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 Thor Mietenennen's Serious Gaze
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A message from Kumquat CEO Thor Miettenennen regarding the latest corporate force readjustments: Dear Employee (and soon to be Former Employee): Just a few short months ago I wrote to you about my optimism in the future of Kumquat. I told you how much I valued our traditions, our culture and most of all, our employees. I told you that I was certain that this corporation's best days were not behind us - but ahead of us. Well, shortly after arriving, I realized that this was a wildly over optimistic assessment of the situation. Indeed, after a careful review, it became clear to me that Kumquat's best days were, in fact, well behind us. I then set forth to develop a plan to - as we say in Finland - scrape the dead reindeer of the road and take it to the taxidermist. However, even this looks like an overly rosy way of looking at our corporate fortunes today. And while it would be easy for me to do what you're probably doing right now - blaming my predecessor, that would be pointless, despite the considerable damage done by that crazy woman. To move the company forward, I tried many innovative ideas. We tried giving away mouse pads with every new PC. Unfortunately, since mouse pads are our highest margin product, that plan has actually cut profits. I felt we could make up the profit shortfall on volume, but that has not panned out well. We tried a different approach to organizing our business units. The alphabetical plan had strong advantages, but has not shown the cost savings we anticipated. We even used our considerable influence on the Bush Administration to enact legislation to outlaw film photography, but that is going to take years. Yes, there are some tough and complicated ways we could improve our market position - but these would take a lot of hard work and may not be successful. And while Thor likes hard work, he does have to think about his stock options and future employability. In addition, I have to consider our board of directors. After all, these guys are actually SUPPOSED to know what they're doing, and there would be a lot of questions it they suddenly started changing the corporation's actual strategy. So given the options, it's clear to me that our best way out of this crisis and into the next crisis is to boost the stock price by cutting employment again. It's not going to be easy this time, especially since we laid off the people who lay people off in the last layoffs. I can assure our loyal customers that the impact on our managers will be minimal: the same people you've heard about, but never actually met will still be on the job and you will still probably never actually meet them. We certainly intend to keep all our promises as a corporation - well except the ones we made to employees and retirees. Since we don't intend to keep paying for your healthcare anyway there's a good chance you won't have to suffer in poverty for a really long time. Additionally, we have retained the employment counseling division of Wallmarsh stores to assist in outplacement of employees. One special request to those of you who have been notified that your job will be eliminated in the next 6 to 18 months. I fully expect you to act professionally while slowly transferring your skills to your manager (who will be assuming your job) and not let the personal concerns of impending unemployment affect your attitude toward customers. Now is the time for me to back to work (and you to start packing your desk). But please, the last thing I want you to do is blame yourself for this mess. And whatever you do, don't blame me - it's all her fault! Thor Mietenennen |
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| Note this is a parody. All persons and corporations mentioned are fictitious. |