“Now, this is made easier to remember through the acronym M.A.R.C.H. which stands for ‘managing awareness, readiness, carelessness, and hunkering’. Now the last one might throw you through a loop so allow me to explain…” I leaned over to my coworker sitting beside me. He leant his ear as I whispered.
“Not only do we get a meeting with another acronym we need to remember, the damned thing doesn’t make any sense.” He chuckled silently and I smiled. Zinger. But the joke fell to a dead silence.
“Matthews! Something you would like to add to the conversation?” I shifted uneasy in my seat. Sure I talk shit a lot but being called on it is when I lose focus; I shrink.
“Ah, the H should stand for humble. Sure we are basically selling ice to Eskimos because there just isn’t enough water to around like there used to be but we are still humble to have those customers. We need to remain humble to do business with them because any day, a new competitor can come in and take that business away from us. We need to stay humble.” There was a long stint of silence. The presenter cleared his throat and continued on with their scripted presentation.
Did I feel good about that? Yeah. It was a big brain move. But I knew I was going to catch shit later. The H should stand for “Hutch” as in Joe Hutch, my boss, who’s going to have my ass for being an ass.