Kaz Poll: Am I good or evil? Read first post before answering.

Kaz: Am I good or evil? Read first post before answering

  • Good

    Votes: 10 90.9%
  • Evil

    Votes: 1 9.1%

  • Total voters
    11
  • Poll closed .
Ditto Kaz.

Sounds like your a man with a good head for business.

You turned your first company around and are on the way with the second.

You had decisions to make to save the company and thats something you will do again with the second company.

Sure some lost some jobs but you kept others and if your successfull you probably be hiring in the future. You will provide more jobs.

Good luck with your enterprises.
 
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Ditto Kaz.

Sounds like your a man with a good head for business.

You turned your first company around and are on the way with the second.

You had decisions to make to save the company and thats something you will do again with the second company.

Sure some lost jobs but you kept jobs and if your successfull you probably be hiring in the future. You will provide jobs.

Good luck with your enterprises.
I appreciate that. So far I'm the only one who voted evil. You all realize I am making a profit, right? How evil do I have to get?
 
I chose good.

You've turned around one business, and are going to do the same for another. It's likely that without your intervention, both would have failed, harming the customers and all of the employees. Instead, the customers are able to purchase products and services they value and the remaining employees, as you noted, have jobs in a stable company.

That makes him a good business man. What's that got to do with his morals?


It's your side that spreads the meme that succeeding at business has nothing to do with morals.

He's being Very Moral. He's ensuring that his customers get what they pay for and, that he is solvent and can meet his financial commitments to employees and vendors.

That Is Moral.
 
By now, under alternative management, 100% of the old work force would have lost their jobs and benefits, and in another three months 100% of the other group would have been in the same boat.

half a loaf is better than nothing.
 
I chose good.

You've turned around one business, and are going to do the same for another. It's likely that without your intervention, both would have failed, harming the customers and all of the employees. Instead, the customers are able to purchase products and services they value and the remaining employees, as you noted, have jobs in a stable company.

That makes him a good business man. What's that got to do with his morals?

If you've ever been in a position where you've had to fire employees, you'd probably agree it's a moral issue. It should never be an easy decision to let people go.
 
I chose good.

You've turned around one business, and are going to do the same for another. It's likely that without your intervention, both would have failed, harming the customers and all of the employees. Instead, the customers are able to purchase products and services they value and the remaining employees, as you noted, have jobs in a stable company.

That makes him a good business man. What's that got to do with his morals?


It's your side that spreads the meme that succeeding at business has nothing to do with morals.

He's being Very Moral. He's ensuring that his customers get what they pay for and, that he is solvent and can meet his financial commitments to employees and vendors.

That Is Moral.

I don't have a side or a meme.

Business is Business. He's not necessarily doing it for the good of the customer, he's doing it to HAVE customers, you know, so they buy shit, you know, to profit cuz you know, that's business.

Being solvent and being good to your customers, is good business. Nothing to do with good morals or morals at all.
 
I chose good.

You've turned around one business, and are going to do the same for another. It's likely that without your intervention, both would have failed, harming the customers and all of the employees. Instead, the customers are able to purchase products and services they value and the remaining employees, as you noted, have jobs in a stable company.

That makes him a good business man. What's that got to do with his morals?

If you've ever been in a position where you've had to fire employees, you'd probably agree it's a moral issue. It should never be an easy decision to let people go.

It doesn't come down to morals. It comes down to a Business Decision. If it comes down to morals, you're bad at business.
 
Business is not charity....you do what you have to do to stabilize your business and turn a profit.

The employees are also not there for your charity. They have seen their coworkers fired and their own benefits cut. I imagine you can't count on their loyalty once the economy recovers and there are other more employee friendly options available
 
That makes him a good business man. What's that got to do with his morals?

If you've ever been in a position where you've had to fire employees, you'd probably agree it's a moral issue. It should never be an easy decision to let people go.

It doesn't come down to morals. It comes down to a Business Decision. If it comes down to morals, you're bad at business.

You're just another cold heartless capitalist. Admit it!
 
If you've ever been in a position where you've had to fire employees, you'd probably agree it's a moral issue. It should never be an easy decision to let people go.

It doesn't come down to morals. It comes down to a Business Decision. If it comes down to morals, you're bad at business.

You're just another cold heartless capitalist. Admit it!

It has nothing to do with heart, it's business. Which, because business needs to make a profit as it's main goal, it needs to be regulated to remain at a Standard, of Human Rights.
 
Business is not charity....you do what you have to do to stabilize your business and turn a profit.

The employees are also not there for your charity. They have seen their coworkers fired and their own benefits cut. I imagine you can't count on their loyalty once the economy recovers and there are other more employee friendly options available

I am sure employee loyalty went out the door with the last of the pink slips. But he can re build that later if it shows them they benefitted. And right now, he wants their attention, not their love. The state of the economy keeps their nose to the grindstone for the short term
 
Business is not charity....you do what you have to do to stabilize your business and turn a profit.

The employees are also not there for your charity. They have seen their coworkers fired and their own benefits cut. I imagine you can't count on their loyalty once the economy recovers and there are other more employee friendly options available

My employees are actually both happy working for me and loyal. In fact in my career in GE management and management consulting before I started doing it for myself I've done numerous staff cuts, fired workers who couldn't cut it and changed benefits and I've got a network of friends across the country involved in that.

How does that make sense, rw? You think maybe workers actually do have a feeling of a personal stake in the success of their company and they're not just doing it for money even though they need to get paid to live? Is that a mind fuck or what?
 
