The Consultant (20 page)

Why had he hired a consulting firm in the first place? And how could all those other CEOs have recommended BFG? Their experiences must have been completely different than his, because he wouldn’t recommend BFG to
anyone
.  

Matthews entered the conference room. Everyone else had arrived ahead of him, and the members of the Board were crowded around Patoff, laughing and joking. All conversation stopped as soon as he walked into the room, everyone moving to their proper places, and he wondered when he had become such a killjoy that people made a conscious effort to avoid his company.  

When Patoff arrived
, he answered himself.  

At the retreat, after the debacle of the bus ride, during the first Speed Conversation exercise, he had asked the people on the opposite team what they thought of the decision to bring in consultants after the merger fell through. Most of the employees had been wary, had hemmed and hawed with non-answers or told him what they thought he wanted to hear. But Craig Horne said he thought the Board could have made decisions about the company’s future based on information gathered in-house. And on the next go-round, when the roles were reversed and it was Horne asking questions, the division head had asked whether Matthews was sorry he had hired the consultants. It emboldened him to know that others seemed to have the same reservations he did.  

Even if the Board obviously did not.  

Patoff stood at the front of the room as Matthews sat down next to the members of the Board.  

“Since we’re all here,” the consultant said, “let’s start. This is the first of what will be weekly status summaries; regular meetings to discuss our progress. We’ve found that our clients are happiest if they are kept in the loop, and sessions such as these allow us to report on current operations, explain the next steps we will be taking and address any concerns you may have.  

“Senior management has just returned from a very successful weekend retreat—”  

Very successful?
Matthews thought.  

“—and we have started to conduct our work management study. Obviously, the study is still in its infant stages, but we will be expanding its scope very shortly. In the meantime, there are rules and procedures that can be implemented which will not only begin to boost your productivity but will enable you to begin transitioning your staff.”  

“To what?” Matthews asked.  

“That’s what our research and analysis will determine.”  

“But how will we know if they are
transitioning
in the right direction,” he said, exasperated, “if you don’t know what we’ll be transitioning
to
?”  

Patoff smiled. “BFG has gone through this same scenario literally dozens of times. We know what we’re doing.”  

“What
are
you doing?”  

“You hired them,” the gruff voice of Mitchell Lockhart intoned. “Let them do their job.”  

Matthews looked over at the members of the Board. Lockhart was scowling, and the other three were nodding in agreement. “They know what they’re doing,” Don Chase told him.  

Matthews forced himself to remain calm. “It is our job to provide oversight, so we have a duty to ask questions. And since I’m the one who started this company, I think I’ve earned the right to have some say in its direction, don’t you?” He turned away from the Board, dismissing them. “It is not your job to implement anything,” he told Patoff. “Everything has to be run by me first, is that understood?”  

The consultant stared back at him with a flat unreadable expression, and Matthews tried to maintain a similarly even mien, hoping his nervousness didn’t show. Even in a roomful of people, the man made him uneasy. “Actually,” the consultant said, “that’s not true. If you read your contract, you will see that we
are
empowered to implement short-term measures that we deem appropriate. After we have completed our mission, then it is up to your discretion whether to adopt our long-term recommendations. But in the interim, we are
required
as per our signed agreement to address any problems we encounter within your organization in the manner that we see fit. And our experience with organizations of similar size and scope tells us that by gradually phasing in targeted rules and procedures, we can not only address some of your concerns immediately but can help position you to more readily adapt once final recommendations are made.” A chilly smile graced Patoff ’s long face. “Now, if we may proceed with our meeting…”  

There were only Matthews and the members of the Board, but the consultant had prepared for this meeting as though he were giving a presentation to the entire company. There was a Power-Point slideshow, a series of handouts with graphs and spreadsheets to back up BFG’s assertions, and copies of the first memos and emails to send to employees. Matthews was the only one with any questions or concerns, and after a while, even he gave up arguing in the face of the consultant’s implacability and the complete acceptance of the Board.  

“You hired him to do a job,” Lockhart repeated. “Let him do it.”  

Matthews spent the rest of the day in his office, fuming and feeling trapped, though he had no one to blame but himself for the situation he was in. At this point, if it were solely up to his discretion, he would fire BFG, consequences be damned. But he was in this with the Board. He needed their approval, and it was pretty clear he wouldn’t get it, so it was probably best to bide his time.  

Why the hell had he ever let the company go public?  

Matthews left on time for once, and in the lobby saw Patoff chatting with a group of sales associates. Their eyes met accidentally, and Matthews forced himself to wave, but the consultant turned away, laughing at something one of the salesmen said. Maybe it was unintentional. Maybe Patoff
hadn’t
seen him. But he knew that wasn’t true, and he strode out to the Jag, rebuffed and angry, honking at two lower level employees to get out of the way as he sped out of the parking lot.  

At home, he swam laps to relax and de-stress. He’d had a pool room built next to the gym last year when they remodeled, promising Rachel that he’d swim twenty laps each day to keep his gut down, but he couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually used the pool. The water felt soothing, however, the swim invigorating, and he decided that perhaps he
should
do this every evening when he got home. Or maybe early in the morning before he went to work.  

He got out, toweled off and found himself with an unprompted erection. When was the last time
that
had happened? Not bothering to put on clothes, he padded around the house looking for Rachel, but his erection was gone by the time he found her in the kitchen, and she just looked at him and said, “What are you doing? Get dressed.”  

They did make love that night, for the first time in over a month, and he didn’t even need any Viagra. He just wined her, dined her, sixty-nined her, as the old saying went, and though he wasn’t able to hold out that long, they both managed to have an orgasm.  

