There's a Dick in Every Office

In every office, be it the Oval or yours, there is always a Dick in it. The Dick in my office was scary. Our blood would race as we quaked with fear in our cubby holes. We could feel her anvil-like tremors coming toward us as she Fee-fi-fo-fum-ed her way down the hall.

We were never quite sure if it was her pure evil making the floors shake or the sub-par flooring that we were so used to. We prayed that she would not stop at our little private hell of a cubby hole. For the poor soul she deigned to grace with her seething presence, we prayed.

With a sickly sweet, high pitched voice, that betrayed her grandness-of-assness, Dick was all rules and regulations. She knew when an email was sent out two years ago and everyone who responded to it. She made up forms for procedures and procedures for the forms. She would inevitably catch you in the smallest mistake. And when she did, she always had the damning proof in a pure white three-ring binder. Like her binders, her office was like the frozen tundra, blindingly white and cold as her soul.

The best part about Dick was that she was an equal opportunist. When our boss, GW screwed up with white binder in hand and a voice that made your teeth rot, she'd point to the email memo that showed how incompetent GW was. These were the days we all lived for. And this was how Dick ensured her and her peons' employment survival. GW was so managerial flaccid, that Dick could white binder her in to an autistic state of "yeses". By the end of the meeting, she had GW's oatmeal brain spinning with data, reports and memos. This is how Dick got anything she wanted and bottle necked everything she did not deem worthy of support (like upgrading my friggin computer for over a year). 

I'm sure you have a Dick in your office. Someone who amasses so much power, that by the end of the fiscal cycle you realize she's been running the show. But like the Giant, Dicks always have an Achilles heal. Once we recognized her strategy, we learned from the bloody master. We began hitting her with any error she committed. It's great to see the big ones fall.

"Before all else, be armed" - Niccolo Machiavelli

In my Feb 19 post, I wrote about the dangers of dressing better than your off-the-rack boss. However, there is always a caveat.

If you just can't help yourself and want to wear those killer pumps or Armani tie, then do so strategically. 

When you essentially know you have one foot in the employment grave as I always did with with my idiot boss "GW", I began throwing caution to the wind like Capote threw down drinks and witty repartee.

First you must carefully assess your boss's deficiencies. After having done this, then you need to pick and choose your attire appropriately for battle.

To walk you through an example, let's take GW. Behind every cliche such as "dull as dishwater" is a grain or ocean of truth. She was the invisible woman. At high power meetings I watched as others looked and spoke through her. It was amazing. Of course once the meeting was done she would tear into the staff as a way to double check she was in charge. After years of her managerial-PMS, I had had enough.

GW was kankel queen with ortho shoes. (Fashion Note: If your coloring is just a little darker than oatmeal, don't buy matching mush colored shoes and clothes). 

I figured if I was going to go down, I'd do it looking good. First I brought out my killer kicks, my shoes were to die for: 3" and 4" pumps, open toe, pointy toe sling backs, and boots, I had them all and they made me feel great.

It didn't matter that I nearly crippled myself, it was worth it. The pain in my feet distracted me from the pain in my ass. Soon after the stiletto parade began, I noticed that GW was wearing a new pair of...wait for it...oatmeal colored open toe shoes! (Yes Virginia they still make them.) But the shoes were not enough, she was wearing them with nylons.

Things were going well, but not fast enough, I brought out the big guns: Accessories! Coach purses, sterling silver watch, and pearl necklaces, bracelets and earrings (borrowed from siblings, but G-idiot-W didn't need to know this). These, with all of their glorious sparkle, paled in comparison to one simple wooden, beaded bracelet.

Now why would this simple wooden bracelet make the KMart suits quiver? People are funny. When they don't know what something is and you're in an office, no one wants to ask what a possible religious object is. And boy, these white women didn't. 

My delicious sparkly accessories garnered a lot of envy and bitchy, back handed comments; and I loved every one of them. But the nail in their coffin was my Tibetan prayer bead bracelet. It was my amulet against their spirit sucking insanity. When I needed to go to that quite, mental place during a meeting, I would simply put my hands on the table, they would see the bracelet and their nervous, twitchy faces were all I needed to get me there.

Sometimes you don't need to drive a 4" stiletto into the heart of an incompetent boss, all you need is to play upon their igonrance and fear. Or you could do both, keep them on the ropes and have fun. I did.