I chose good.

You've turned around one business, and are going to do the same for another. It's likely that without your intervention, both would have failed, harming the customers and all of the employees. Instead, the customers are able to purchase products and services they value and the remaining employees, as you noted, have jobs in a stable company.

That makes him a good business man. What's that got to do with his morals?

If you've ever been in a position where you've had to fire employees, you'd probably agree it's a moral issue. It should never be an easy decision to let people go.

I agree it's a moral issue. But the moral issue doesn't just reside regarding the ones who go, it's regarding all of them, the ones who go and who stay. And there's no perfect answer. I have to live with that. I struggled a lot when I realized my choice of career impacted so many people's lives like that. But I had to come to terms with that the worst thing I could do is not make a decision so I had to do the best I could and not let it eat me up. But firing people has never been easy for me and I hope it never will be.
 
I'm doubting you're even bringing your morals into your decision making process

Why do you doubt that?
Dr Drock just thinks like yer typical Liberal in that he thinks business is all cold hearted and unfeeling. He probably thinks that your evil and doesn't want to acknowledge that you saved a floudering company and a lot of peoples jobs on top of that. Because that would mean he'd have to admit that sound business practices entail cost cutting. He thinks business exist only to provide pay and benefits to it's workers. Make a good product that the people want? Hell no, that's not what businesses are for.

My vote: You're good. My wife has the better business sense in our marriage. Even though I make more than her I have the "clock in, clock out" mentality while she is always thinking of new business adventures.

Are you married Kaz? If so what sort of role does your wife play in your business dealings if any?

LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The stuff that goes on in people's heads.

If I thought it was all cold and mean wouldn't I have voted evil?

Sometimes this board provides great entertainment.
 
That makes him a good business man. What's that got to do with his morals?

If you've ever been in a position where you've had to fire employees, you'd probably agree it's a moral issue. It should never be an easy decision to let people go.

I agree it's a moral issue. But the moral issue doesn't just reside regarding the ones who go, it's regarding all of them, the ones who go and who stay. And there's no perfect answer. I have to live with that. I struggled a lot when I realized my choice of career impacted so many people's lives like that. But I had to come to terms with that the worst thing I could do is not make a decision so I had to do the best I could and not let it eat me up. But firing people has never been easy for me and I hope it never will be.

It sounds like you not only made the right business decision, but the right moral decision as well. Kudos! :thup:
 
Business is not charity....you do what you have to do to stabilize your business and turn a profit.

The employees are also not there for your charity. They have seen their coworkers fired and their own benefits cut. I imagine you can't count on their loyalty once the economy recovers and there are other more employee friendly options available

I am sure employee loyalty went out the door with the last of the pink slips. But he can re build that later if it shows them they benefitted. And right now, he wants their attention, not their love. The state of the economy keeps their nose to the grindstone for the short term

I agree that's often true. But my employees understand the decisions I make because I explain it to them. I actually had an issue when I cut benefits in my first business because the representative of my new provider called me "cheap" to my staff for cutting their benefits. I had to deal with that they were pissed off at him. They understood the reality. No they didn't want to have their benefits cut. But they bought into my story I'm going to do whatever it takes to not do it again and only go up from here. Though I admit that they reacted that way to him did surprise me.

My story to the new staff next week will be the same. I'm cutting staff and benefits once, but from here we go up. My employees knew the business was in trouble, I'm sure my new ones will too.
 
One and a half years ago I bought a design and print business that wasn't making money. In addition to generally scrutinizing expenses and cutting where I can, I invested $100K in expanding our digital capabilities. Then I shut down our production department laying off one third our staff and split the work that had been on our offset presses I'd shut down between the digital and outsourcing. I also slashed contributions benefits (mostly medical) by half. I did hire a new designer and focused the business more on the front end work. The result was for the staff left that we increased revenue by 20% and became profitable.

- The staff who remain now work for a stable company with secure jobs.
- The staff I laid off are having trouble finding new jobs and still mostly on unemployment because of the economy.

Now the fun starts. I'm now buying a print business that isn't making money, I've been working on that acquisition for a couple months. We are closing on the deal Friday or Monday. The business I'm buying has customer service and presses, but no design capability. It gives us a whole new customer base with revenue to target the design work. It's a good business, but the owner's not a business guy like me. So, what's my plan?

First, you guessed it, I'm shutting down production and this time laying off half the staff. I'm keeping the customer service side, the other half are going to have their benefits cut in half. I'm going to pay the upfront money by selling the production equipment and pay the ongoing payments to the seller from the staff reductions. So I get the business for free. At the same time, I am moving my business to their facility (theirs is bigger) and negotiated a rent cut. So I cut my rent in less then half and eliminate double payments for utilities, phones, insurance, etc. And I save money in production because digital and outsourcing is cheaper. I get the business for free and even make money before I even start to sell design work to their customers.

So, am I:

Good - The 60% of the staff remaining instead of worrying about their business shutting down all the time are a lot happier and working for a profitable company on the upswing. There will be raises at the end of the year instead of job cuts.

Evil - 40% of the staff are gone, the rest have had benefit cuts and I made an evil profit doing it.

What am I?

I'm voting evil. Profit, disgusting.

evil
 
Good guy, definitely. You are creating wealth whereas it was being destroyed before.

A money losing business is an unstable business that threatens 100% of the jobs. You are saving at least some of the jobs where there would be none in the future.

I admire your business acumen. I hope you make a lot of money.
 

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