Tuesday, July 1, 2008

A Riveting 911 Story

September 11, 2001.

I think we all remember what happened on that fateful day.

What I remember even more is how the CEO of Cube City handled the tragedy.

Scene 1: My Cube
I was sitting in my cube that morning when a fellow cube dweller yelled, "Oh my God! A plane flew into the World Trade Center!"

A few minutes later, the same cube dweller yelled, "Oh my God! Another plane flew into the World Trade Center!"

I tried to reach local and national news websites after hearing about the second plane and couldn't connect to any of them. I knew something major was going on.

Scene 2: The Cube Kitchen
Our Cube City kitchen contained a television with one channel, and that channel was in Spanish. A bunch of us flocked to the kitchen and gathered around the television with our Spanish-speaking cube dweller Rafael. We started watching the drama unfold as Rafael translated the commentary for us.

Scene 3: Obscene
After about ten minutes of this activity, our CEO -- the dumbest CEO in the world -- entered the kitchen. He said, "I know this is riveting, folks, but let's get back to work."


Scene 4: Going Home
An hour later, our Cube City building was evacuated as a safety precaution due to potential terrorist threats. Suddenly the dumb ass CEO had realized how riveting this event really was. He even sent a company-wide email to inform us of the seriousness of the event. Dumb ass.

Scene 5: Yesterday
Yesterday, a fellow cube dweller told me a 9/11 story so strikingly similar to mine that I felt compelled to blog about it. I guess there are a lot of far-behind leaders in Cube City who are competing for the Dumb Ass Award because I really couldn't believe that this cubie's story practically mirrored mine.

What's your 9/11 story in Cube City?

2 comments:

Unknown said...

You're so right. Eerily similar stories where happening in a lot of cube cities, which only confirms one of my dreadful suspicions: there are dumb ass bosses everywhere.

Mine:

I worked at a company in the travel & hotel business, of all things. Cube City dwellers gather in the kitchen watching the one small TV.

While the rest of us become aware that this event will seriously impact our entire country, dumb-ass-boss becomes aware that this event will seriously impact...the travel business. He and other dumb-ass-executive types begin frantically directing us stop watching TV and update the website's handling of cancellations and refunds.

When several of us decide that work just isn't really important that day and leave, dumb-ass-bosses are overheard complaining, saying that we're overreacting.

Nice.

Michelle Medley said...

At what magnitude does a breaking news event have to be in order for Dumb Ass Boss to stop what he's/she's doing and pay attention? Have they no curiosity?

On 911, could any task in the office have been more important than finding out if other planes were in the air - and missing? Whether our capitol would be the next target? Whether DFW was in lockdown? Did you not stare in awe at the TV as the entire island of Manhattan was shown in a cloud of dust?

The Idiot Boss at my cube city told two Tech workers - "that's enough boys," let's get back to work.

Sure, they went back to their cubes - but they watched streaming video on their screens.

I get angry when I hear these stories. They're downright unAmerican.