He fell asleep almost immediately afterward.  

It was still dark when he was awakened by the ringing of the phone next to his bed, and he answered with eyes still closed. “Yeah?” he managed to croak.  

“Hello, Mr. Matthews.”  

It was Patoff.  

“I know you forbade me from coming over to the fine house that you share with your lovely wife, but I had a few ideas I wanted to run by you, so I thought I’d give you a call.”  

“Do you know what time it is?” Matthews demanded.  

“It’s two-fourteen,” the consultant replied, and the preciseness of the answer made Matthews open his eyes. There was a hint of rebuke in the response, maybe even a threat. He wasn’t sure how that was possible, but it was.  

“I’m hanging up,” Matthews said. “You can tell me your ideas in the morning. During
business
hours.”  

“If you don’t want me to share with you the ideas that will save your company, that’s fine,” the consultant said smoothly. “I understand. Apparently, that’s not a priority for you, and you’d prefer to put it off to a later time that’s more convenient. But when CompWare is in Chapter Eleven, I want you to remember this phone call and the chance I gave you. I want you to realize that you could have saved your company if you
weren’t so fucking lazy
!”  

There was a click as the consultant hung up, and Matthews was gripped by a feeling of panic. The panic was unfocused—was he afraid that CompWare
would
go bankrupt? Was he afraid that the consultant, once angered, would somehow take revenge on him?— but it left him shaky and nervous. He placed the handset back in the cradle.  

“Who was it?” Rachel asked groggily.  

“Nothing. Go back to sleep.”  

She was suddenly wide awake. “Was it that man?”  

He pretended he didn’t who she was talking about. “What man?”  

“The consultant. The one who came over. I had a dream about him. He was chopping off people’s heads and replacing them with those horrible snow globes.”  

Chopping off people’s heads?
 

Matthews shivered. “No,” he lied, “it was a wrong number.”  

“But weren’t you talking to them?”  

“No. You must have been dreaming. Go back to sleep.”  

She did, easily and quickly, but he remained awake for some time, staring up into the darkness, muscles tense. When he finally drifted off, he ended up in a nightmare, and in the dream, it was
his
head the consultant was chopping off.  

The next morning, Matthews decided not to go into work. It was the first time he’d ever done anything like this—ordinarily, he went in even if he was sick as a dog—but he deserved to take a day off after years of such unrelenting dedication.  

Besides…he was afraid of seeing the consultant.  

That was ridiculous. The man worked for
him
. CompWare was BFG’s
employer
. But the fact remained that the consultant seemed to be the one calling all the shots lately. Patoff was the dominant one in their relationship. Especially after that phone call last night.  

If he didn’t go in today, though, it would make it that much harder to go to work tomorrow. He could feel his grip on Comp-Ware slipping, and if he had any hope of holding onto his company, he needed to fight for it. He needed to
be
there.  

Matthews forced himself to get out of bed. He couldn’t back off now; he couldn’t give up. And he couldn’t hide in his office the way he had yesterday. He had to remain engaged, and he decided to visit all of the departments on all of the floors, to get out there and talk to people. Maybe he’d call his
own
meeting, without the consultant present, and find out what his employees were thinking. He wasn’t by nature a democratic man, but desperate times called for desperate measures, and if he needed to let workers think that he was basing his decisions on their input instead of autocratically issuing edicts, then he would do so.  

He couldn’t let Patoff walk all over him.  

But as he looked at his face in the mirror while preparing to shave, he could see the truth in his own eyes.  

No matter how tough he might talk, he was still afraid of the consultant.  

SIXTEEN  

TO: All Employees RE: Proper Foot Attire 

Beginning this Monday, April 15, tennis shoes and other types of athletic footwear will no longer be considered acceptable attire at CompWare. Boots and sandals are likewise prohibited. This interdict applies not only to those employees who come in to work each day but also to those who have been temporarily granted permission to telecommute. If you are telecommuting and do not have a webcam on your communications device, you must install one at your own expense and submit a photograph of the shoes you are wearing each morning before you sign in.  

Brown or black dress shoes are the only proper foot attire for males.  

Closed-toed shoes with heels of less than a half-inch in height are the only proper attire for females.  

Any questions regarding this change in policy must be submitted in writing to CompWare’s Human Resources department before the end of business hours today. Reading this email constitutes acknowledgement and acceptance of the policy change.  

Thank you. 

Regus Patoff  

Regus Patoff  

BFG Associates  

For Austin Matthews, CompWare CEO  

SEVENTEEN  

“So,” Phil said, looking down at Craig’s feet as they met on the outside steps, “are you wearing the right shoes?”  

“Very funny.”  

Phil laughed. “It is, actually. Can you believe how ridiculous this is getting? Next thing you know, they’ll be telling us what kind of hair styles we can have.” “I see that
you’re
wearing black shoes instead of your usual sneakers,” Craig noted dryly.  

“Yeah, well, you have to know when to pick your battles.”  

Walking into the CompWare building, Craig couldn’t help noticing everyone’s footwear. Male or female, all shoes were regulation, and he realized how easy it was for an employer to change and control the lives of its employees. Corporations were governed from the top down, and an autocrat didn’t have to contend with the messiness of democracy. Edicts were issued and obeyed, and people’s appearance and behavior were instantly altered. Companies were little fiefdoms, which explained why business owners were so relentlessly anti-regulation. They wanted to dictate everything under their jurisdiction, and they didn’t want the disorder of the real world intruding into their domains.