Team Leads & Middle Managers Are The Big Problem At Chevron

Team Leads & Middle Managers are a big problem and an absolute waste of money for Chevron. For the most part they do not work. Most of them are on the internet all day and watch videos and play solitary on their personal iPads. They are mostly administrative, cause more harm to the team then good, and when they step away from the internet because they feel guilty of not doing any work, they micromanage to attempt to justify their existence, frustrating team members in the process who are actually producing work. They reduce efficiency and honestly are a nuisance to the team.

Those of you who have had to report directly to a GM temporarily after the departure of a team lead who was not replaced immediately know what i am talking about. Teams flourish big time under a GM. And the GMs learn a lot as well and help support the team far better than the team leads do.

Getting rid of the team leads and Middle Managers will be a MAJOR GAME CHANGER to Chevrons profitability. Most team members know how to do their jobs well, and the more senior individual contributors are always willing to help the more junior team members. Why the heck do when need team leads?

MW and NH, let's get rid of all the team leads and Middle Managers, and have the GM's handle business, and watch Chevron flourish like you have never seen before. Team members are far more motivated to work hard for the team and to make a GM and his/her department look good as opposed to working for a worthless team leader or middle manager. These team leads act as a filter between the workers who truly know what is going on and the GM's who should know what is going on but do not. What a horrible business model. It's reminiscent of playing telephone as a child to pass the message from employee to GM, but this time through high salaried team leads that distort the message in the process. Our GM's are given small sound bites by these team leads and are being played majorily.
The team leads have become great at managing up to the GM's to justify their existence, creating a class of ignorant GM's who don't understand the business as well as they should...

MW, let's make our GMs work a little harder by removing the team leads. They will know the business better and will drive better results for this company. Next years ROM should elimnate most team lead positions

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@5pxw. Who is AG?

Almost all the 25+ technically competent leads and mentors were shown the door in 2016 and 2020.(yes a lot chose to leave to get out of what they saw coming). The the company deserves the CTC leads they have today.
A few years it will be all over when the buzzwords don't work an AI fails to replace the years of knowledge we chose to throw away in favor of diveristy.

CTC GMs are nothin' more than fancy word-spewin', ladder-climbin' varmints. They're as genuine as a three-dollar bill and about as helpful as a trapdoor on a canoe. Got the whole crew just echoin' their nonsense like a gaggle of parrots at a hootenanny. It's a downright buzzword bonanza, I tell ya!

Most PSG 25 and above are talkers with no delivery experience including GMS in CTC. AG is useless

@3atj, totally correct. I worked with someone who was a marginal performer, but was a strong MARC and ALLY advocate, hosted a lot of their meetings (while his/her job languished). Was on a first-name basis with lots of GMs. This allowed this person to escape the 2016 and 2020 purges.

@2xuv Unfortunately, what you and I did to succeed is not the recipe for success today. I was also a 30+ year employee and successfully worked my way up. Today, it isn't about doing your core job to the best of your ability. Today, the job is to "play the game". As an example, I had employees who were marginal at their core job but loved the "extracurricular" activities. Networks, social engineering events, posting on CVX social media etc. Oh, the glowing feedback on their performance was over the top......except that wasn't their core job. That's what it's about today. So glad I'm gone.

Team Leads exist to inform the individual contributors. People want to be managed. The TL positions are layers added so information can cascade and people “feel” connected to the strategy. If done well, the team knows why they do what they do, and they get better at it over time. If done poorly, a TL is a glorified email forwarder. We’ve all seen both types.

I have no problem with team (chapter) or with the theoretical application of Agile, it is just the Chevron’s tendency to run multiple levels of middle management with overlapping duties just bogs down the whole system. Simple structure, minimal levels, focused on identifying and executing bankable results does not seem like it should be that hard to maintain. More management does not make for more job clarity/impact; full stop!

I spoke to my GM and she agreed to replace the TL. Yay!

You need some place to go…TL and Middle Manager jobs are there! The more positions the merrier!!

