Southwestern Groupthink a Major Problem
First of all thank you for your time. I would like to first establish what kind of a person I am. Many times I've noticed that disgruntled employees are dimes a dozen and few have as many problems as they seem to proclaim. Often their friction in the job market results from their lazy attitude as well as an overall negative attitude. I'm a college student in Tennessee. I have always been a hard worker. While on campus I ran for class president and lost by 3 votes. I held two jobs and ran my own clothing company called "Nordic Uprising" which designs clothes for many big name bands. I had a 4.0 my first semester and currently hold a 3.87 because my school counts an -A as a 3.5 GPA score. I created two clubs on campus and practiced with a rock band on campus. Last semester I ran a campus paper. My previous summer I did foreign aid trips to bring in relief to an area struck by an earthquake. I tend to be labeled an overachiever and I work extremely hard. So please bear the previous information in mind.
Here are some quick stats on the summer:
I worked 95 hours a week. I was never sure if I would make anything. I was bitten by two dogs. I was held at gun point twice. I had my car keyed. I was at one shooting. I made 7 thousand but spent 2 thousand on expenses and spent an additional 2 thousand on car repairs after I crashed my car. I hit an (possibly) illegal immigrant who is currently suing me for traumatic stress injuries from the car crash. The amount of money that my car insurance will go up over the next couple years can't equal the amount I saved over the summer. About half of the folks with cars crashed this summer and several got bit by dogs. You get so tired from working 95 hours a week that you start to fall asleep at the wheel and you are trying to look at houses and trying to look at your map and several people crash. I found several nights I almost crashed as I was driving on the wrong side of the road. All of this happened and a host of other things.
I will say that the groupthink attitude that Southwestern generated can't be compared to anything I've ever seen before in my life. They yelled at students "for their own good." It was like a reality tv show without money and fame. I don't have enough time to tell you about all the lies that student managers told me, but we were constantly bombarded with "noble lies" which were lies for our own good. The students that bought into the system became very cold toward students that were having problems. If a student talked about something that was wrong like a car crash or a dog bite it was called "puking" and they were pressured into being quiet several different ways. The peer pressure in the group was immense. In our group their was less pressure because all of us thought on our own except for a few and most of us had a fairly hard core comradeship that kept us together. Our managers tried to break our loyalty to each other and make us loyal to the company. Many of the students that I would have loved to hang out with that went into southwestern I now wouldn't even be able to maintain a genuine amiable air when I talk with them. They are pushy and apply their "knowledge" from southwestern in real life. They use others as steps on their ladder to success and the company encouraged sneaky and dishonest behavior. I was told we could make our own hours which is a total lie. You have to keep the company hours. We were told that we would get Sundays off but we worked every day whether we were at unpaid meetings or whether we were knocking door to door. We were told that the average student makes 8 thousand dollars. This may be true but if you get a student who makes 20 thousand there are a ton of students that have to make far less than 8 thousand to make the average amount that each student earns be 8 thousand a year. Also throughout the year there were costs that were incurred that you were never told about, like the cheap hotel and cheap sample books that cost around $400 and all of this was investment that you couldn't get out if you wanted to.
You are supposed to remit 75%, which gets hard when you get in a car crash and you need money to pay for it. I don't think you can get the money that you remit to the company until the end of summer, and there are definite disadvantages to leaving early. There are certain incentives that the company uses to try to keep you working, such as giving away large amounts of your commission if you don't deliver your books, but I believe they will send you your money if you quite but I don't know. I never tried to leave the company, but I did get hired with the understanding that I could return to my college which was 3 hours away and get my belongings at some point in time since all I had was a computer bag with clothes and a few toiletries inside. I tried the entire summer to go back but I was told it would be best to stay, and college credit (which I had paid for but not yet received) as well as various awards that I had put my all into earning were held over my head as disposable if I were to go back. So when I crashed my car I decided it would be a good time to return to the college later on and pick up my belongings. I drove the 3 hour drive and picked up some of my belongings since the rest had been lost. (My belongings would not have been lost if I would have returned within 3 weeks instead of 12 weeks like I had originally thought I'd be able to.) I didn't tell my boss because I knew he wouldn't let me, but I went anyway. My boss constantly called places to find out where we were and he had called the car shop where I fixed my car and asked if I was back out on the road. They said I was and that I had asked for directions back to college, and so he immediately called me. I didn't pick up the phone but that night after I got my stuff I did my nightly stat call which they say is just to check up on you and help you with any questions but in reality it keeps tabs on where you are at and what you are doing. So my boss pretended to not know where I was and tried to get me to tell him where I went by beating around the bush, and when I wouldn't he got irate and yelled at me over the phone that I was BS-ing him. On my honor I never said a lie the entire conversation but there was no way I was telling him where I was because I wasn't sure what the consequences would be.
I'm sorry that this is so short and grammatically incorrect....I really have to go to work. But if you have any questions I'd be glad to talk to you. There is so much to the story. Thank you for your time
