humor

It’s the central contradiction at the heart of our all-too-finite existence that we cannot reconcile the uncontainability of our dreams with the futile limitation of our resources. It’s no wonder we’ve come rely on strategies to get through the day. In David Allen’s world, the metaphor is the overloaded information-driven workplace. For Merlin, it’s the in-box.

I was recently put in charge of on-site tech services after a two year apprenticeship as the assistant. Surveying the mess left to me by my former boss, I’m amazed at how many open projects he allowed to grind to a dead stop on his watch. I suppose it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise. Bloated from the effects of rapid growth, my company suffers from years of rampant position-creation and ill-considered solution grafts. Left to grapple with a culture of contradictory goals, incomplete training and an end-to-end process similar to Sartre’s “No Exit” (“hell is other departments”), I’m surprised my predecessor got anything done at all.