Friday, April 25, 2008

A force of one

The office was empty the other day but I found my attention being drawn continuously to the door of the boss. It was open a little bit wider than usual, often an indication that he wanted to know who was passing and my spidey senses were getting twitchy, detecting a strong strand of Weariness coming from within. He had been in conversation with those who live on the upper floors and an orange docket was on his desk.Not a good combination.

Unfortunately,today I was the only chicken in the coop.

One of the reason's my backwater was so bereft of officers is due to the fact that my part of the Metropolis had undergone a number of 'Strategic changes and ongoing evaluations' They turned out to be so 'ongoing' that morale had dropped lower than an Estate agents bonus prospects. People were avoiding the place, turning up briefly to collect paperwork and doing their enquiries on the hoof so to speak.
Moves off were discussed regularly but HR have been huffing and puffing about manpower staffing levels,'priority borough' policy and looking to 'avoid' people moving off.

Change in the Metropolis is invariably down to 3 factors once you whittle away the management speak.
1.New in post. Needs to make his /her mark
2.Been in post a fair bit....promotion board /SPP or equivalent bonus coming up
3.Reaction to statistics (usually flawed and out of date)which decrees that resources are not being applied properly.

Factor 3 often turns up in factors 1 and 2.

Two of the lads in the Team behind me talk so much about various and ingenuous ways to get over the wall that I have mentally named them the 'Tunnel kings'.

Any way,enough of my musings.I realise the boss was on his mobile to an old mate of his and he had walked to the far window to look out over the station Yard.

Time to make my move.

I grabbed my jacket and notebook and slipped quietly towards the corridor.
I glanced across. Still by the window? I was on my way....

'Dibble step in a minute and take a seat'
'D'oh' How did he do that?
Clearly his spidey senses were on heightened levels as well.

I turned back and sat down in the hot seat.He handed me the docket 'Those above want this looked at'
I flicked through..'Ahh eh...come on Guv I have only just kicked into touch the other pile of ..er..the other job gave me'
'Your the man for the job Dibble' he said holding my gaze long enough for me to know 'discussion' was over.

I trudged back to my desk and flicked through the file again.
Still,I thought to myself,you have got to stay positive. It could have been the Congolese old Bill asking for help with the British connection for this job

4 Comments:

Blogger Unknown said...

Bad luck, I guess. Maybe you could replace your spidey with new stealth technology. LOL

8:51 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Top blog and for what its worth I'm adding you to the blogroll over at NightJack. I have an unfortunate reputation in division for being able to polish turds and have been in the position described in your post so often that I now feel uncomfortable if I don't have at least one career threatening hot potato in my docket. (I am also tempted to self harm some days and I have taken to playing in the traffic on motorways)

3:05 AM  
Blogger Officer Dibble said...

FTP
Stealth Technology.I like the idea.

I was thinking of E mailing Tom Cruise to see if he had any harnesses and wires from the Mission Impossible series going spare.

Nightjack
Thanks for your comments.I have enjoyed the posts on your site. Good to see the blip of being 'off air' has been resolved.
I think management see me as a relatively safe pair of hands.
Personally I think I just have spells of being a grief magnet

12:07 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Good post.

12:15 PM  

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