Meetings With The Silent Voice

['Gotta read the last two days Notes From The Cube to figure out what's going on here today.]

Learned something at the meeting a couple of days ago. The Silent Voice doesn't like to be contradicted.

Now, since The Silent Voice doesn't say anything at the meeting, it is almost always impossible to know What to Say without inadvertently contradicting him. -

(Side trip: Yep, it's a him, not a her. Someone wrote after yesterday's Note that "Of course, The Silent Voice has influence over the prez, she's sleeping with him!" Sadly, nothing quite so tawdry or romantic. The rumour here is that he saved the prez's life once, or his ass, or has really really good blackmail stuff on the prez. Or, for the catty, that he is sleeping with the prez. But when you see the two of them together, that's a disgusting proposition: gays have much better standards than The Silent Voice. Besides, The Silent Voice is on Wife No. 3 and is a notorious office lech - albeit, he is also the Moral Voice of Standards, too - so go figure.)

- What To Say without accidentally crossing The Silent Voice. Consequently, smart managers and veeps say sweet nothings at their meetings with The Silent Voice and pray to the God of Continued Employment that they are still on his good side when the meeting's dust has settled.

(Side trip: A metaphor - "dust has settled." Our meeting rooms are sterile and often colder than ice, dully lit to match the dullness of most meetings' content. The only "dust," perhaps, is the smutz that gathers on our brows as we sit quietly fighting off sleep.)