Comment by ryandrake
12 days ago
Your rental car example reminds me of my own "pizza dinner for the team" example. A company I used to work for would order pizza on Thursdays for folks who were working late. No paperwork, no expenses, no manager approval--at 7PM on Thursday, 5-6 boxes of pizza would show up in the break room, and people would spend a little more time at work hacking away. Win win. As the company grew, of course, people being idiots, the free pizza got abused. People would walk into the break room at 7:01, take an entire box, and leave the office. So, sure enough, free pizza night ended.
Because it's easier to just forbid than eat the cost or (heaven forbid!) talk to people.
How much was this pizza costing the company? Pennies in the grand scheme of things. How much were the rental cars costing? Pennies. Probably a rounding error in even the smallest department's budget. You can afford to hire an army of engineers making $100K each, but $10 pizza is where you draw the line? $100 rental cars? Really???
It’s not about the money, it’s about power and control.
Litigation can be one reason, but I think the more likely reason is that people want to avoid confrontation.
Could you tell the person taking the pizza that that is inappropriate behavior? Sure. But that is confrontational. The people who might set the boundary are worried both about how they will appear to others (am I being a bully?) AND about the possible repurcissions (is the guy I'm telling off going to yell at me or threaten me?)
Its far easier to just stop buying the pizza.
[dead]
> You can afford to hire an army of engineers making $100K each, but $10 pizza is where you draw the line? $100 rental cars? Really???
If anything it's a double loss. The guys stealing pizza are telling you who they are. Perfect for a paperwork trail to being let go.
If I ran a company like that (I'm very glad I don't; it would stress me out and I'd hate it), I would immediately fire anyone who did something like that. Anyone who would so blatantly steal a communal resource from their peers is an untrustworthy scumbag. Why would I trust them with integral parts of my business if I can't even trust them to not walk away with $20 worth of shared pizza?