Russell Wiley Is Out to Lunch (18 page)

Meg Wilson comes in and apologizes for being late. I’m mildly pissed, but at least she has a reason: she was held up at a client meeting.

Finally, Cindy Lang makes her entrance. Despite being almost fifteen minutes late, she’s taken the time to stop in the kitchen and make a coffee. She sets her mug down at the head of the table opposite me.

“Are we all here?” she asks.

An outside observer might assume this was Cindy’s meeting. That she was the boss we were here to serve. In fact, Cindy is the most junior of my four managers.

I look around the room, making eye contact with everyone but Cindy. “Right,” I say, “let’s get started.”

We run through the items on my agenda. I welcome Erika Fallon and Sally Yun, announce formally that Roger will be taking a leave of absence starting in a week and a half, then update the team on revenue forecasts and details of the latest budget cuts. No one brings up the layoff rumors, so I glide right by that issue, asking each of my managers for their usual team update on current projects and issues. I allow the meeting to proceed and wind down at its normal pace. It looks like I’m taking occasional notes, but in reality I’m just writing down the names of the people in my department, putting each name into one of three columns. Halfway through the meeting, Angela picks up her pen and starts adding more swirls to the pattern she’s creating on the inside cover of her notebook.

Erika Fallon pays attention to how Meg, Pete and Roger deliver their updates, then seamlessly takes her turn and delivers an efficient five-minute report.

Something about Erika Fallon’s delivery reminds me of Sam. For two years after we got married, Sam threw herself into a career in public relations. She was passionate about her job, enthusiastic about her work, and eager to advance. Within a year, she became an account executive, working on a rotating client list, putting in long hours, bringing work home most nights. She was making good money. Just like Erika Fallon, she invested in a chic work wardrobe. She prided herself on being ultra-organized, always on top of things. Then something changed. Seemingly overnight, she became allergic to what she was doing. Nothing was right. She hated her clients. Her colleagues drove her crazy. The concept of spin—the basic mode of communication for the PR industry—disgusted her. I listened. I commiserated. After a while, I told her to look for another job. After that, I told her if she really couldn’t stand it she should just quit. That was twelve years ago. Somewhere along the way, I realized that Sam and I were having a communication problem of our own. Maybe I should have taken into account the business she had worked in. When I said “quit,” she spun it into “retire.”

After Erika wraps up, Cindy speaks. In front of her peers, she’s less of a showboat, hiding her true colors. Keeping one eye on the clock, she wraps up precisely at 12:29. Everyone starts closing their notebooks and acting as if the meeting’s over.

“Oh,” I say, “there’s one more thing I should mention.”

I remind them that Henry has hired a new consultant named Judd Walker to work on a special project. That he will be working on the twenty-sixth floor for the next couple of months. That he will likely need to speak to each of them individually.

“He’s been round twice already,” says Pete.

“What exactly is he working on?” asks Meg.

“Just some data gathering,” I say. “Some analysis. Our job is to make sure he gets everything he needs to complete his project.”

“What kind of data will he need?” asks Meg.

“We’ll let him figure that out. Let’s see what he asks for and help him any way we can.”

“OK,” says Meg.

“OK,” says everyone else, starting to get out of their chairs.

“Just don’t overburden him,” I say. “I’m sure he’ll be crunching a lot of numbers. Make sure not to give him anything he hasn’t specifically requested.”

“OK,” says Meg.

“OK,” says everyone else.

“How about this?” I say. “Anytime he asks you for anything, no matter how trivial it seems, please review the request with me before responding.”

“OK,” says Meg.

“OK,” says everyone else.

“In the meantime,” I say, “just try to ignore him. Pretend he’s not here.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

I buy an egg salad sandwich and a diet iced tea and head to the concrete park around the corner from my office. It’s a mini-refuge between the high-rises. I find a table being vacated by three Brazilian tourists near the trickling wall fountain. Within a minute, I allow the other two chairs to be dragged away. That suits me fine. No one will bother me now. And I need to think.

Henry’s demanding a twenty-five percent staff reduction from my eight-person department. Excluding myself, I’ve got seven people to choose from, not including Erika and Sally, whose original department has already endured its trauma.

I unfold the sheet of paper on which I’ve written the names of the people in my department into three separate columns.

I take a bite of my sandwich and think about what to do next. I have a clear understanding of how to define my A players. Meg, Roger and Pete are the only ones I can rely on to take on and complete any assignment.

After that, we all rely on Kelly to help organize all the added-value extras we’ve promised to advertisers—such as cover wraps, special distributions and promotional mailings.

Beyond that, Barbara gets a free pass. She didn’t take the voluntary early retirement package the Ghosh Corporation offered earlier this year. That means she wants to stay. After more than thirty years of loyal service, I simply can’t fire her.

In my own head, it seems straightforward. Cindy and Jeremy have to go. There’s only one snag. There’s no way I’ll convince Henry to agree with my assessment.

I break the problem into two.

I know I can sell Henry on the idea of firing Jeremy. He’ll ask me to explain why I’m not firing Kelly instead. But my story’s simple. Jeremy’s not working out. He’s still on probation. Besides, Henry will give me one of my picks. He may not like Kelly. But he doesn’t even know Jeremy’s name.

Cindy is the tough one. She recognized quickly that Henry shares a fatal flaw with many great salespeople. He not only loves to sell, he loves to be sold to. So that’s how she spends her time. Fawning over him. Pushing herself forward. Maintaining the kind of unsullied workspace he admires. Taking credit whenever possible for other people’s poopie. Convincing Henry that she, Cindy, is one of the company’s future Unicorns.

My task won’t be easy. But for the good of my team, it’s important that I succeed.

I put my notepaper away and continue thinking.

