From Donna’s Desk
In our department, the sentence “I found this under the conference table” can mean anything from “a missing IT ticket” to “an ancient cursed artifact the company built its first fax machine from,” so I’ve learned to pause before responding.
Managerial instinct is basically just pattern recognition with more paperwork, and every fiber of mine said: Do not unleash these near exit doors.
“Let’s open them here,” I told Milo.
He beamed, because to Milo, “open them here” is raccoon for “congratulations, you are now a junior treasure hunter.”
We lined them up on my desk. Black paper, black ribbon, no tags: the packaging equivalent of a burner phone.
I opened the first one.
Inside was… me.
A small, eerily accurate Donna figurine, complete with purple glasses and sensible blazer, staring up from my palm like I had just been promoted to my own action figure.
Milo, meanwhile, had opened another box. “It’s us,” he breathed. “We’re so cute!”
He was right. Mini-Milo. Mini-Dash. Mini-Finley. Mini-Drew. A tiny version of the department, lined up along the edge of my desk like we were about to hold a very small, very concerned staff meeting.
That’s when I noticed the smell.
Not the new-plastic smell you expect from corporate swag.
Not even the faint whiff of warehouse dust.
Catnip. The figurines smelled like catnip.
If you’ve never worked with a mostly-feral black cat, let me translate: in our environment, “smells like catnip” is less “fun bonus” and more “prepare for incoming strategic strike.”
That should have been enough weirdness for one day.
It was not.
Accessorized with each doll was a pin. Not sewing pins. Not safety pins.
Long, sharp, red-topped pins.
I didn’t say anything out loud, because leadership books frown on the phrase, “Are we being hexed?” appearing in performance reviews.
But the thought hovered there along with the faint catnip haze:
Someone, somewhere, ordered voodoo-scented, cat-attracting miniature versions of my staff.
Best-case scenario: this is a deeply misguided attempt at “employee engagement.”
Worst-case scenario: someone in Corporate believes the fastest way to increase productivity is to literally poke us.
Milo just looked delighted. To him, this is the kind of thing that happens when you think positively and believe in conference table treasure.
Management textbooks have whole chapters on communication, delegation, and budgeting. There is nothing under “What To Do When Your Team Becomes Catnip-Scented Voodoo Merch.”
But that’s the job. You look at the strange thing in front of you, you take a breath, and you decide:
- Who needs protection?
- Who needs information?
- And who, exactly, ordered this nonsense?
Because under all the absurdity, that’s the real work: making sure your people feel like people, not product.
So for now, the tiny versions of us are staying in my office, far from Riley’s line of sight and even farther from anyone in the C-suite.
The pins are in a locked drawer, pending investigation, a safety bulletin, and probably a strongly worded email with “clarification” in the subject line.
To be continued…
