Part of the grand history of American business is the tradition of
the family-owned company. These vaunted names of modern commerce --
Ford Motor Company, McGraw Hill -- have flourished, or at least managed
to survive relatively unscathed for decades. Invariably though,
somewhere down the line, the assumption of inherited management yields
to another American tradition: the boss's idiot son.
Without the benefit of a Latin genus nomenclature, the boss's idiot son is not so much a rare, as he is an unfortunate breed. On occasion, the owner's progeny can be a resource -- better yet, a trusted-ally in back office power plays -- but more often then not, he deserves little more than a pat on the head and an office where he can't do any damage. He's the one who takes a full fiscal quarter to order office supplies. He's the one who negotiates vendor contracts based on economic factors like the volume of lap dances and smoked sausage-filled gift baskets he's gotten over the course of a year. He's the one who's mocked, occasionally openly, for his misguided or nonexistent work ethic and well-honed ability to make a mess of the simplest tasks.
Throughout my media career I've encountered the species in several variations: as my boss, as my co-worker, and as my client. Interestingly, the common threads among them all were false workaholism and a well-honed appreciation for pornography. (I'll leave it to the scientific research community to determine if there is a link or not.) A case in point is a young man we'll call Johnny Incompetent*.
Johnny was the heir to the throne of a once-mighty, family-owned trade publishing company -- a fourth-generation softhead unto whom was bequeathed the reins of his diminished, although profitable birth rite. With this inheritance in place, Johnny first chose a path far from publishing, joining the Marines to fly "whirlybirds" (as he liked to call them), rather then become a bitter, old publishing failure like his father (a tale for another time.) Johnny even graduated from the Naval Academy: a true commitment, his demonstrated dedication to defending liberty through aggression. Regrettably, Johnny's plans to be a career officer were sidetracked. I heard a litany of stories as to how he ended up in the family business, as opposed to making his living as a merchant of "Death from Above" (as much of his casualwear advertised).
A few tales involved drunken hijinks that would likely have had superiors suggesting a career change. There was the story of nerve damage caused by a broken bottle at an Anchorage, AK wedding reception. There was even a tale told in hushed tones involving the accidental deaths of some colleagues. No one really knew what drove Johnny back to the cold bosom of the family biz, but whatever the reason, we were stuck with him and he with us. Johnny was named operations director, a title and role created especially for him. This meant it was his responsibility to make sure that everything ran smoothly. As he would explain, "If I'm doing my job right, you won't even notice I'm doing my job."
Sure enough, everyone noticed Johnny wasn't doing his job. When the office fax machine he'd bought used -- prior to learning that ink cartridges were no longer made for it --suddenly ran out of ink, we noticed. When he booked the editor of the company's international agricultural magazine on a flight from New York to Brazil that made four stops -- totaling 14 hours of layover time -- we noticed. But, the most noticeable mark of Johnny's reliably terrible operational actions was the hire of Suzy* as office receptionist.
Suzy was a towering woman who looked like she'd been plucked from obscurity at a gentleman's club. Everything about her was exaggerated: the artificially bloated lips, the bottled blondness, the Barbie doll-like curves. She dressed for success, if you measure success in yards of black lace, fishnet hosiery, and red leather. Simply put, she was a walking wet dream -- a teenage boy's notion of perfection -- which made her more than qualified as far as Johnny was concerned. Her office duties? If she had a written job description, I was never privy to it.
| His myriad requests for his bombshell secretary had all the subtlety of a barnstorming evangelist. |
As Suzy's top-heavy form teetered around the office on her customary spike heels, Johnny kept cooking up reasons to have her walk over to his desk. "Suzy, I need help with this order form." "Suzy, could you get me some more paper clips?" "Suzy, could you tie my shoe?" He had all the subtlety of a barnstorming evangelist. The only saving grace was that Johnny's objectifying requests often kept Suzy from actually answering the phone, which was for the best. Left to Suzy's devices, callers often wound up on hold for minutes that gave way to hours, often abandoned altogether. But, it wasn't really her fault -- Johnny needed some mushroom barley soup, and he was simply too busy to leave the office. Four months after she started, Suzy went to lunch one day and never returned. Why? No one really knows. She had no personal items at the office, nor had she established any real attachment with the company. Johnny was crestfallen: No more peeping down blouses. No more derriere-gazing. It was all over.
As the boss's idiot son, Johnny excelled. He was the picture of inherited success, no taking that away from him. There was even talk in the production office of adding him to the top of each masthead with this very title -- above the editor-in-chief, above the publisher – "Boss's Idiot Son," the real position of honor. It would've been a thing of beauty. Not that Johnny would've noticed. He read just one magazine, and last time I checked, there was no masthead in Barely Legal.
*Names have been changed
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