Bay Street, the heart of the financial district of Toronto, is a place I love to be at 8 o'clock in the morning; it is what urban living is all about. The traffic is bumper-to-bumper with yellow cabs dodging in and out, picking up and dropping off. The streetcars trundle along their rails, bells ringing and stopping to disgorge suited and bespectacled business people into the street with briefcases, coffee and already thumbed, though newly minted, copies of 'The Globe and Mail' under arm.
The brokerage houses have been open for hours with computers humming over the returns from Hong Kong and Shanghai. Last night, the bottom fell out and the price of crude dropped alarmingly. Still, the opening bell for Toronto and New York isn't due until nine and, by then, simulations run, they'll have decided what is to buy and what is to sell – at least for the first thirty seconds. Today will be another roller-coaster.
In this last hour before trading starts, you can feel the anticipation and thrill of major business deals made, last minutes run happily to black ink or, hands wrung together at the sight of a red bottom line; it happens thousands or millions of times every day just as millions of dollars can appear or disappear with the fluctuating numbers of an electronic feed.
Today, I'm wearing my new Harry Rosen suit that I picked up on the weekend; charcoal grey, pinstriped and three buttoned as is the current trend although I don't like it. I probably look like a businessman but I'm not. I carry the same silver aluminum briefcase and giant coffee as the rest but I'm just a writer. Where I stop before a steadily revolving door to stamp out my cigarette, it does not say 'GJM Brokerage' or some such. It says, in gold embossed letters which match the gold-tinted steel frontage of the building, 'Global Business Publishing'. It is the central nervous system for a large number of trade magazines but, most importantly, the home of 'Global Business Magazine', a glossy, opinionated and cutting-edge weekly that offers analysis of current trends through advanced analytical algorithms held in strictest proprietary secrecy. We are only a few notches below 'Forbes' now and they are nervous about that.
I reach into my pocket, considering another cigarette. It would be nice to stand outside for a few minutes and I'm not due at my desk until 9. Like the past two weeks, the weather is wonderful. The sky is cloudless where it appears between the towering, metallic facades and is taking on a cooler tone of blue that coincides with the slow change of the season. The sun is still relatively low and the street remains in full shadow but, where it catches, the sunlight is thrown in brilliantly irregular reflections reminiscent of shifting beams seen from below water.
I reject the idea of another cigarette and fall into the short queue before the revolving door, take my place in the little, pie-slice shaped compartment and then I am ejected into the black marble and gold steel lobby with it's disconcerting silence amid a bustling throng of human movement. Shortly thereafter, I exit the elevator at 23 and enter the offices of 'Global Business Magazine'.
“Morning, Paul”, says Jackie, the receptionist.
“Morning, Jackie. Beautiful day. How are you?”
“It is! I'm terrific, thanks for asking. Kathryn says she needs to hear from you”. Kathryn Mason is the editor-in-chief, my boss along with the boss of all the other assistant editors.
“OK, I'll get to her straight away. Thanks!”
“Have a good one”, she says dismissively, already punching a button on her console and reciting automatically into her headset, 'Global Business Magazine, how may I direct your call?'.
Our offices occupy the whole of the 23rd floor. It is a hike to arrive at my small and cluttered side office. I nod in greeting to many whom I know as I pass through the various departments: Advertising, Analysis, Copy, Layout, Legal and so on until the door closes behind me and I hang my jacket and begin to roll up my sleeves for the day. I open my case and extract 'Bert' from his Velcro-strapped security. Yes, my laptop is called 'Bert', thanks to my daughter. My daughter is also responsible for the various, randomly placed and brightly coloured stickers of Sponge Bob and Dora that dot 'his' lid. I plug in the LAN cable and wake the dormant beast. The screen lights up, connections are automatically engaged and, before I can sit down, the in-house email system starts and my in-box begins to fill. I sigh, looking forward to a half hour of coffee and deletions. The phone rings and I spin on my chair to pick it up.
“Paul here”, I shoot over the line.
“Kathryn”, she states and continues. “I needed your guest editorial by end-of-day yesterday”.
“You've got it, Kathryn. You didn't delete me again, did you?” She laughs.
“I hope not. Hang on”.
“Hangin'”. My attention strays back to 'Bert'. I begin canceling the unchecked trail of inter-office forwards.
“OK, I think I almost did”. She is laughing again. “Sorry, Paul. C'mon over. We'll run over it together so I can get it to Copy before 10”.
“Kay. Gimme five”. The line buzzes, the connection already closed. I cast my eyes over the full inbox and mentally decide it will have to wait. The hard-copy of my editorial, 'Hate for Success', is in a folder at the bottom of my case. I grab it and collect my jacket on the way to Kathryn's office.
When I arrive, I knock and enter without waiting for an answer. Kathryn is sitting behind her desk with a strange expression on her face, her eyes twitching back and forth rapidly to read the text on her screen. I sit down with pen and hard-copy at the ready. She does not acknowledge my arrival but begins to speak immediately.
“This is making me uncomfortable, Paul”.
“It's meant to be a bit disquieting”. She nods.
“Tell me about the research. What's 'JIR'?”
“The Journal of Irreproducible Results”.
“NBQ?”
“Nonsense Business Quarterly”. She shakes her head, despairing.
“Does IBM have anything to do with IBM; a newsletter, information circular?”
“International Business Magazine, published in India – mostly naughty office jokes”. Kathryn sighs and looks down at her lap.
“So this is entirely a satire on the degradation of management practices”. Hers is a statement.
“That's correct, but not only that. I'm insinuating a collapse of correct interpersonal interaction as well. The statistics are based on a sample of six evil bosses and seven disgruntled ex-girlfriends – that's the JIR article”, I comment and reach out to indicate the title on the screen. Kathryn slaps my wrist and I withdraw.
“So '57% of upper management found brow-beating their subordinates into submission more successful that positive reinforcement' is a complete farce”.
“That's correct”.
“Paul, why do you do this to me?”
“It's 'cause I like you, Kathryn”.
“You know I'm going to have to run this through 'Legal' to see if we're liable for misinformation”.
“Doesn't surprise me”. She drums her fingers on the desk and then looks at me. "You're not an assistant editor for the New Yorker, right?"
"Nope".
"The Atlantic?"
"Not that one either".
“Then, would you please leave and make sure that the next one is a real article?”
“I can do that”. I rise to leave before she can rethink. I do a little skip as I close the door behind me.
It all went rather well to be honest.
Associated Press (Business), the next week, published, 'The Culture of Hate on the Upswing in International Business – Studies show increased productivity'. After 24 hours, they realised the error and retracted. Even Kathryn had a good laugh over that.
It just goes to show you that journalism is not dead; it just takes a day to wake up.
thanks for visiting.
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