Undercover Boss , CBS , CEO of Churchill Downs
 

Undercover Boss , CBS , CEO of Churchill Downs


Just watch the show, on CBS, This man is all Class, Grade 1,

Love the show.

I hope other watch it.


http://www.churchilldowns.com

Lester

Very good show tonight. Really, illustrated the importance of purse levels for compensation of the baskside workers.

It was a great show. The COO gets points for the experiment. :ThmbUp:

Going to have to watch it on internet or their site. Missed it :mad: Glad it was good though.

here is the link if you miss the show
 

http://www.cbs.com/

watch and enjoy

I was somewhat surprised how clueless he was of the pay scale and hardships of employees and independent contractors (trainers) plying their trade at his racetracks. Christsakes, that female custodian is practically paying to work at Arlington-$8.oo per hour and driving each day from Chicago to Arlington and back-she's nuts. Also, his mispronunciation of the word "valet" surprised me.

Rather than someone gaining an understanding/appreciation of the love and dedication of those trying to earn a living at the track,I think the show better pointed out the woeful ignorance those in charge possess.

In the nature of full disclosure, I once worked for CD. I thought the show was pretty good, but agree with Illinois that it's incredible how clueless the guy is when it comes to the workers' plights. He kept talking about how he was stuck in his office and didn't get out amongst the people, but that is nobody's fault but management's. CDI is not a huge company like IBM. The show really pointed out the division between mgmt and employees. I know that most of these guys in the room with Carstanjen NEVER interact with their employees, except for the poor head of HR, who has the unenvieable duty of firing people every six months or so.

I found it very ironic that he said the company needed more people that had the diverse experience of front/back side. For the past several years, there MO has been to fire those type of people and hire people with NO horse experience, like Carstanjen, who came from GE.

I hope for the sake of everybody there that this show does help all the employees get more respect for what they do, because there are many very passionate people there, but I seriously doubt much will change.

$8 an hour for that gal to clean the place, man that is despicable, glad she got a raise.

I have to admit that the thing with the valet was very emotional. Good for Arlington to name a race after the daughter.

Not surprisingly, the racing exec was completely out of touch with what makes the track tick.
It is worse when it comes to their knowledge of their customer (the bettor).

I don't know about anyone else but I couldn't help but thinking how nice the boardrooms looked, and then contrast that with the $8 cleaner, it made CD look like a slave labor situation. Funny that the exec couldn't do an $8 an hour job.

I don't recall the cleaning lady getting a raise. She was given an "opportunity" to not have to drive an hour and a half to and from work to make $8 and clean executive suites and clean an OTB closer to home instead.

I wonder if she went along with the switch. Cleaning an OTB has to be one step above cleaning a monkey cage.

I was surprised that he knew as much as he did (which is not much). I hear stories about the totally clueless CDI suits from a friend of mine at BRIS. Seems like a nice guy though.

The thing I noticed the most is that he never spent any time with anyone who dealt directly with the customers. No sellers, no waitresses, not the guy who sells the form, not even a parking lot attendant. This guy was clueless and he is still clueless. JMO

His knowledge of bettors if shown on TV would have been more embarrassing that his bugling.

It was a classic example of corporate disconnect with a guy who really didn't even know the business of his company. The gestures at the end of the show were condescending and insulting. Except for naming the race for the daughter, and you know that wasn't his idea. If that's what the show is every week, it's pretty sick.

If I am not mistaken he only made one very small policy change. The cleaning folks leaving in the middle of the night can ask security to escort them through the dark parking lots to their cars.

That was it.

Named a race after the guy's daughter. Gave a small trainer a few extra stalls. Gave the press room girl a promotion to the marketing dept. Gave the cleaning lady a raise (how she lived on 8 bucks an hour to begin with is beyond me), made her a fulltime employee and gave her the option to work at an OTB closer to home -- none of those things address the problems he encountered.

I guess it is nice to help out a few individuals but nothing was done to really identify and address any systemic problems that affect all the other employees who were in the same boat as those selected few (not to mention all the other employees/positions that went unnoticed).

The COO is still clueless about the company he runs and its people, especially if that is all he knows about it.

It was a superficial as I imagined NEVER addressing the patron who comes in everyday to support the game.