As I lay be bed last night, a Saturday evening, I looked forward to the coming week with a bit of relief. Ms. Gruff will be out of the office Monday through Wednesday on a boondoggle - one of her periodic "business" trips. She'll be at an industry conference in sunny Tampa Florida while the rest of us schmucks are stuck here in the frigid Northeast, many of us addressing the tasks she is simply too busy (or unable) to address. I certainly can't deny it'll be a relief to have Gruff out of the office for a few days, many hundreds of miles away. On the other hand, I'm a bit miffed! However, it does bring to mind an issue I have not yet raised - something I've dubbed "filtering".
What I'm miffed about is that Gruff "filtered" out my request to go to the conference she's attending this week. You read correctly - I submitted a formal Trip Request to seek approval to attend the Florida conference; and Gruff apparently never routed the request up-chain for approval by the manager and director. What a bitch she can be (sorry for my blunt english)! For Gruff to attend this conference is a 100% pure "boondoggle", i.e. a waste of time, of absolutely no value to the company. It's essentially a paid vacation to Florida.
I'm not going to lie and claim my attendance would not have had some boondoggle component to it; it would have. However, there would have been some value for me and the company if I had intended. I would have learned some things and applied them! There is no such chance of Gruff doing the same!
Gruff "filtered" my trip request. In this particular instance, Gruff exercised what is the most severe form of filtering - she blocked my request. By doing so, she prohibited management above her from even knowing of my interest. I know this because, had she not, I would have received the request back, indicating either approval or disapproval.
Filtering occurs frequently in MyCompany and, I suspect your's as well. It's a behavior where management is looking out for themsleves and not necessarily in the best interest of their employees or the corporation. Filitering is a real shame because it's de-motivator for the employee and has numerous negative effects on companies.
When I think of filtering, I have to wonder how many good ideas were raised by lower rank folks like myself, which never made their way past the next level of supervision. Sure, many of the ideas may have been lame and were not worthy of further consideration. However, I am certain there were other ideas - even if only a small percentage - which could have had positive results for the eneterprises.
