Einstein said, "We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them".
The move to ENGINE was all but inevitable. It is the direct consequence of our gross organizational incompetence, arrogance, and culture.
I want to be successful in my job. I want to turn up and work hard. I am a well educated technical practitioner, and passionate about my field. But like many others, I am hamstrung by a complete lack of vision from those that lead us.
In the week that major organizational changes were announced, I find myself undertaking the most banal administrative work at the behest of those that provide my work direction. This administrative toil is treated with reverence, and of being of the utmost importance, yet it is of no consequence at all.
The people that lead me have no background or training in the technical discipline they are managing. It seems they adapt to this situation not through delegation, trust and a growth mindset, but instead by gravitating towards what they know as they clutch to the vestiges of power and control.
Feedback on these Sisyphean undertakings is met with incredulity at best and utter disdain at worst. The expectation is to keep trying until the process works. If the process doesn't work, the blame is to be placed squarely on those executing it and their ineptitude. The process itself is always beyond reproach. The guidance is that if the process isn't working, try harder.
Problems that are raised to leadership are swiftly ignored, I suspect mostly because they either don't have the aptitude to understand them, or capacity to resolve them. Or it could simply be that addressing a problem would contradict the carefully curated truth that they've been spinning to further their own careers. Poor quality work is celebrated, fundamentally flawed work is left unchecked.
Middle managers refuse to take ownership of this situation and focus instead on managing upwards, doing everything in their power to present an idealised version of the crumbling reality beneath them.
So what were we expecting to happen? Gross offshoring was one inevitable consequence. At some point someone was going to notice that the fiscal reality doesn't reconcile with the self congratulations we reward ourselves with.
We are bereft of leadership, vision or strategy, in a sunsetting and increasingly socially execrable industry. We outsource innovation to third parties with vested interests. We rely on overpriced consultants whose main advice is seemingly to copy the same strategy they sold to our competitors. And we are relying on the same leadership that supposedly transformed us to win in any environment to lead us out of a terminal condition of their own creation.
To the sycophants. Those that manage upwards. Whose only skills are blindly following process and their only motivation is furtherance of their self interests, Do better. We are depending on you.
To those that create. That solve problems. Display ingenuity. That keep our people and the environment safe. Who challenge the status quo. Act with genuine strategic intent. And turn up every day to do their best in the face of organizational mire and adversity - thank you. You are the engine that keeps this company turning.