Rewards for Failure

I look at this picture and understand exactly the want to put fingers around another's neck and choke the living daylights out of them. In yesterday's Washington Post I read and reread Mr. Libby's editorial explaining the reasons bonuses were paid to certain employees. In "Repairs, and Repayment", he makes this profound statement:

"Mistakes were made at AIG, and on a scale that few could have imagined possible." He goes on to state, "...AIG has made a set of retention payments to employees based on a compensation system that prior management put into place...I would never have approved the retention contracts....It was distasteful to have to make these payments. But we concluded that the risks to the company, and therefore the financial system and economy, were unacceptably high."

In today's paper, I read that he asked that the awards be returned. Some employees did so while others grudgingly kept their take. When asked by Congress for the names of these people, Mr. Libby balked and used the excuse that these certain employees are too good to lose. My only comment after mulling over his excuses for bad behavior was "WTF?"

I don't know about the rest of the United States but this simple citizen is so sick of the questionable choices made by upper management regarding outrageously high bonuses for poor decisions, unethical choices, and basic bad behaviour. Why should we settle for excuses? Then, he goes so far as to comment that he didn't want to lose these employees who would have walked if not given their compensation? Let them walk! In our struggling economy do you think they will actually leave a company that is still paying their salary? Does he not understand the job market today?

It is attitudes such as Mr. Libby's that have gotten us in the financial and moral crisis in which we find ourselves today. But this is the way we have raised the present generation. These employees are the same people that went to birthday parties for others and expected to take home lots of treats themselves. These are the same people who were raised to believe that EVERYONE is a winner, EVERYONE gets chosen for the team, EVERYONE gets a star. They have not learned that there are no rewards for making a muck of something. They have not learned the lesson of true failure. And until we take a step back and LEARN from our mistakes rather than be given bonuses for all the bad choices we make, we never are going to get it and the downward spiral will continue.