We Need Numbers

Over the weekend, colleagues across the whole group received hurried Teams meeting invite from the management. Judging from the timing, I guessed it was a long due townhall meeting. Some colleagues found it alarming and was wondering whether it was an 'earth-shattering' announcement. We didn't have one the previous year because we were too busy dealing with the start of the pandemic. And suddenly, my CEO decided to talk to all of us. The whole tone of his speech wasn't very uplifting at all. The general message was that we were surviving. The group consisted of four entities, but he merely touched on one company, ignoring the rest. The second half of his speech turned alarming when he started talking about investors and revenue numbers. 

"We might not have a job next year if we don't have the numbers."

"Even if you do your job well, but we don't have the numbers, then we all fail."

I bet alarm bells were going off in the heads of junior staff. Wonder how many translated his words to a call to bail, and abandon ship. Corporate entities definitely need a healthy revenue stream to pay everyone's salary. But are we really in such dire straits to justify such an alarming tone?  Or are we just getting squeezed dry because someone wants more bang for their buck? At the end of that whole speech, he asked all of us to acknowledge that we understood what he had just laid out. The takeaway-- no vision, no strategy, just numbers. Well, everyone wants numbers, right?