#190: A Text From the Boss
Arthur Trope Presents: The Inscrutables
No. 190
“A Text From the Boss”
Hanelore’s demands are in. She must have some kompromat on someone bc Slothrop stopped by my desk & asked how it was going w her. I told him she was asking for 20% more on the salary, 2 extra weeks of vacation + a reserved parking spot in the garage. He said that all seemed reasonable. I told him she also wanted “creative input” on the social strategy & didn’t want to just be my go-fer. He said he had a better idea, which was to put her in charge of the new video division he wants to spin up. “Picklefish Films,” he said with a little sparkle in his eye that’s been all but extinguished since his “Three-Pronged Strategy” started to fall apart and he had to add a fourth prong. Turns out he’s been keeping up w the McKinsey guys who are on retainer w SynrSys & they were telling him 80% of all internet consumption is now video content. “People can barely read anymore,” he said. Even one line captions are asking too much, he said. We’ve got to give them video, he said. And so just like that, we have a new video division, Picklefish Films, which will be headed by our former intern with plenty of chutzpah and zero film experience. I’ve got to hand it to her, she played her cards well. I didn’t even know we were playing cards. Slothrop wants her to report directly to him, bc “this is going to be big”, he said. So I’ve been bypassed, which I have mixed feeling about. On one hand, I don’t have to manage anyone. On the other, I’m not really clear where I stand around here. An org chart might help. Since the SynrSys acquisition, I’ve never actually reported to anyone. Anyway, Slothrop has a new, fifth prong in his Three-Pronged Strategy. To recap: (1) more cats & dogs; (2) more “authentic”, less-polished panels; (3) shorter captions; (4) globalization; and now (5) video. I don’t think we’ll be competing with Bollywood on production quality, but I guess we’ll see what Hanelore spins up. Maybe we’ll see that animated version of Gus the Cat after all. -Ed.
