Bienvenue, content crusaders! Tin Blott here, taking time out from my intimidatingly high-powered executive lifestyle to brush some crumbs of hard-won insight from Mr Rumpus's very best floral brocade Sunday tablecloth onto the hardscrabble floor below, the better to aid those less fortunate than myself.
Veteran newsletter employees often say stop me in the corridor to say, "Tin... my God... how can you? What you're proposing will rip the heart from this whole company! Why!? Oh Jesus Christ, WHY!!"
To: Tinny B
To: Tinny B
From: Anonymous
Dateline: 11 January 2009 02:02
Hi Tin. Fabulous to see you looking so swish and shiny. One question – how DID you manage to get the unions on side? Last I heard, Paul Holyman was saying you were stupid while Ewan Bryce was promising to fight you – by playing possum from his foxhole. What's your secret to getting those pesky union prols to be so compliant? Did you have a man on the inside? Yours, Anonymous
Do you have a question you'd like to put to Tin? Post it in the comments below and the king of content will tackle your query in a future post, possibly after feeling an uncharacteristic flicker of disappointment that his unwavering commitment to quality content has not been recognised in all quarters
But that's not the subject we're going to address in this post. Instead, here are some knotty queries sent in by a brace of faithful readers, who clearly realise what a total font I am when it comes to wisdom.
To: Tinny B
From: Desparada
Dateline: 10 January 2009 18:32
Dear Tin. I have a question for you. Like the poster above I work for a very exciting multimedia company where content is king. Only trouble is our circulation is plummeting and nobody looks at our website because it's rubbish. Should I leave now whilst there's money for redundancies or wait until we go completely tits up in about 6 months time? Yours Desparada
Hello Desparada! As it turns out, I actually dealt with a similar query quite recently but I'm happy to reiterate my advice. You should do what you feel is best for you, and only you... because no doubt that's what the person in charge of your company will be doing. Another kernel of counsel: perhaps don't toss around that word "t*ts" when you're applying for your next job. Public life may be coarsening but it's our responsibility to strive for a higher standard. So who's next for a paddle in my font?
To: Tinny B
From: Anonymous
Dateline: 11 January 2009 02:02
Hi Tin. Fabulous to see you looking so swish and shiny. One question – how DID you manage to get the unions on side? Last I heard, Paul Holyman was saying you were stupid while Ewan Bryce was promising to fight you – by playing possum from his foxhole. What's your secret to getting those pesky union prols to be so compliant? Did you have a man on the inside? Yours, Anonymous
Greetings, Anonymous! Suggesting that a company may have a spy on the inside during any sort of guild negotiations is a surefire way to spread paranoia and fear among the rank and file... so let me just say "no comment" while nodding and allowing a slight smirk to play across my features. A-ha!
Posts
Just stumbled across this.
ReplyDeleteTin,
ReplyDeleteCan I ask your advice?
I was recently appointed to a very senior role in a newsletter similar to yours and my first act was to gather all my staff together and scare seven shades of sugar out of them.
Sadly I now find myself in a 'pants to the laundry' situation, because due to faulty Tom-Tom navigation, my leaky ship has been steered further into an iceberg of cold despair.
I now discover that my most senior production staff have all been allowed to desert ship, leaving me with a crew that is not only mutinous but totally incapable of steering the ship to dry land. Help! Should I rely on Tom-Tom to guide me to safety?