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A really bad day :(

W_L

Entry posted by W_L

1,107 views

This is the part of being the man behind the numbers that I hate.

 

Let's start at the beginning, I had already projected a $250,000 deficit in our businesses budget, which I could fix by reducing the contract labor lines. Basically, like most businesses in the US, we have a rotating pool of contract labor from temp firms for maintenance. If we reduce the contracting and ask for more internal care and watchful of incidents, we could keep cost down without cutting jobs of full-time people in any of the medical or billing departments.

 

Well, bad news came first this morning, when I was told that our funding will be cut from our foundation director for certain medical areas due to shifts in interests. Basically, this affects HIV prevention and screening, Diabetes programs, and Asthma care. Now that is just another $200,000, which meant some cuts would be needed.

 

Nextt another, problem came up as I was told one of our major hospital contract had also discontinued. The loss was another $150,000. This was related to physician referrals for outpatient services, like ambulatory rehabilitation, which the hospital was looking to cut.

 

So we're now up to $600,000 in losses, which are bad enough.

 

At around 1 PM, I found out that my CEO signed without consent or review with the finance department several contracts worth $1,500,000 for a new EMR system in order to attract "meaningful use" funding (Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act requirement)..However, I have to pay consulting costs and software of $300,000.

 

To add insult ontoo injury, one of the manager, without permission, got the CEO to sign off on a contract for an expensive suite of office software for $200,000.

 

So, I now have about $1.1 million in combined losses and deficit spending.

 

You know what the executives told me to do to fix this issue, find the weakest performing departments and either eliminate the departments or fire people up to the amount of losses.

 

I figured that we'd need to fire about 20 people between a mix of managers down to case worker level.

 

Heck, if people had bothered to notify me earlier and give me indications of issues, I could try to plan this out better. From the executive to the directors to managers, everyone was out for their own needs first. Now, what am I supposed to do except fire some unsuspecting person?

 

This was bullshit on so many levels.

14 Comments

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Percy

Ugh. Letting people go is the worst and when it could have been better planned or avoided...beyond frustrating. When I started managing, I figured out why the older generation use to keep a flask of whiskey in their bottom desk drawer. For days like that. (Not that I'm advocating alcohol as a solution. Joann's idea of a hug is probably better.)

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Andy78

That's a problem that is being faced by so many NHS hospitals here in the UK (my own hospital is now around £80 million in the red).

 

In order to avoid wide scale redundancies, many jobs have been regraded which has lead to a reduction in pay (thankfully my job is funded at a national level so I'm not affected).

 

Many hospitals over here are now cutting external contracts and directly employing the relevant staff themselves. My hospital recently decided to employ its own catering team instead of using the contractor any longer, and we have (allegedly) managed to save a predicted £100k.

 

It really sucks to be in the position of firing people. Of course, when they tell you to fire people, they mean the ordinary workers; God forbid you suggest firing one of the managers, or one of the board members. In my hospital, you could either fire ten ordinary workers or one senior manager - guess which our COO would prefer?

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MikeL

Contractors and consultants can really cost a business a lot...not just their fees, but the damage they do to morale. Only CEOs are a greater burden.

 

I'm not sure why you have to fire the innocent employees. I would guess your intrepid CEO earns at least 10 times what you do. He should bear the glad tidings. Of course, he could hire a contractor to do the deed.

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Y_B

You could always volunteer to quit and save someone else their job

 

Anyways, over 200 busy bees were set free just this past Thursday at my mom's office when their entire department got outsourced to India or some shit. I'm not at the position where I could live with myself if I had the authority to executive lay offs that could put thousands of people out of work and practiced it.

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W_L

You could always volunteer to quit and save someone else their job

 

Anyways, over 200 busy bees were set free just this past Thursday at my mom's office when their entire department got outsourced to India or some shit. I'm not at the position where I could live with myself if I had the authority to executive lay offs that could put thousands of people out of work and practiced it.

 

Actually, this is my last straw, I can't save their jobs based on my meager salary, but I am not going to continue working for an organization that has such crazy management, who don't take personal responsibility about their own bad choices.

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rustle

My heart goes out to you. This type of me-first mentality is what's really wrong with corporate culture. Once management attains a certain status, they're no longer accountable for their actions, because they can cut back everybody else's piece of the pie to cover their own shortcomings or lack of sound judgment.

 

W_L, I wish you all the luck in the world, and have every confidence you'll emerge from this a stronger and better man. I'll keep you in my thoughts.

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Ashi

Some people don't realize when they move up to a higher position, it comes with higher responsibility. I think the management has to be pretty bad to be able to have such unauthorized purchase, but then it's not unique to your organization.

 

No, you can't save them, because you ain't superman. I tried to save some people, but it didn't help my career. So as much as we'd love to be saints, choose wisely. If your CEO couldn't understand his intemperance in using money has a consequence of costing other people's lives, there is nothing you can make him learn to be a better human being. Some executives do earn their positions, but some are purely up there through fate (and they don't know how lucky they are).

 

I might side with Y_B that you can always quit, but just remember, it didn't help my career one bit. If you defy to "lay off" 20 people, they'll just find another person to "fire" you and lay off the 20 people (lay off and fire are different. You fire someone who has done misconduct. "Lay off" is a result of reorganization, the person isn't stigmatized with labels. People who are laid off gets benefits after release. Fired person gets nothing).

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Ashi

not what i meant...

 

I don't mean you're asking him to quit, but anyways.... Gosh, let's not :fight:.

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W_L

not what i meant...

 

I was getting to that point either way, the management has changed significantly over the 2 years I have been working. On one hand, it has allowed me the ability to quickly rise through ability and talent in an organization that lacks decisive leadership, on the other hand, there is a reason why management is that bad.

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