The mess just multiplies....

I come back to my desk with my diary which is half filled by my stupid drawings/doodling and rest with plans and to do lists. The funny part is in my every to-do list, my first point is always fixed- pay attention in the meeting. But in the course of time I’ve realized that there is world of difference in the plans made on paper and the plans actually executed. So my not paying attention in the meeting is justified.

I take a seat in front of my first generation laptop and check my mail box. No new mails. My phone- No new message. My landline-No missed calls. I am dreading the day when God himself would come to me and say- No guy for you. Stop expecting.  But till that day comes let me combat my luck. I’ll continue call back on unknown number, I’ll continue wearing stilettos, I’ll continue staring at new joinees and I’ll continue believing in movies like DDLJ and Jab we met.

But right now I need to continue with my minutes of the meeting. I pour myself a glass of water and take a deep breath. My neighbor is about to fire questions about excel and flaunt the answers for the same but I tell him ‘I am in middle of something important’ and shoo him away. There must be some discussion in the meeting which I can recollect. Scrolling my mails up and down in the quest of answer after some attempts…… I found it. I found the clue!!! It was from my boss, the subject line read : Agenda for agency meeting. At times I love working in corporate. For a single task to be done there have to be exchange of atleast 10-12 mails. First 2 on introducing the task, taking opinions…next 2, 3 on taking approvals explaining it to other team members, next 2-3 on the PLAN, next 4-5 about the proceeding of the plan and lastly more 3-4 mails on how the task is done or it needs to be redone from the start…and the cycle continues. Its just like daily television soaps if you miss few episodes, it hardly matters. Things move here at a snails pace, you can catch up anytime. I open the mail and find about 13 points that needs to be discussed in the meeting. Of which 5 are actionable and rest are just to be reviewed if the first 5 gets executed. I remember, of these 5 only 3 are agreed upon and 2 are discarded in the meeting. I felt good that I used my brain in right manner and saved some of being exhausted in the meeting. I had to forward the pdf brochure of Gold ETF, our new product that needs to be launched in the market.

Thankfully it was saved on the desktop itself since further modification was done to it, thanx to continuous inflow of opinions and suggestion. It was renamed as Gold. I quickly wrote few discussion points and attached the file which was last open on my laptop before I went for the meeting. There are certain guidelines for sending mails in a corporate office. Before sending its always necessary to check the ids in to : list and the cc: list. It was wieldy for me as I had to just do a ‘reply all’ thing since last mail was sent by my boss. Given a chance, he would mail about his project to External Affair Minister and request him to get funding for it from neighboring countries. I was sure that I am not gonna miss any stakeholder in the mailing list, infact the mail would go to people who are even remotely bothered about the project. Won’t be surprised if the canteen department was also updated about it, after all they would be the one to provide tea and coffee for the next meeting.

Paramount part of the list was done. I minimized my mail box. The moment it went down and the previous file was open My eyes widened n stuck to the screen as if I had seen Ambani’s bank account. I was dumbstruck, could not digest what I saw. I want to bury myself in the drawer, this cannot be true. Gaurav’s photo was smiling at me from the screen. Last file opened on my laptop was not Gold it was Gaurav. I opened my mail box and checked the sent items. The damn server works fine only when we want it down. It felt like all the glass doors n walls are crashing over me. Please someone call for an ambulance. What was I thinking…what was I doing…where was I looking….God why am I existing.

Just when I was trying to come to terms of the calamity that has happened…Got a reply on the mail : whats this attachment??

 From : Krishnashetty@fici.com (AVP Mktg- my superboss)

 To: sanjana.patil@fici.com.

CC : jatinsen@fici.com (My boss). Thankfully the revert was not a reply to all. But my mortification was surely in front of all. My desk phone was ringing. Caller : Krishna Shetty…………


To be contd...