The Company and Their Minions

Minion:  A sycophantic follower; a loyal servant of another, usually a more powerful being.

During my visit I had dinner one evening with Little Westside Jonny.  Part of our discussion revolved around his job which has deteriorated from what he considered a very pleasant situation to one that's less to his liking.  He had a system and he performed at a very high level.  The company minions - in their infinite wisdom - have decided to institute a system of their own.  This is their right.  It's their company.  It's not LWSJ's company so they didn't ask him if they could make these changes.  It's kind of a company-wide policy to get everyone on the same page.  These policies generally do a good job of policing laggards but they also tend to punish the efficient over-achiever.

So LWSJ begins to work at half-steam.  If he's going to be forced to participate in an inefficient system he's going to work inefficiently.  It's very passive-aggressive.  His productivity has gone from way above average to somewhat below average - not low enough to be punished but low enough to be an irritant to the minions. It's brilliant. I loved it.

"Jesus," I said.  "That's exactly what I did when my company began to screw with me."

"I know!  I know!" he said.

"They don't know who they're messing with, do they?" I said.

We laughed about that for a while.  What could I say?  Don't do that?  Dude knows me too well.

The conversation turned to me and my extremely pleasant circumstances in Vacation City.  I got it good and I know it even though I'm loath to admit it.

"You don't have too much to complain about, do you?" he asked. 

Then he said: "Give it five minutes.  You'll find something to complain about."

We laughed about that for a while, too.