Contingent though I may be, today I took an online course about protecting confidential information from thieving jerks. It seems that the exemplary employee is, unfortunately, a total d-bag. The dialogs (assisted by wonderfully awkward photos of poorly coiffed actors) went something like this:
Hey, Greg! That was a great marketing meeting. I'm starving! Want to go get some lunch?
Sure, Bridget! Let's go.
Aren't you going to put those client files away?
We're just going around the corner. I'm sure it will be fine.
Those files have confidential information, Greg. You know as well as I do that it's our company policy to lock things up.
You're right, Bridget. Let me just lock these in my file cabinet, and then we can go to lunch.
So perhaps I'll claw my way to the top of that itchy corporate hemp ladder by chastising my coworkers at every opportunity. Worth a try!
Watching these corporate propaganda pieces, like the news reels running before films in the 40s haranguing upstanding citizens to buy more war bonds (except with no classy nostalgia), fills me with indeliable sadness. The forced joviality, the tyrannical bonhomie, the smiles that you see, cheek-anchored by invisible marionette strings...it's as absurd to me as anything out of a Dali painting or Beckett play. I think it's no coincidence that many of our "transgressive" modern-day novels & movies feature anti-heroes who come from corporate office environs.
ReplyDelete