[ Recommended listening: ark - L'Arc-en-Ciel ]

So here's the job, really.

You're in the office not by your own merit, but because a manager is gambling on any sort of win to recoup his losses. Within a year, you're the only one that stuck through all the disasters - even the guy who hired you has left. The turnover and promotions have already made you one of the more senior employees below management. The office is left at square one and desperately needs to be rebuilt.

What do you do?

Any decently rational person would see the writing on the wall and prepare their own departure. But for whatever reason, I've taken the Great Teacher Onizuka route.

With the defiance of a Driver's High opening, I approached my former manager's manager with a sort of ultimatum: if you want me to be the foundation of this near empty office, we're throwing our old conventions out the window. Yes, I would still do the job on paper of running all your systems, but my own goal was to work with our new hires to be more genuine with their ideas and interactions. Strict professionalism, management should have learned, can be stifling.

And though I may never have done such outrageous or inappropriate things as Onizuka, I have had my share of being called up to management offices regarding humorously-placed googly eyes, excessive amounts of birthday balloons and the hideous bronze walrus that become our office mascot, et cetera. But like Eikichi-san, I have seen these antics bring my people together. They all survived the disastrously high turnover rate of the past so far, and seem to be thriving.

No Toyota Cresta's destroyed in the process.

 

While I don't know what exactly the future may bring for me, here's to a decent anime that inspired me to write about my work, and a manga series I really should read! Hope to be around these parts a bit more often - see you all soon.