An open letter to my senior management

I wrote an as of today sent this letter to the upper echelons of Pearson Asia Pacific.  Time will tell if I get anything but dead-air and/or platitudes with absolutely no followup.  Still, it felt good to write, and my coworkers are all in agreement... and some even think I don't go far enough.  So yeah.

Should I get no response, my next option will be to find the general company listserv and go populist with the message.

And so, without further ado...

To whom it may concern,

I’d like to pose my concerns regarding the efficacy of the current makeup and revenue-target model. While this has been an annual headache for myself and my coworkers, as we all scramble to account for the hours supposedly “missed” during national holiday leave, I’ve long since stopped beating that dead horse and grudgingly accepted that any and every “holiday” is more or less one extended scheduling aneurysm of 25%-filled makeups, and makeups of makeups, etc. I am not questioning this policy in itself at this time.

Rather, this year seems to have added yet another layer of needless complexity in the form of the “revenue-target” and its incentive structure, as is currently implemented. Let me lay out my own situation, and that of my campus: I am about to go into an 8-day “makeup marathon” which will compile two entire weeks worth of classes into a single stretch of time. At its worst, I’ll be actively teaching – without anything but a lunch break – from 9am until 8:30 at night. My fellow teachers face similar, if not worse, schedules.

We proposed that the makeups, rather than having to be lumped together as previously mentioned, instead be allowed to be spaced out into the first week or two of February, as both a quality of life, and direct quality of teaching issue. This has been what has worked in the past over my 3-plus year tenure here at Pearson, and I didn’t expect there to be much resistance to the same solution this year. Much to my surprise, the idea was deemed unworkable due to the revenue-target system that has been implemented. Under this structure, the local Senior Teacher, Center Manager, and apparently even the Regional Manager would all be directly financially punished if this so-called “target” were not met. This target is, to my knowledge, developed by the financial dept. and senior management, and is continually raised if met – and again, financially punished if a given school underperforms in a given month.

Given this model, for a small, slow-growth school like Chunshen, there is absolutely no room to space classes out over the next month, or for any schedule irregularities whatsoever. Virtually any discrepancy would result in the school falling “under target,” and thereby punishing the local management.

There is, therefore, active pressure on the management to meet this goal. That is understandable. However, there is no such incentive for the teaching staff to do the same.  Consequentially, there is a considerable degree of resentment at being made to compress half a month of classes into a single week.

This is doubly aggravating on a holiday like the upcoming Spring Festival… this is a holiday that happens annually; that is to say, every year. This could have been planned for, this could have been planned around; the monthly target could have (and quite frankly, should have) been adjusted to reflect the fact that the entire country is taking a week off.

And yet here we stand again, my 4^th Spring Festival at this company, now more stressed and overworked that any of the prior three, due to the shortsighted implementation of this policy, and its disregard for an annual, completely foreseeable schedule break on its teaching staff. Meanwhile, senior management will be enjoying extended vacations, with no compulsory makeups, or near-unattainable revenue targets hanging over their heads and paychecks.

Again, I’ve come to tolerate the policy of holidays merely being deferred classes, with little more than grumbles and a resigned shrug. That makes a level of financial sense, even if it is unorthodox. What I am perplexed and frustrated by, rather, is the myopic implementation of this revenue-target system, and the unnecessary additional level of stress it puts on teachers and center managers to not only make up all holiday classes – but to also do so by the 27^th of that given month. For a school like Xinzhuang or Xuhui, with their large number of classes and staff, and therefore relative flexibility with scheduling, the stress may be less. I cannot speak for them, but for a small, slow-growth school like Chunshen, it adds a completely arbitrary and unjustifiable deadline to complete these makeups.

While I hope that my words might find a receptive pair of eyes, my experience with the managerial structure of the company tells me I’m far more likely to get a nicely-worded brush-off and be promptly forgotten in the name of slightly better returns on paper, and positions above my own receiving congratulatory bonuses for effectively manipulating my and others’ schedules to make the returns looks nicer.  I hope this is not the case, and that there might be a real and serious look into the value vs. cost ratio of this policy from an HR standpoint, rather than merely a bottom line view. I simply wish to make clear my concerns and frustrations regarding this policy, and the unwarranted additional stress it places on my coworkers and me. I do not question the financial sense of requiring makeups for even national holidays at this time… but I strenuously question the sense of mandating that it be done in the same financial month, especially for a holiday of the length of Spring Festival.

It is my sincere hope that, if nothing else, future holidays may be planned for in advance and have the arbitrary “revenue target” adjusted accordingly to reflect that schedule disruption, rather than forcing teachers and administrators alike to frantically compress a large number of classes into an extremely limited timeframe, or face the punitive action of a reduced paycheck.  It would not cost the company money, and it would certainly make many employees dread national holidays a little less.  They would still be rescheduling nightmares in the name of naked profit, but they would at least be on our – the teachers’ and local-level staff’s – terms time-wise, rather than that of an arbitrary monthly deadline.

Thank you for your time and consideration,

(CS) TAW Out.
LYRIC HERE