, not rewarded. And for the person whose IS was hijacked -- you can have the patent invalidated. Have your next job lined up, though.
Divisions are being pushed to deliver growth while the commercial centre is under-resourced, the infrastructure isn’t fit for purpose, and global people are moved/promoted leaving a wave of destruction with misalignment and unresolved issues—I’m honestly sick of it. It’s a complete disconnect—like tying our hands together and asking us to swim across the river, then questioning why we’re not moving fast enough.
@bp The only way works in this company. Hard working people never get recognized. "Work smarter not harder"-- they write it in the playbook
This kind of thing happens all the time at this company. An old friend of mine was laid off during the pandemic, and his project was taken over by a new “expert” who has since been promoted several times. My friend’s innovation is now the core product of our department, but no one ever mentions his name.
I once submitted an invention submission, and it wasn’t until the patent was published that I realized my name wasn’t on it.
My moss told me that right now we are in a promotion freezing stage. I believe he made it up just because he did not want to give me a promote
If you steal another person’s work and claim it as your own, that’s another way to get promoted. That happened to me by the same woman twice and she got promoted to T6 and praised by management for my work. She went with the Solventum spinoff and I heard she recently got laid off.
Self promotion does. Talking and writing books about innovation … that is new trend in 3M R&D.
Nothing gets you promoted at 3M.
Just the way Bill likes it.