I'm mad, because somebody whose life-earned craftsmanship I admire—and whether you're a car mechanic or a mob hit man or a cod fishmerman, I admire lifelong craftsmanship over most other things—was spied upon in a kind of "secret shopper" program.

And, by this hired minderbinder with boxes to check and letters to circle, found wanting.

And the thing is, my friend knew it was a secret shopper all along.

How?

Didn't I just tell you this person was a lifelong craftsman?

(Not to mention an all-out hustler and getter of results.)

Yet, my friend's art didn't match the minderbinder's boxes and the letters.

So the score came back, 55/100.

What does that score mean, you ask?

Nothing, of course!

I've always casually loathed the idea of secret shoppers—in general, spying is only slightly more morally cool than torture—but it took until now for me to form the following angry thesis:

If your organization is so shoddily managed that it can't  trust its managers to know whether or not the employees are doing good work … and can't find civilized, honest ways to do intelligent spot-checks … then your organization desperately deserves to be toppled by a competitor who can figure out how to profit from truly skilled human beings.

I realize we live in a country full of such organizations. But just because they're common, doesn't mean they're not crap.

Somebody, tell me I'm wrong about this.