Just do what I did for 31 years…. Show up for work on time, do your core duties to the best of your ability, don’t be seen slacking off, and last but not least, don’t step on anyone’s toes. If you change job positions every 5 to 6 years and don’t burden your boss or department manager, you will be fine and retire after a long career like me.

@1exo is spot on. If you take "problems" to your GM, rest assured they don't want to hear them. As soon as you leave their office, your fate is sealed to one of 3 outcomes: 1) Your career suddenly stalls, no promotions, nominal raises, increasingly out-of-the-loop; 2) Directly or indirectly (usually from your manager), it will be suggested to you that maybe you should place out to another group; 3) All the EEs in the world will not save you from the next layoff round, perhaps coupled with 1) and 2), above. Any time you get the urge to go to your GM, repeat to yourself, "Chevron does not want to hear problems".

Team Leads and middle managers were supposed to be eliminated by the 2015 and 2020 'transformations'. Looks like those were a smokescreen to get rid of boomer managers.

“why not take it up with your GM”? I assume you are joking! In Chevron if you wish to get ahead you must always kiss a$$ to all those above. Even constructive feedback will put you front and center of the next layoff…not a team player.

Is this for the people who were let go or you just like posting on the layoffs site for no apparent reason?

Bahaha, this person has it backwards. TL’s are the glue that keep things going. They support thier O&M and are the bridge between upper management (who may not have insight to the day to day activities). A good TL will check on thier team and support them with garnering engineering and technical support. As well as assisting with career development.

Instead of hiding here to vent, why not take it up with your GM? Set a meeting and let them know exactly how you feel. You may be surprised what happens when you don’t act like a cockroach.

I’ve had some extremely effective managers that truly cared and engaged at the worker level, I had one that would call me out of the blue and ask how things were going and if they could do anything for me or how they could remove barriers. Small gestures that went a long way.

I’ve had others that only wanted engagement fed up through the team lead and were essentially coasting along through an expat sunset assignment trying not to rock the boat until their retirement.

You’ll encounter all types during your career, some pull their weight and others, not so much.

I like my team leader.

There is a canoe race between Chevron and Exxon. In the Exxon boat there are 9 rowers and one manager. In the Chevron boat there are 9 managers and 1 employee. The starter g-n fires and they are off. The Exxon boat moves rapidly while the Chevron boat struggles just to go in a straight line. As expected, the Exxon boat crossed the finish line well ahead of the Chevron boat. After the race, the Chevron managers fire the employee and schedule a bunch of meetings to figure out why they got lost.

You have it reversed... Team leads exist to justify the existence of the GM's PSG and do all his/her pet projects. It has nothing to do with the helping the working team. If your TL is not helping, be thankful there if is no harm.

There are too many people under most GM for them to directly manage all the personal development, project assignments and progress reviews, but you are correct that most team leads are required to do much to much busy work and if Agile really functioned as designed chapters should be much larger talent management bodies rather than being managed by so called tech leads. The problem is that Chevron retained the old Team structure (in chapters) and added all the Agile structures on top of that, which just led to an expansion of overlapping middle managers hindering real work. The old saying “those that can do and those that can’t become managers” is sadly broadly true, but then all the performance reviews are done by managers alone with predictable results.

Agreed….some TL’s cause more problems instead of just getting out of the way. Some of them are like throwbacks to a time when the higher ups loved having these types to hara$$ O&M. They truly are mot needed but they will not cut that out.

I agree 100%. We are so top heavy. I’m in CTC and have a sub chapter head as a direct supervisor who doesn’t do any actual work and is instead there to “manage my career” and preach we lead behaviors. WTF? It’s just another clueless manager that I have to explain to what I’m doing, meet with bi-weekly and engage in other d-mb activities that add zero value to actual work. The PO who gives work direction is a bit better but kind of clueless as well honestly. What a sh*t show

Rough weekend?.. take a deep breath. Everything will be ok. No sarcasm intended.

Thread regarding Chevron Corp. layoffs

Team Leads & Middle Managers Are The Big Problem At Chevron

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