So amidst all of the tasks that I complete over the course of a workweek in Corporate America, I have to say that there is one thing that can at times be the bane of my existence: status reporting. Status reports can come in a variety of forms, and can sometimes be so well-disguised, that you aren’t even conscious of the fact that you’re reporting the status of anything. They are often next to pointless, and are only thrust upon you so that you can report numbers to your boss who will then, in turn, show them to her boss, and so on and so forth. Corporate researchers are still unable to find an actual purpose to this baffling practice.
Some types of status reports I’ve encountered in my work experience:
The Status Report Spreadsheet (SRS):
This is one of the more traditional forms of status reporting. Mr. Bossguy tells you that he wants to see some numbers, letting him know how many new clients your team secured over the past month, versus last month, measured up to the yearly targets set by corporate. Okay, so it makes sense that this info is good to know. But the thing is, what should be a matter of plugging in some basic numbers turns into having the absolute exact number with no margin of error, put into this official impractical template designed by some dude in corporate who has never actually used the spreadsheet. Typically, when you fill out this spreadsheet with your status numbers and send to the boss, he will not even focus on the numbers, but will complain that you used the wrong font size and color. This, in essence, wastes the time that you could be using to actually do the thing that your boss wants you to report that status of. This is, universally, regarded as one of the big OMG’s – Office Mysteries that are Great.
The Status Report Conference Call (SRCC):
After you fill out the SRS, you will likely be asked to present these numbers on a Status Report Conference Call (SRCC). This call will likely last 1-2 hours, and will typically end with a bunch of angry executives complaining about how the yearly targets won’t be met, or how they aren’t “aggressive enough.” Also, there will be that one nitpicker who complains that your template doesn’t exactly match the almighty corporate reporting guidelines. After the SRCC, you will be left with more work to do on the status report, which will most likely keep you busy up until the interval when the next status report is due. At that time, you will have nothing to report since you just spent all of your time reporting the status, rather than having an actual status to report. Quite the paradox.
The Status of Status (SOS):
This is, perhaps, the most annoying type of status: the infamous Status of Status, aptly known as the SOS. Before you submit the status spreadsheet to the boss – the status spreadsheet that you’ve been tweaking and retweaking for about the past 2 weeks – your colleague decides that it would be a good idea to hold a call about the spreadsheet to discuss the numbers that you’re planning to plug in. This is the dreaded SOS. Just a thought – if status reporting is so complicated that you need another call to discuss the status of your status reporting, then this just might be a bit counterproductive. The best is when another colleague wants to talk to you in advance of your call with the other colleague to discuss the report for the boss – this is the status of the status of the status, which is simply known as “stupidity.”
Corporate Word of the Week:
“Hold their feet to the fire” – I think I threw up a little when I heard this phrase uttered by Ms. Loudwoman across the hall. She was talking to her boss about her colleagues who still needed to submit their work on a project, and said that, “I really need to hold their feet to the fire on this, and get those product launch slides from them.” Ummm what? What’s wrong with just saying some other less annoying cliche, like “they need to own up?” Also, this sounds a bit twisted – like an ancient pagan ritual or something. Corporations today – where do they get this stuff?
Out of the (Big) Blue 