Corporate Meetings

Definition : A type of orgy in which people perform intellectual masturbation to cum with loads of crap.

Do I need to say more !!!!!!!!!

Corporate Cliches

There are some phrases that I keep hearing day in and day out. I thought I will spend some time pondering over what they mean or if they mean anything at all.

I have heard the expression "look at the long term" so many times that at the beginning of this month I decided to start counting its occurrences.

Going by the theory of relativity what is long for me is short for the management and vice versa. Let me explain: Whenever I ask for a project change I am long and the management is short and whenever it comes to vacations the management is long while I am short and people tell me Einstein did not get Noble for relativity. He must have had nasty manager.

I never quite understood why my manager keeps emphasizing on "the bigger picture".
Hence I decided to find out the bigger picture. I searched every wall in the office, looked in every nook and corner but there was no bigger picture only some mundane posters which talked about ideas and stuff. None of these can be the bigger picture because every damn person in the office has memorized these and yet the management feels that none of us has seen the "bigger picture".

One day my curiosity got better of my fear and I sneaked into my manger's cabin looking for the answer and there I found a picture of him taken while he was vacationing in Greece. So this is the bigger picture he talks about all the time!!
No doubt it is important.

My personal favorite is “It’s got to be a team effort”. What I like about this one is the timing. Whenever the team and the manager disagree this beautiful line is quoted.

This one is specific to my company which sells retirement solutions. The buzz word these days is: “owning retirement”. The logic being, the baby boomers are going to retire soon and there is going to be huge money that one can tap.

Everyone has been asked to think about ideas on these lines. I have a really innovative idea.

The baby boomers will be 60 in 2010 and that is when they retire. So assuming the life expectancy to be 70 they are going to die in 2020. Then there will be huge demand for coffins. Business opportunity!!!

That’s called “out of the box” thinking.

Corporate Mondays

Monday : No body likes it... me included. Missed a morning meeting today and why the hell people expect me to show up at 9:30 AM on Monday. Anyways my boss is cool and nothing much happened.
After a round of ciggarette and coffee I started my work around 10:30 AM...then I saw the girl I was talking about in the last blog(Corporate Parties) by the looks on her face it was very clear that there is not much scope after what happened on Saturday....or i was just imagining.

So after I had spent about 1 hour deliberating over my chances with that girl one of my team mates called me for lunch..Oh wait a minute I had attended one of those HR meeting before lunch....there was no need to but I did not have anything better to do and more over this girl was also there in the meeting....another chance??? NAHHHH...
I don't know whether girls like rebels or not but thats what I usually am and today was no different. Yet again....I was speaking my heart out...damn it I need to control that...and thank god no one from the senior management was there.

So after the meeting I had lunch and was really sleepy so had another ciggarettes..and got back at the desk at 2:30 P.M.
Realiszation1 : Half the day is gone and I haven't really started the work....okay need to relax ...another cigarette
5:30 P.M.
Realization2 : ditch yaar bahut ho gaya kal dekhte hain.

Corporate Conversation

I think I have had a lovely time after college not that I mean life in the campus was not as good. That was great too. So what has changed between then and now?.I have started enjoying solitude, anonymity and the zone of being “comfortably numb”. So what did I do after college?: Lived a life less than ordinary. The expression that I often use to describe it is “Middle class timid life style” and that’s what is called mundane. But mundane isn’t always boring though I will agree that it implies long stretches of boredom.

This boredom is often the genesis of some very interesting conversations. Like the time when I was changing the job for the 4th time in 3 years.

I had become bored of questions like:
“Where do you see yourself ten years from now?”

My Answer:I am relatively blind to such long time frames.

Well this is not the best answer.

The best I have heard is:“I see my self sitting in a glass office on the 14th floor of Oberoi towers, facing the Arabian Sea, my legs on the table, and a sexy secretary standing by my side”. Yeah that’s where I see my self.

Another bouncer (and this specially applies to likes of me): “What makes you feel that you are going to stick to this job? "

My Answer: Well in the first place there are no such feelings but if you insist, I will hold on to this job because I have already changed three jobs in three years!!(Beat that).

See if I hadn’t been bored I wouldn’t have thought of such answers.

