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Meeting
(refer 'cul de sac') - inspired somewhat by the
concentration camp model employed by the Third Reich,
a process which involves trapping people in a room,
blocking off their contact with the civilized world,
occasionally supplying the hostages with stimulants
to keep them just at the fringe of life and then
draining the life force out of them by setting pointless
agendas and asking meaningless questions. The gassing
of the participants was ruled out because management
thinkers figured it was far greater fun to watch
people suffer by making them participate.
"Man was making great progress until the devil
created the perfect management tool to stop him…
Meetings."
Ram heard these wise words of wisdom being whispered
in his ears and looked up just in time to see Chai-La
(the mystical Chinese canteen boy) disappear into
a meeting agenda sheet. The warm potion woke him
up as he stared bleary eyed around the room. They
had been locked in there for hours, and by the looks
of it things had not really moved anywhere. Even
the teacups were religiously maintaining their positions.
"Can someone
please tell me what we are here to discuss?"
implored a tired PP, too exhausted even to twirl
his trademark handlebar moustache. This clearly
was not his sort of thing. Vikas (Ram's boss) had
been waiting for that question all day.
"We are
gathered here to take stock of why we need to meet
more often on this account. All people concerned,
from client to all departments in the agency. We
need to ensure that we all are singing from the
same page. We need to ensure we are moving forward
seamlessly towards our goal. We need to regiment
our diverse actions into a method of systems and
processes that will ensure optimum productivity."
Vikas paused to glance down at his watch and realized
that he could get in another cliché. "Swift
strokes will smoothly cut through the water and
rapidly power us forth."
Everyone was
awestruck by the sheer absurdity of that statement
and then…
"What?"
PP hollered nearly blowing everyone's head off.
"Is the agency actually paying you to spout
such utter rubbish?"
To Ram's utter
surprise Mr Bose (the client) jumped to Vikas's
rescue. "I agree with him, that's a great idea
Vikas," murmured Mr Bose, clearly pleased with
the fact that he was spending as much time away
from his oppressively eccentric boss that Monday
morning.
Mondays were
generally rough on Mr Bose. The chairman of the
company queried him incessantly on the status of
various jobs, on and below his radar, and usually
Mr Bose would be left groping in the dark for most
answers.
"That
predicament (groping in the dark) is great for most
of your nocturnal activities, but doesn't really
help us in running the marketing of an organization,"
the chairman would boom in the corridors, often
to Mr Bose's embarrassment.
Mr Bose had
seen one more such embarrassing situation popping
up that day and hence on the previous Friday asked
Vikas to organize a meeting to discuss operations
and procedures.
Vikas, being
the 'wonderfully crafty servicing rascal' that he
was knew exactly what was wanted. So he shot out
a mail to all and sundry that they would have to
block Monday for a very important client meeting
and then followed it up with a 27-point agenda that
no person having a semblance of sanity about him/her
would have finished reading. Net result was that
the conference room was packed with nearly everyone.
"Stop
indulging him Mr Bose, we are wasting a day here
and the effect will be felt on all of your jobs,"
said PP, resuming his ongoing 'love' affair with
Vikas. "Why are we here? And what is meant
to be discussed?"
Vikas knew
that there was no real answer to that question.
The meeting ran the risk to ending as quickly as
the Indian innings if he answered that honestly.
He needed to divert the conversation to a topic
where PP would forget the question that he had posed
and give him a clear window of at least an hour
of participation. He knew just what to say next.
"We are
here firstly to establish more control over the
creative process. Many times what you deliver comes
as a complete surprise to all of us. Is there a
system which we could evolve that might make this…"
Vikas was stopped
mid sentence as he expected he would be.
"What
the f@#$ing hell are you talking about? I don't
get any kind of brief from you fellows; on top of
that every piece of work is wanted yesterday. What
am I supposed to do? Share ideas in the middle of
the night…"
Vikas leant
forward like he was listening intently, but as Ram
knew by now he had switched off. Task achieved he
knew that the meeting was now in cruise control
and he would not require to make any kind of intervention
for the next hour and a half at least. He could
use that time constructively to figure out whom
he could target next.
