Right, let’s talk about my run-in with the whole “Maria McManus” approach. Not the person, mind you, but this system, this grand idea they rolled out at my old workplace.
That Whole Maria McManus System We Had To Deal With
So, one Monday, boom, we’re all in a meeting. They told us this new “Maria McManus Method” was going to change everything. Make us super efficient, streamline all our tasks, you know the usual corporate talk. We even got these shiny new binders and had to sit through days of training. I remember thinking, “Okay, let’s see how this goes.” I tried to be optimistic, I really did.
Then we actually started trying to use it. What a mess. The special software they bought? Crashed every other hour. The forms we needed to fill out for every tiny thing? Half of them were missing from the system, and the other half made no sense. I spent a whole week, a whole week, just trying to get one simple client report processed through this “McManus” pipeline. Before, it would take me maybe half a day, tops. Just grab the data, make it look decent, send it off. Easy.
But no, with this new system, it was like:
- First, you log into three different platforms.
- Then, you find the “McManus Pre-Approval Form Version 7.3b.”
- Fill that out, hope it saves.
- Then wait for someone in another department, who’s always “in a meeting,” to click a button.
- Only then could you even start the actual work.
It was nuts. Productivity just tanked. Everyone was grumbling. You’d see people just staring at their screens, looking completely lost. I remember one time, I needed a simple piece of information from accounting. Used to be a quick phone call. With the McManus method? I had to submit a “Cross-Departmental Information Request,” which then got routed to a committee, apparently. Took three days to get a one-sentence answer.
The funny thing is, this older guy in our office, let’s call him Dave, he just sort of… ignored it. He’d nod along in the meetings, then go back to his desk and do his work the old way. And guess what? He was the only one still getting things done on time. He told me once, “Kid, these fancy systems come and go. Just focus on doing good work. That’s what matters.”
And you know what? He was right. That Maria McManus thing eventually just faded away. They stopped talking about it, the binders gathered dust. No big announcement, it just sort of died. But Dave’s words stuck with me. Not long after that whole fiasco, I started looking for a new job. Found a smaller company, one where they actually trusted us to, you know, do our jobs without a twenty-step process for everything. Best move I ever made. Sometimes, all that complex stuff they try to sell you? It’s just noise. Simple and direct usually works best, at least in my book.
