Preparing for the Bull in the China Shop

Jeannette hung back as the rest of the people in the lobby filed into the meeting room. She felt the happy smile slip from her face as the doors closed behind the last straggler. Although pleased that there had been no complaints in the twenty minutes since the managers’ convention started (a new record!), she was wiped out.

It takes a lot of work to pull off an effortless meeting and Jeannette was fortunate that her capable crew had been there for the past four days setting up rooms, creating endless seating charts, welcome packages, goody bags, name tags, and slide shows.

They had reviewed the show schedule, checked that all food allergies, vegan meals, kosher requests, and juice fasts were accounted for with the kitchen crew. District Five is separated from District Two meeting room as they took the recent regional alignment hard and there is some worry that trash talking or even District defection may happen if they are corralled too closely.

All the refreshments for breaks during the next two days, and one last bonus morning, have been reviewed and signs thanking the sponsors of each are tagged with the appropriate day. The books written by tomorrow’s speaker are unpacked and on rolling carts, ready for the autograph line at the conclusion of his (hopefully) brief after dinner message.

Extra notepads, phone chargers, laptop cords, pencils, whiteboard markers, pens, tampons, acetaminophen, water bottles (still and bubbling), tape guns, flattened packing boxes, Twizzlers, Tootsie Rolls, butter pretzel twists, Rolos, and granola bars were stocked in the supply room, the door signed as ‘Quarantine’, and only two other people had the key. Everything was ready. Everything was under control. Nothing could go wrong.

Permitting herself that wishful thinking Jeannette sat on the padded banquette next to the break station and watched the service team setting up the hot pretzel bar, complete with dipping cheese and German mustard flights. She sent a quick text to their event hostess and asked to have the amount of optional celery sticks double. She had severely underestimated those with gluten intolerance, but there would be enough time before the break started to add them to the spread.

With the meeting successfully underway she surreptitiously glanced around and then let her head drop back against the seat’s padding. Just a moment of rest was all she needed, and the welcome meeting wouldn’t end for another thirty minutes. No one would need her until then. She could sit there and be invisible.

“Hello there! Where do you want me to put this?”, said an unknown voice.

Her eyes snapped open, and she looked straight into the face of a charging bull. A huge red bull. No. Make that a huge Red Bull. It was the life-size replica of the iconic energy drink proposed for tomorrow afternoon’s break. More precisely it was the life-size replica of the iconic energy drink that she had turned down when it was proposed for the break- no one needed 300 amped up managers at a three day meeting. The convention center coffee was usually sufficient to do that on its own.

“Ma’am, this is heavy. Where do you want me to put it?” The questioner’s voice sounded a little breathless, and Jeanette suddenly noticed the two arms wrapped around the silver can.

“Oh! Right this way”, she answered, “follow me.” Standing up and pivoting quickly she whirled around to face the supply room and catching her foot under the front of the banquette she stumbled backwards trying to gain her balance and collided directly with the silver can replica and its invisible carrier.

The collapsing aluminum can cradled her and saved her from smashing to the ground. The delivery person was not so fortunate. His hands still held the smashed can firmly, but his feet frantically paddled as he tried to stand himself, the can, and Jeanette back upright.

Jeanette knew he was kind of alright because she could hear him chanting ‘oh no oh no oh no oh no’ quietly as she got to her feet. Turning around she saw that his side of the can had formed itself around him, too, and he was trying to push the crimped and ruined prop off himself as he got to his feet. It fell soundlessly to the thickly carpeted floor, a mangled wreck of a once proud energy drink emblem, the pop top flipped up but thankfully it had been empty, so they were spared cleaning the sticky mess.

Before she could do more than stutter out an apology the second-worst thing that could happen began- loud clapping was heard in the welcome meeting room and a blur of voices and moving chairs announced that the meeting was ending early. It was going to disrupt the schedule for the entire day.

Glancing over towards the break area Jeanette saw that neither the celery not the warm dipping cheese were in place yet. Not good! Not good at all! Thinking frantically, she stood up straight and turned smiling towards the rather worse for wear delivery man.

“Please, will you help me and set that upright right here?” she gestured towards the small reception area to the right of the break station. “We also need to move the banquettes against the wall and create walking space around it.” She started pulling on the padded seats and enlarging the space.

Shrugging, he straightened his shirt and tucked it into his slacks, then pushed the misshapen can into the newly created display space just as the doors to the meeting room opened. Jeannette smiled at him, then facing the doors she nodded and gestured the head of the lines of people exiting towards the decidedly drooping 6 foot tall Red Bull can.

“This meeting is about creating goals and making actionable plans,” she stated. “One of the often-overlooked aspects of planning is a failure to anticipate a deviation of the plan and incorporate it as you continue toward your goal.”

She glanced at the delivery man who was staring at her with something like wonderment mixed with bafflement. She took a deep breath and continued.

“No matter how well you plan something will go wrong. This is the first of several practice sessions we will have during the meeting. Break up into your districts and work together for fifteen minutes to create… to create…” she looked back at the delivery man who gave her a wide smile.

“To create an explanation for this ‘delivery man’” making air quotes with her fingers in the air, “to use when he ‘returns’ the ‘damaged’ prop to his company. Include the reason the ‘client’ smashed the can and returned it in this condition.” She nodded encouragingly at the regionals while they shepherded their managers into groups, noting that District Two kept their distance from District Five.

“The district that has the most plausible answer will get five points and a pass from attending the 7 AM breakfast on the last day” she announced to enthusiastic cheers. “Each practice session will test your ability to cope with disaster and keep your team motivated. This first session starts… NOW!”

As the groups started to talk, District Five loudly proclaiming that the other Districts would need Red Bull because District Five planned to sweep the exercises and sleep in on Sunday, Jeannette slipped to the side of the room and slumped against the doorway. She could feel her ankle swelling and knew that the fall she had taken was going to leave a bruise on her hip.

As she checked the time she noticed the Ops VP walking towards her, shaking her head and clapping.

“Jeannette! You are really something. How did you keep this a secret? Throwing a curveball into one of your meetings is the last thing I’d expect you to do, you always have everything running on schedule. What made you think of it?” she asked, lifting her palms up in an expression of surprise and wonderment.

“Well, Jenny, you never know when you’ll have a bull enter the china shop and turn everything upside down. Since you can’t plan for everything you need to be ready for anything”, she answered, thinking to herself: “and it’s the least I could do for that poor guy after I wrecked his can!”