There was a time in my youth—a brief, shining moment—when I thought I could take on the world. I would be unstoppable. I didn’t know how I would do it, of course. But I was determined about one thing: I would refuse to be ordinary.

There was a time in my career when, through a combination of luck, circumstance and my own proven performance, things went really well. I was promoted fast. I changed companies a couple of times. My salary doubled in three years. Then doubled again in another five. When things started to slow, I jumped to the
Chronicle.
That was more than four years ago. I settled in. I got promoted, moved to a bigger office. And that’s where I am today. On a slow train to obscurity. Stuck in the world of middle management. Navigating my way through a world defined by hiring freezes, reductions in force and faux-generous severance packages. Buried under an increasing workload. Getting calls from out-of-work former colleagues still looking for jobs—while the headhunters have all gone quiet.

I’ve dug myself into a hole. I assumed my performance would speak for itself. I had faith that management would recognize and reward good work. Then I sat back and watched as other people—aggressive, hard-charging, permanently networking types—charged ahead. I let it happen. Why? Because I was too busy digging my hole to do anything else. I didn’t have time to deal with all the networking. I didn’t realize the subtle difference between being labeled a high performer instead of a high potential. But that’s all got to change. I can’t sit back anymore. The company needs to see me as an investment in the future, not a cost it wants to contain. The company has to see a new side to Russell Wiley. There’s only room for one Unicorn in my department. And that Unicorn has to be me.

I finish my iced tea, throw away an uneaten half sandwich, and head back to the office. I feel on the verge of a momentous decision. It won’t be easy. But the time has come for me to step outside my comfort zone.

I run into Rachel Felsenfeld, Liz Cooke’s nemesis, at the elevator bank in the lobby.

She looks at me out of the corner of a half-closed eye. Her hair is cropped short and plastered to her scalp with wet-look gel. She’s wearing a designer ballet shirt, black tights and flat black shoes. The shirt is decorated with asymmetric orange and black stripes: horizontal on her right sleeve and across the front, vertical on her left sleeve. I realize the pattern isn’t as anarchic as it looks. It’s intended to represent something.

“Is that an elephant?” I ask.

She looks at me as if she hasn’t quite understood. I’m not sure if she even knows my name.

“Your shirt. I figured it out.” I lean forward and trace the pattern in the air, ignoring the fact that she takes half a step back. “Leg, body, leg, trunk.”

Rachel’s eyes are now fully open. Despite her anorexic frame and my clear height advantage, she looks ready to take me down if I move another inch closer.

I shrug and step back. “It looks like an elephant to me.”

“Then I guess it is,” she says.

We ride up to twenty-five in silence.

I realize that if Martin leaves, Rachel Felsenfeld will be Henry’s first choice for the creative director position. Liz Cooke won’t even be considered. Just as if I ever leave, the only internal candidate Henry will consider to lead my department is Cindy Lang.

I approach my office slowly. I’ve always defended my way of doing things. I tell people it’s organized chaos. As long as the cleaning staff doesn’t touch anything, I always know where everything is.

Today, I imagine the scene through Henry’s eyes. Henry, who views his immaculate, virtually paper-free office as a reflection of both his well-ordered mind and the control he brings to every management challenge.

It’s not pretty. Overstuffed folders stacked in precarious columns. Most of the carpet hidden, except for necessary pathways between chairs, window and door. More folders piled atop the desk, along with a seemingly random assortment of memos, clipped articles and half-filled spiral-bound notebooks.

To Henry, this office is a Horse’s stable, not a Unicorn’s lair.

“Barbara,” I say, leaning over the wall of her cubicle and acting as if I don’t notice the photograph of a porcelain farm boy figurine that dominates her computer screen. “I know you’re busy. But how soon do you think you could get a dumpster delivered to my office?”

I come home from work to find Sam on the couch, reading a magazine. Her bare feet are on the coffee table, with cotton pads stuffed between her shiny red toes. Taking off my coat, I almost trip over the brown leather turd-stool she’s moved close to the door.

“What’s going on?” I ask.

“Just hanging out,” she says innocently. “I’m testing a new nail polish. Which do you prefer? This one?” She tilts her left foot in my direction. “Or this?” She lifts her right foot off the table so I can see her toes better.

“I can’t tell the difference.”

“Come closer.”

“Let me get changed first. What’s this doing here?”

“I’m not really loving it anymore,” she says. “I was thinking I’d take it back to the store tomorrow.”

“You can’t take it back,” I say.

“Why not? Shila won’t mind. And you hated it anyway.”

“I’ve gotten used to it. It’s comfortable. It’s multipurpose. It’s so much more than a stool, but still not quite a chair.”

“It’s ugly. It doesn’t fit with the rest of our stuff.”

“Nothing fits with the rest of our stuff,” I say. “Anyway, you can’t take it back. If you don’t want it, I’ll take it to my office. I might be able to use it.”

“OK. Do that.” She looks back at her toes and sighs. “Well, Rainy Day Red, I hate to break it to you like this, but it’s over between us. I’ve fallen for Glistening Cherry.”

“What’s going on?” asks Cindy Lang.

“Just a little spring cleaning,” I say. I wipe the first trace of sweat off my forehead with the back of my hand. I’ve been pitching files for about eight minutes, trying to ignore the slightly nauseous feeling in the pit of my stomach and focusing instead on the positive: I’ve already cleared two patches of carpet.

“I was looking for a copy of the IBM presentation,” Cindy says.

“I’m busy now,” I say.

“It’s just that I have a meeting on it in ten minutes.” She knows that’s usually enough to make me drop what I’m doing.

“Which meeting is that?” I try and sound casual. I don’t know of any meeting. I step past Cindy and drop the files I’m holding face-down in the dumpster.