Manager, manage thyself

The main causes of economic decline are the large number of overhead managers and their support staffs and the selfish attitudes and greed of those managers. According to research the average managerial salary increased about 8 times in the past 30 years while the average worker's salary increased about 5 times. In addition, top corporate managers granted themselves ever larger percentages of profits as benefits and perquisites. Many managerial functions, such as public relations and counseling services, can often be superfluous, and the costs associated with these non-productive services can be detrimental to the company and to the overall economy. Because managers' promotions depend upon the number of persons supervised and the size of their operating budget, they are motivated to add more personnel and push for larger operating budgets. It is possible to decrease overhead costs by 30%-50% through a focused value analysis of overhead, which proceeds through 4 stages: 1. appointment of a challenge team for each major overhead function, 2. identification of the demand for and perceived dollar value of each function, 3. development of options for cutting these costs, and 4. ranking of these options and implementation according to priority.