Business Humour, Boards and Committees, Oh My!

Whether you say business humour or business humor, the fun is about to begin. Bored boards and incompetent committees are the tools of consensus, and consensus we must have, being all very democratic here, excruciatingly so, in fact.

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As one forges intrepidly through his life, responsibilities accumulate, sometimes through one's employment; sometimes through the urge to “give back.” These responsibilities come from time to time in the form of committees and boards. Usually, they are an outgrowth of our daily activities: corporate boards, school boards, institutional boards, whatever. If you are a worker bee, you find yourself eventually sitting ^over, on, or _under one. Boards and committees, whether standing or sitting, business humour or the volunteer kinds, are an endless source of amusement, which howsomever, can be appreciated only in the rearview mirror, for the air in this room tends to fluctuate from still and torpid to stormy and torrid.

One of these diversions is going on right now in the pub's Board Room, or was that perhaps, the Bored Room? Well, Molly's friend, the President of a small business, is on the menu today. He looks tired now, for he set up the room, arranged for the equipment, ordered the menu, notified all concerned of the time, and researched solutions for several sticky corporate wickets. Soon he shall be quite awake—we shall get the bandages ready.

Our Edward Lear, who has been on a number of committees and boards, in fact, a plethora of them, will take him aside later and explain that boards are one thing and worker bees are another, and that buzzing about is unsuitable to the more glacial dance of life on a Board. He sighs, recalling a half day spent upon deciding in favor of font size Ariel 10 over the less respectable one of Ariel 12.

Shall we tiptoe in and listen? Oh my, this should be great fun, for the Monday Morning Quarterback is warming up and about to skewer the President for committing a proactivity</<B>!

Business Humour: Committees and Boards

Obtund

At the top of all organizations
Is the Board with its strange perorations
Where little gets done
Except to obtund
Useful work with its vituperations.

“Yes, but.”

There's an animal that's called a “yes but.”
Part rabbit, part sly fox, part robot.
His plan's to shoot down
Those ideas which are found
To actually DO something, that's what.

Meeting of the Minds

Over time, the same questions we'll treat
In the vanishing hope our minds meet
But we just wring our hands
Taking pot shots at plans
And generate plenty of heat.

Business Humor and the Obvious

So what does that word mean, the Board?
Some days, it just means that we're bored
By taking all morning
To issue a warning
To take care near the bull, you'll get gored.

Task Force

For those who decide to take charge
Of a task force gone begging. Discharge
That impulse, my friend,
You will twist in the wind
Misunderstood, by and large.