Truth be told (which sometimes is an alternative), I have been busier than a one armed paper hanger. True, I did take a short vacation in the United Arab Emirates where I obeyed most of the local customs, but my main task has been fighting off an unwanted acquisition.
There is little (no) reason to believe that anyone was interested in our product suite; my guess is that they wanted to acquire us because of our HR department achievements of 1) "cost effective labour force" and 2) our capability recruitment of migrant immigrants with talent at sea.
In secret talks, I offered my services to the acquiring company for a price tag (discrete-but does include a Samsung 23 Ultra, first class on Emirates and a Tesla) but they were constrained by their core values of full transparency, which seems to me pretty dumb.
In order to fight off the acquisition, I arranged a meeting between our chief nerd Comrade Karl Marks and Miss Cynthia Axe our downsizer.
Engineering and Organized Crime
Comrade Karl spoke with a heavy Russian accent about our clients' myopic biases in assessing our innovative product. The comrade is not Russian, but he was a communist in his youth; he studied Engineering and Organized Crime in Moscow. The meeting between the comrade and the prospective owners can be described non-wow. Karl said that "since our clients' staff implemented working from home one day a week, our 'pustemah clients' are disconnected from reality and scorn our product's unique value add; which is an undiscovered pearl".
Miss Axe focused on her business partnership approach during downsizing season, and furthermore suggested that the acquiring company speak to our Finance director, Mister Herr Krebbs. Axe: "Krebbs has a real German accent and you'll get tons of details, but at least it's a real accent. Comrade Karl is a basket case".
.jpg)
Cynthia Axe: Tis the season to be jolly
Mister Herr Krebbs was in a quandary. On one hand, he wanted to spill the beans to protect his own Arsch after the deal is signed. On the other hand, Krebbs is loyal, which may or may not be a good thing. Herr Krebbs did however disclose one thing: "ve haf no Kash in ze Bank". Krebbs always uses capital letters when he writes Bank.
CEO Stan demanded that I meet with the acquiring company to "blow up the fucking deal immediately or I will send you back to Canada, to freeze your white ass off".
So, I set up a meeting with our Diversity Project Manager, Hugh White, and met with their CEO about "factoring in diversity". Hugh went on and on, and when we woke up, we were outside, lying on the sidewalk, near a newspaper stand where the economic headline read:
Major Deal Off.
