True to stories I heard prior to entering employment with United Rentals, senior management had very questionable management tactics. My district manager at the time of my employment with United Rentals was a very callous bully. Though I interacted with him very little, relatively speaking, his influence was pervasive and created an incredibly disspiriting atmosphere, not just within my location, but also within the region. Before one interprets this as a single person issue, the head of marketing for the company displayed much of the same behavioral overtones. For example, more than once they came to my location and demanded off-the-cuff responses from our manager and sales staff in meetings with the entire branch in attendance (welder, yard men, mechanic, counter staff) to questions of internal financial roll up figures and competitors' daily inventory status that would require, at minimum, research and/or referencing reports. Mine was one of the better producing locations within the region and yet was still, in effect, gripped by fear. Additionally, the same could be said for all but one of the other district managers -- though much of my evidence for this is hearsay. I cannot simply write this off to United Rentals being a good ol' boys club, though there are a lot of those traits. I simply think that some companies are poorly run while others are well run. And, heck, maybe I just had a bad experience?! The biggest and best insight, in retrospect, that I received prior to accepting the offer from United Rentals is that one's success and quality of life with the company is largely dependent upon one's direct manager. Unfortunately, the managers across the board appear to be negatively motivated and they do not appear to be selected based upon their virtuosity by any means. While I am thankful for the opportunity that I was given to work for United Rentals, I am also very glad I moved on. I have never worked for a company that I ended up feeling so empty about in the final analysis in terms of the climate, direction, purpose, etc.
