Personal

The bench

At lunch with the Big Boss a fortnight ago. "That's interesting," he said as I pointed out maybe we'd been told once or twice too many that we shouldn't be afraid of being allocated to "the bench" (essentially, not working on a specific project).

I was referring to the way each communication from a senior manager these days includes the phrases "I'm looking forward to my time on the bench" and "you know, it's nothing to be scared of". Combine that with recent leaflet-bombing of the offices and you start to wonder if there isn't something to be worried about all along.

But Big Boss's comments clearly hid what he knew of the near future. Last week posters started cropping up everywhere with positive, encouraging slogans. None mentioned The Bench explicitly, but all featured smiley employees sitting on a variety of benches.

Then today an actual bench appeared outside the canteen. It's surrounded by pictures of happy people but it began to draw a crowd as people prodded it like the monolith in 2001.

Time for me to go on that 'Communicating bad news' course. See if I can separate the news from the story.