Like most people I am not satisfied with what I am doing. Plainly put I think I am not making enough money and naturally it shows in the appraisal meetings. In particular, I remember one with a certain manager X. (I prefer to maintain anonymity. There are two reasons for it: 1) It keeps all my managers wondering 2) I have no hard feelings for X because he was not a bad person, just a little stupid).

X: So are you enjoying your job?
Me : No. (Simple answers are more shocking than sophisticated ones)
X : Why not ?
Me : I did not come here to do what I am doing
X : Will you like a project change?
Me : Not necessarily, I don't want pain in life just for another bullet point in my resume
X : Well in that case we will be working together for a year or so
Me : In that case I will rather have te bullet point
X: okay, we will see. You have been here for some time how do you like the culture here
Me : I will rather be at MMMCo
X : Why ?
Me : It pays 15 lpa.
(I knew that even Mr X was not getting this much so...)
(there are was a long pause and I got an inkling that I can knock out Mr.X)
Me: and you know ,being at MMMCo its quite possible that I get a chance to talk to some big shot in the very first month of joining ,where as right now…..

Needless to say, I was moved on bench the very same week.

Another set of interesting people are the H.R. guys (well mostly they are gals).

H.R. by the very nature of its work has the business of poking its nose where it’s not supposed to.

I often use my fictitious girlfriend as the source of instability in my life to dodge the H.R. hounds.(sorry darling, but if you do not save my ass then who will).

Just after I resigned from my previous job I got a call from H.R. for an “informal chat” about what can be done to retain me. (I seriously doubt the success ratio of such “informal chats” but that’s what the corporate protocol is like. Given a chance I will beat the shit out this corporate culture, etiquettes and what not).

As an obedient employee and soon to be an ex-employee I walked to the meeting room and there was this beautiful lady,with whom I have been trying to talk to for the last one year , sitting alone in the meeting room. I told her that I was called for a meeting and she said she is the one who will be conducting the “exit interview” for me
and I am like “uhhh…..what about the informal chat”.

So anyways, all the chances of using my fictitious girlfriend as an accomplice were ruled out. Hence began our conversation

HR : So why are you changing,don’t you like it here?
Me : Peronal reasons
HR : I need to know the exact reason . It will help us reduce attrition
Me : I am not comfortable talking about the exact reason, atleast not here. Can we go down to the cafeteria.I need some caffeine.

And for the first time in my life I realized how dumb I can be Just when I thought that I was doing okay I blurted out “You know its because of my girlfriend.” And then what?

HR : “Are you getting married?”.

By this time I was back in my seneses and made a desperate attempt to bring the conversation on track:
"No but we are having problems and I will like to stay close to her."

All I was thinking at that time was that the next time I meet this girl I am going to say it did not work out but that was the last I saw of her.

I think thats all I have for today...I intend to keep writing these blogs even if no body is interested in reading .....after all its life less than ordinary

Corporate Parties

Somehow I have never been able to grasp the concept of this event.Usually there is free flowing alcohol but there is bosses wife as well so you cannot drink too much and if the orgranizer really wants his bonus he will make it a family event and then there will be children too.

who cares!!!!

Yesterday ,there was such a party. I had fun but I am expecting monday to be even more exctiting as there will be some music in the office for sure.

The girls who look so dumb on weekdays were nothing short of hotties( any girl is Aishwarya once I am drunk) .Anyways as usual I was looking at girls dancing away to impress you know who and I was sitting in a corner gulping down one drink after another.

Just to provide you some background, I am interested in two girls in my office, not that it makes a difference to them but I am still interested and after yesterday I really doubt they are going to be interested in me anyways.

So fuck the girls!!Drink to the last drop!!!!!

Finally the animal,I mean the party animal in me was aroused after some 5 bears, 2 Whisky , 1 wine and 2 oldmonks. (You see I believe in tasting everything around because "Kal ho na ho" .No ,I am not drunk any more that was a pure PJ)

You are not reading this for the party description ,are you? Let me tell you the interesting part and that happens after I get drunk. So I was drunk and waiting outside the lift and there was huge a crowd and one of the two girls that I am/was interested in was standing right ahead of me and ,you know, I can be a real gentleman in such situations. The only problem is my language.The drunk crowd in india is not so benign to girls was all I meant when I told her: "Wait for the next lift or you will get squeezed".

Okay....that is one thing I am going to remember for a long time but before that also I did certain acts of chivalry which could be of interest to you but the problem is I can only recall them hazily....I will keep you posted as and when I recall them