1 post tagged “apprentice”

Fired

We were geeks, to be sure.  We were the kind of kids who enjoyed chess and building centrifuges and, in my case, writing faux-Poe gothic fiction.  But one of our gang (if four teenaged wimps can be so called) achieved the impossible: he won himself popularity with the toughest boys at school.

Wayne couldn’t laugh out loud at his dad’s nonsense, or he’d have been killed.  So he started to impersonate him at school.  At first he only did it around his friends.  But one day, during P.E., a tough kid complained that his boots were too big and Wayne blurted out in an army voice, ‘Big boots – I like that in a man.’  Now, the general rule is that impersonations aren’t funny if you don’t know the person being impersonated, but the tough kid and all his friends started laughing.  They had tough dads too, and were glad of any opportunity to laugh at them. 

Mocking macho fathers became standard practice during football.  ‘You’ve got a tight young butt and shoes to die for – I like that in a man.’ 

One day, Wayne accidentally did an impression of his dad in front of his dad.  His brother was showing their dad how big his arms were getting from doing press-ups, and Wayne said in his dad’s voice, ‘Good arms, Francis - but remember, a man only ever looks as good as his hair.’

Luckily, his dad didn’t realise that Wayne was taking the mickey.  That man could have told you how to survive in the wilderness by eating bats, but he couldn't recognise satire if it leapt out of a bush and stole his cufflinks.

Fast forward: I'm watching some comedy spoof of The Apprentice on television - you know, Sir Alan Sugar pits hotshots against each other in a competition to win an early coronary in his employ - and I'm finding it particularly funny, because everyone in the spoof sounds exactly like Wayne's funny impressions.  The self-seriousness, the sales-speak, the OTT aggression.  'See you in the fast lane!' they threaten each other ambiguously.  'Listen Rogers, it's par nine for the bogey and the bases are loaded.  It's time to pull your finger out your arse and smell the coffee.'  Wonderful!

Alan Sugar appears.  I realise it isn't a spoof.  These are real business people.

I'd have guessed that this type of business person would be extinct by now, and I'd have been wrong.  But I'll bet that they soon will be extinct, and I think I'll be right.

Here's just one reason: the rise of the company blog.  It is both driving and heralding a change in corporate culture.  Having a company blog doesn't just affect the way potential customers see you; it affects the way a company sees itself.  The majority of company blogs are as alluring as a back-alley flasher, but more and more really good ones are appearing, and they all have one thing in common: an absence of the kind of pelvis-thrusting bespoke-suited corporate barking you see on The Apprentice.  The more a company appreciates a need for a blog - and companies are starting to see blogging as very important indeed - the more it appreciates having employees who sound human.  And the more it comes to view as ridiculous those people who can't undo the top button on their conversational shirts. 

Are you ready for the irresistible rise of the recognisably human employee?