PP was in his
element now, he was standing and spouting all his
hate and distrust for clients and servicing in a
manner that would have done Eminem proud.
"You fellows
don't know your …" as his tirade continued
on and on, until he began pausing for breath much
like an unfit account executive stops to recharge
his batteries when he is being given the run around
in studio.
"Another
ten minutes," Vikas told himself.
Ram kept his head down trying to avoid eye contact.
He knew that danger was approaching. While the rest
of the room stared in rapt attention at PP, Ram
knew Vikas's gaze would fall on him as PP began
to taper off. He needed a diversion.
Rashmi, the
head of media on the account was sitting right in
front of him. Innocently oblivious to what would
happen next. Ram knew little of her, as she had
recently joined, bar the fact that she loved to
talk and never made a point unless it was twelve
sentences long. An ideal person to take the baton
on from PP. Ram began drumming his fingers on the
table just loud enough to break her thought process
and cause her to look up.
Vikas's gaze
was sweeping across the room like a tractor beam
and locked into her innocent gaze. She smiled back
at him like a helpless goat tries to charm a tiger
out of making it the next agenda on the menu-with
the same success rate.
"Well
thanks PP for making your opinion felt and heard.
I guess we have addressed the creative process,
Rashmi what do you think must be done on the media
front? In this rapidly evolving and continually
changing media game how do we ready ourselves to
stay on top of the business? Are we geared for it
today?"
Ram always
marveled at how Vikas made everything sound so important
that they actually felt at times that they were
responsible for world peace.
Rashmi let
out a small inward groan; she knew that the question
was an utterly redundant one. But nonetheless was
one that she could not dismiss off cursorily, at
least not when she had just joined the agency.
She paused
collecting her thoughts and then launched the offensive.
"Well it has been a question of reach for our
brands. Namely trying to reach either servicing
or the client whenever there has been a media decision
that needs to be taken. And you guys somehow never
seem to return any calls, mails or messages. Are
we treating media with the respect that it deserves?
Considering that's the place where the major part
of the budget is spent? Or are we just plain scared
because we don't nunderstand it?"
Vikas was slightly
taken aback by her overzealous participation. He
had avoided all contact with her since she had joined,
as she was prone to asking too many intelligent
questions, too many questions that involved numbers.
How Vikas hated numbers, except anything involving
7 (but that's another story).
"Thanks
Rashmi, but that's the agenda for yet another meeting.
You have probably tabled a very valid point and
we rightly should address that at a separate meeting.
Lets mark out next Monday to discuss that,"
said Vikas using the standard 'don't know what to
say so will set up meeting 'maneuver.
Mr Bose was
actually smiling, tasting the pure joy of yet another
Monday away from the office. Life was getting better.
"Sometimes
things are worse, when you look up. Sometimes it
is better to look down on things than to look up"
for once those wise words of wisdom spoken in that
trademark Chinese accent made no sense to Ram. As
he felt the teacup nestle in his hand, he looked
up trying to find Chai-La, only to find Vikas's
gaze locked on him. Bummer!
"Now lets
ask the young Ram Shankar, what we need to do to
streamline operations on this account?"
There was a
hushed silence in the room as all eyes turned to
Ram. He felt his stomach cringe. His throat went
dry. Somewhere in the background he felt he could
hear the high pitch of Chai-La's wild cackling laughter.
This was going
to be a very long day.
 After
stints at Lowe, Mudra and Everest the author is
now with Triton as Associate Vice President Brand
Services. In additiion to that he is also patron
saint of Juhu Beach United - a movement that celebrates
obesity and the unfit 'out of breath' media professional
of today. To join up contact vinaykanchan@hotmail.com
(The
views expressed here are those of the author and
indiantelevision.com need not necessarily subscribe
to the same)
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