Our organization’s five partners went away on a retreat to discuss the next year’s budget. The remaining employees who had experience under their belt were essentially out all day, leaving five of us entry levelers to run the office by ourselves on a Friday.
The day started off strong at our weekly 7:30 am sales meeting. We all showed up. At 8:30 am, we took a field trip to Starbucks. At 11:30 am, three of us called an impromptu meeting to discuss the onset of enjoying country music. 1:00 pm called for a very leisurely lunch at the favored deli. And the rest of the afternoon we took turns DJ-ing our favorite tunes.
Were we unproductive? No, we finished everything we had to do that day with time to spare.
So what is the point? A company’s leaders hinder its efficiency? Anarchy should rule after all?
The point is that if we were any older and had any more experience, even with time to sit around and music to play and useless conversation to have, we probably wouldn’t do it. We might be out on the golf course with our friends or stopping in with lunch for our spouse or being there after school to pick up our children. The older you get, the more you have to lose and therefore the less time you have to waste.
No other time in our life will be confined to our office with no one watching - we had no choice but to have fun with each other. We had to be there but we could be casual. At entry level, we can afford to waste time because as far as we know we have a lot of it. Honor your lack of experience. But be sure to mark your Outlook calendar for three to four years from now you’ll want to know when you should start holding on to your dwindling time clock.
There were two types of new-hires those that get to order a new chair and those that are given a hand-me-down. I always thought that your chair was a metaphor for your career path. We were confined to the stationary seats from grammar school to college and even throughout the job search interview process. Then you land your first job and more often than not, you’re landing in a standard rolley chair with fairly cheap upholstery. Eventually you earn arm rests. A few years later, maybe a title or two up the ladder, you move into the “L” stages - leather, lumbar support, luxury. And finally, there’s the few who make it to deep-buttoned tufting with brass trim or those thousand-dollar ergonomic mesh ones.
I recently discovered, however, that not all entry levelers are seated equally. One week ago our newest employee came over to my desk asking me to order him a new chair. Sitting in my non-reclining rolley without arm rests, I threw the wheels into a rugged reverse and grabbed the office supplies book. Citing his bad back, “The Chair Man” chose a $234 head-high leather seat with padded arms, swivel, tilt tension, and pneumatic adjustment - yes, the chair came with its own vocabulary.
It was three hours into work today that The Chair Man came over to my desk and asked when his chair was coming in because “that one sucks!” What he did not know was that after he had left the office last night, a late delivery rolled in looking like a first class seat ripped out of 747 and planted on wheels. He had been sitting in it all morning, without spinal symptoms.
I see two lessons learned from The Chair Man. First, an entry leveler can find a way to upgrade the standard rolley with a convenient bad back. Second, you don’t really have to have a bad back to be a pain in the ass.
I ordered business cards a week ago for one our new employees. We have an established relationship with a mighty fine printer that unfortunately takes a mighty fine amount of time to complete an order. This particular new employee whose title will now be Director of Impatience came running over to me everyday asking if his business cards had arrived which meant everyday I had to come up with another reason as to why the process of placing raised print on hard stock took so long. Then came the day of the most important networking event - which absolutely required the widespread dispersing of the Director’s 3½ x 2 inch recyclable identity. Unfortunately, I had run out of excuses with the man who couldn’t run out of patience because he had none to begin with. And thus, I had to drive out to the printer and pick up the cards hot-off-the-press, literally.
MapQuest estimated that my destination was 40 minutes away. I estimated that would mean one and half hours that I would have to work late to catch up. A bit unnerving but I tried to enjoy the mid-November drive - windows open, crisp breeze, trees, fall leaves, barren fields - wait, where was I? This business-to-business errand turned out to be a field trip to the actual lumber yard. Obscure but an interesting opportunity - other than a brief segment on “Sesame Street” on how paper was made and a few scenes from “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” I had never actually seen the inside of a paper mill. Of course I barely had time to look around. I was up against the Director’s strict deadline. At the very least though, I can now say I’ve driven the dirt roads and dodged the flying wood chips of a lumber yard. As for the Director of Impatience - well he now has in his hands 500 chances to get a paper cut.
I must have been in second grade when my parents first showed me “Trading Places.” Some might argue against my parents’ choice to ignore the R-rating, but my dad thought the opportunity to teach us about commodity trading was too valuable to pass up. In retrospect, I know he just couldn’t tolerate kids movies but at least I was able to learn early on about the orange trade. The economic lesson was simply supply and demand - the more oranges the crops produce in any given year, the less they will cost. The bonus lesson from the movie was about the workings of another market - prostitution.
Back to oranges though - this year’s crop trade appears to be a bit more complicated. In fact, it seems less logical than Eddie Murphy dating a Spice Girl. Orange production is up. Consumer demand is down. Yet prices remain up. According to AC Nielsen, “Retail sales of orange juice… fell 12.3% from the comparable year-earlier period, while retail prices were up 13.5% from last year.” So what gives?
The traders sure aren’t giving anything. Citing potential risks to oranges like fatal citrus greening disease (is this just a fancy term for ripening???) and worried that the smaller size of the oranges this season might call for more needed to fill the standard box, producers aren’t lowering the raised prices.
I don’t really understand how the markets work sometimes but I guess that’s where an education on commodities earned through watching “Trading Places” leaves you. All I know is that on entry level salary, I won’t be able to purchase much orange juice this year. On the bright side, Sunny D contains less than 2% concentrate - stock up.
Inspired by “Juice Prices Defy Crop Recovery.” By Tom Sellen.
The Wall Street Journal. Wednesday, January 2, 2008.
Have you ever been in a situation where you come up with the greatest point off the top of your head? For me, that occurred while making an argument as to why our company’s marketing collateral should be kept as brief as possible. My partner, Mr. Wordy, disagreed in favor of a longggg testimonial piece. Neither of us wanted to budge.
“Look at Snickers!” I screamed and gave myself kudos for the amazing example. “All they have to say is ‘Hungry? Grab a snickers.’ They don’t go into detail about the crunchy peanuts topped with chocolate and filled with caramel and nougat!”
That’s when a co-worker from another department moseyed on over - he was all smug, hands in pocket. He quietly voiced that he would like to retaliate my argument. And then he began to sing:
“Happy peanuts soar over chocolate covered mountain tops and waterfalls of caramel prancing nougat in the meadow singing songs of satisfaction to the world.”
My co-worker sensed that I was still a little skeptical and by the power invested in YouTube, he played the commercial clip featuring a guitar soloist strumming about the splendor of a Snickers bar.
Mr. Wordy proved his point too. Had someone asked me if I was hungry, I would have said “no.” But after being entranced by musical magic featuring a world constructed with confections, I had an instantaneous craving. Sold! And for at least for a good five minutes, my mouth was too occupied to make any more of my “greatest points.”
