Group Efforts 21

Group Efforts
The Diary of a Workgroup Manager

Episode 28 (1996)

The silly season arrives, the I.T. team behave mysteriously, Danny gets a Final warning and Rose says au revoir.

Tues 11th
Long grass and light evenings announce the arrival of the summer silly season. Further evidence is provided by Llewellyn's curious behaviour at the management meeting, as he sits disinterestedly through Danny's quite creditable PowerPoint presentation, the result of some serious hard work on the lad's part, the shock of which has left him quite drained. Scenting victory, Andy Miller tells Llewellyn that he finds PowerPoint boring too, and that if he wants to see some interesting software he's welcome to pop round to Contracts for a Freelance demo. Llewellyn replies, mysteriously, that such a demo might not be relevant in the present context, and we all troop out feeling that Something is Up.

Wed 19th
Amrat returns for his third attempt at connecting to our network and beginning the OLE Automation project. This time he's accompanied by the B2's Bob, who gets him plugged in and working within ten minutes, grins widely, and leaves. Interestingly, the application that Amrat loads first is not Access 7.0, but something else which looks like a cut-down word processor. He fiddles with this for a few minutes, evidently without much success, then runs a few command-line DOS box programs, evidently without much success there either. When Cathy asks him what he's doing he clams up, switches the machine off and disappears in the direction of I.T. Later Cathy tells me that the 'word processor' was Microsoft Internet Explorer, and that in her view Amrat is Up to Something. I agree.

Monday 24th
I receive a complaint about Danny, who has obtained a Euro 96 Final ticket and is taunting less fortunate fans with a scanned image of it delivered by email. Minutes later I receive my own copy, complete with graphical attachment and the message 'View it and weep, sucker!' in Rich Text Format. Danny's triumph is, however, cut short by a barrage of incoming mail from Solvents Stores, the entire staff of which appear to have tickets for the England-Germany semi. These are closely followed by an all-recipients missive from Costello, placing the drawing office scanner out of bounds and threatening confiscation of any ticket whose image is henceforth electronically transmitted, especially if it's for the Final and England get through. Thoroughly nonplussed, I replace my earphone and return to India's second innings.

Tues 2nd
Shocked disbelief at the management meeting, as Llewellyn announces that the Suites Trial is suspended with immediate, and indefinite, effect. In the uproar that follows, George, with his usual tact, asks why we've all been farting around for the past three months, while Andy punches the air in triumph and says it almost makes up for England's tragic Euro 96 exit. Colin Smiles, meanwhile, complains about his wasted suites training preparations, in the process letting it slip that these had been based exclusively on the Microsoft Office applications. Semi-enlightenment comes from Costello, who says that with things moving so quickly it's no longer just a question of deciding which suite to use but of reappraising our entire application strategy. The others nod politely though clearly with little comprehension, but I remember Amrat, OLE and the Internet Explorer, and catch Llewellyn's eye across the table.

Fri 5th
Time flies, and amazingly it's au revoir to Rose as she heads off on maternity leave. We present her with a huge box of chocolates, an even larger bunch of flowers, assorted baby clothes and a Czech Republic supporters scarf courtesy of Danny. She replies that she'll miss us all, but that she's still hoping these will be the longest three months of her life. The bad news is that her stand-in will not, as hoped, be supertemp Julie, since she's now fixed up on a permanent basis elsewhere. Instead, Kay from Personnel has promised me a tried and tested alternative who will, she assures me, make a big impact on the department. Unable, as always, to fathom Kay's cryptic humour, I head off for the inaugural meeting of the Suites Campaign Survivors Society, headquarters Peg's Homeward Bar.