Creeping up the right rectum isthe path of least resistance
The worst critic of a successful band will always be that fifth member of Boyz II Men who didn’t make the cut. You know, like how Randy was never in The Jackson 5. Anyway, we’re at the back end of the company Christmas party. As a returned soldier (read: corporate discard), I always watch these forced social interactions with great interest, from a distance.
People have repeatedly asked me how I’ve been able to churn out 50 columns a year for over 14 years. My standard response has always been “With great difficulty!”
It’s just a witty response devoid of any meaning, I know. However, the truthful response to the question would be along the lines of “With heavy reliance on half-truths and embellishments.”
Allow me to give you an illustration of the technique that we columnists employ to mine stories out of the general public’s misery. When I see a corporate group out on an expensive lunch organised by Blossom, the receptionist, based on the baby shower she and cousin Mandy attended at this particular Doppio Zero, I immediately start character development for the novel coursing through my mind.
I can spot the office gossip in seconds. I can tell you who the manager is by the useless, idiotic smirk on his face as the hapless waitress is sent from pillar to post on his unimaginative whims. And I can also tell you who the Dilbert snitch is.
For the uninitiated, Scott Adams, the creator of the Dilbert cartoon strip (and subsequently exposed right-wing Trump supporter), wrote an amazingly accurate book, shining the spotlight on the absurdity of the corporate rat race.
Adams coined a theory called the Dilbert Principle, effectively arguing that companies deliberately seek and promote non-performing employees to minimise the damage they can inflict on the business. Within the Dilbert paradigm we have all experienced the office snitch.
The latest Christmas party I witnessed happened this past weekend at a lodge in Ladysmith of all places. This Dilbert caricature was clearly unloved by every one of her colleagues. She was the loudest, most skimpily dressed, with excessive makeup.
The boss was clearly hanging on to every word coming out of her mouth with Brutal Fruit breath.
Watching this catapulted me back to a work environment I experienced some years back. A woman came into the work space with zero expectation of doing any work whatsoever. Her plan worked better than anything concocted by Hannibal from The A-Team. Her devious methods were as ingenious and effective as they were doomed.
Within two months we noticed that she had a zero work output. None. But all the managers in the department were fawning over her.
She had mental health issues. Childhood trauma. Bad experiences. And she would tell anyone who had whatever three seconds to spare in that hectic environment. Before we knew it, we’d all been given bits and pieces of her work to execute as a way of exhibiting that good ol’ team spirit.
We were being expected to use our own petrol to go and visit her at home, as a group, when she was feeling poorly. We would each get a snippet of her work and email it to the boss, who would then assign one of us to collate all of it into a report. And then he’d send out the report as having been co-authored by the two of them.
By then she was so bolstered by this affirmation of how empathetic to her plight we all were that she’d occasionally walk around the openplan office, sitting on our desks to chat to everyone about their work and generally where we fit on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Don’t be daft. Of course she was catapulted into management.
Unfortunately, her sponsor overreacted and basically got deported to his country of origin in Europe.
Such creatures are all around us. Where it becomes a downright tragedy is the realisation that this is clearly the standard modus operandus in our corridors of power. Merit is a swear word. Creeping up the right rectum is the path of least resistance.
As 2023 comes to an end I wish upon readers of this column a truly festive season and a country whose politicians have constant diarrhoea to discourage alimentary canal climbers.
Before we knew it, we’d all been given bits and pieces of her work to execute as a way of exhibiting that good ol’ team spirit