original publish date: 17th January, 2010
decades on …
I remember (nearly) everyone missed what I was trying to say with this one.
It WAS NOT that I thought, then or now, that employee well-being should be explicitly reflected in the financial statements.
I was trying to say that, as an employee, you need to understand that these documents represent the executive’s ‘scorecard’, and anything you want needs to be framed in a way that will likely make them look better (or at least, not worse).
The problem isn’t that those in charge of your well-being can’t read feelings; it’s that they’re graded on finances.
transcript
FTE #1 (looking at financial statements): Nothing here seems to convey anything to shareholders about whether my needs as an employee are being met.
Caption: There’s a lesson in that for all of us.