Cake!

I'll admit it. I find humor in some people's failures. Epically when a devious and or manipulative plan falls apart. Like what happened recently at work.

During a late morning manager's meeting, a person in attendance made a comment about it being the General Manager's birthday. Not being one to miss an opportunity to kiss up, one of the managers hatched a plan to have a little surprise birthday party for the GM that very afternoon.

I found out about this by the meeting request that came in my email right before I left my desk for lunch. "Surprise Birthday Party for GM in the training room at 2:00pm." When I came back from lunch, the meeting was canceled with the message "there will be cake for whoever wants it at 3:00pm." This is where the comedy sets in.

A little while ago I mentioned on this blog about me buying a co-worker a Mountain Dew as a thank you for him going out of his way for a project of mine. The point I was trying to make with that blog post was even small gestures of appreciation or kindness can go a long way, as long as they are sincere. Gestures of appreciation or kindness done solely for personally can backfire on you quickly.

Here's a link to it, in case you're really bored and want to read it:

Simple Little Things Add Up

This is a good example of the later. The Manager who took it upon himself to throw the surprise party couldn't care less about celebrating the GM's birthday. He was simply wasn't going to miss an opportunity to look good in front of his boss.

At work we all know this for it is the standard mode of operation for this particular manager, and everyone sees through it. There was nothing sincere about this, his history shows this clearly. It was also clearly shown by the fact that the GM's birthday is in June, not January. If the Manager was sincere, you'd think he would have picked up on that sometime over the last 12 or so years the two have worked together. Especially when birthdays are announced monthly in the company newsletter emails.

But the main thing I got out of this little life lesson is this: there was a lot of birthday cake to be had six months before it should have been shared. And now the opportunist manager is pretty much obligated to come through is more cake in June!



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