Undercover Boss - the 1% meets the 99% [View all]

[NashvilleLefty]

Personally, I wish that EVERY CEO was forced to be on the Undercover Boss show - but, of course, I do have a few issues.

Bosses have a natural tendency to think they "deserve" their position (and pay) and that the big problem is with the "lazy" or "incompetent" employees. This show demonstrates bosses trying to do the front-line "grunt" jobs and sucking at them. They find out first-hand that the jobs they pay shit for are actually hard - so hard that almost without exception the "bosses" suck at them.

So much for the idea that low-paid people are lazy and incompetent.

The problem I have with the show is the "personal" side. The "bosses" always get to know the individuals they trained/worked with. The bosses are always touched by their personal stories and almost always do something (including writing personal checks) to help those individuals.

Although I think that's wonderful - here's my issue: every single one of their employees have personal issues. Sure, they are touched by the stories of the individual employees they encounter, but what about the rest of them? In a few cases, the bosses make sweeping changes that affect all of their employees, but mostly they just do something nice for those that they met.

This is great for those involved and makes for great TV as well as making the boss feel better about himself - but what about the rest of the employees who weren't lucky enough to get on TV?

Finally, for all of those who are considering "Going Galt" - DO IT! We'd actually do much better without you and your "holier than thou" attitude.

P.S., before this show came out, I was never prouder of TN or our former Democratic Governor Phil Bredesen than when I saw TV film of him investigating TennCare by watching him actually take calls - "Thank you for calling the TennCare helpline, this is Phil. May I help you?" Afterwards, he identified lots of problems that could be easily fixed.