How To Succeed In Business (Without Really Trying)

I’ve had a lot of jobs in my working life, but for 22 years I’ve worked in one field.  It’s a field I happen to be extremely good at, fortunately, but it’s a field I fell into quite by accident.

My first degree is in economics, and there’s not a huge amount an economics degree is useful for.  My first job after graduating was working as a bank clerk, but it quickly became obvious I shouldn’t ever be in a role that involves direct interaction with the general public.

I left that role within a year and started temping at a huge behemoth of a 1970s oil company.  It was one of those companies where once you got a foot in the door you could stay as long as you wished; so big that nobody knew what anyone else did, so profitable that no role was ever challenged in the name of efficiency.

Initially I was taken on to pack files into boxes ready for an office move.  That move accomplished I was then passed around from department to department, until the almost inevitable moment when fate intervened in the shape of M.

I was 22, M was 30.  He was handsome, with floppy blonde hair and a rarely-used smile that caused laughter lines to bracket his mouth.  He wore baggy suit trousers with fitted jackets (hey, it was the 90s and this sort of thing was acceptable back then – it was the era of JNCO ultrawide jeans), but his shirts… oh those shirts.  Pristine white, the type of bright white you see on a Persil advert, perfectly ironed with creases down the sleeve so sharp you could cut yourself on them.  Always white, always worn with a brightly coloured but attractive silk tie, always leading to speculation on what lay beneath.

I fell for him in the way that only a 22 year old girl can fall.  Blind to all his faults, I mooned around after him in a completely unsubtle fashion.  I moved department to department, but kept close watch on M at lunchtime in the staff canteen.  It was easy to pick him out; in a sea of boilersuits his shirts only stood out all the more brilliantly.

Eventually I’d spent a little time in each department and HR called me in to ask where I would like to be based.  There was no choice for me; wherever M and his shirts sat, I wanted to be sat as closely as was physically possible without breaching the company sexual harassment policy.  Like a genie from a lamp, the head of HR granted my wish and I found myself sitting not as closely as I could’ve wished, but only a couple of feet away from M.

In this case familiarity may not have bred contempt but it certainly led to some disillusionment.  Things are different for millennials I know, but for good Gen-Xers there was an expectation that you’d move out of the family home in your early 20s.  In spite of being 30, M still lived with his mum, and it was she who was responsible for his glorious attire.  She washed and ironed those miracles of perfectly pressed cotton, not M.

I still fancied him, but not with the same passionate lust I had previously felt.  We went out in a group a few times and got blind drunk on many occasions, but I found myself completely unable to shoot my shot when faced with the glorious perfection of those shirts.  I contented myself with lusting at arm’s length, then going home each evening and masturbating furiously at the thought of stripping off that pressed cotton and feeling his skin against mine.

Eventually I was transferred to the parent company and a site in the wilds of North Wales, but M and his shirts were never forgotten.  He was made redundant and moved hundreds of miles away and we lost touch, but I would occasionally think of him and smile, as well as feeling a twinge of lust.  He inspired a few long-standing masturbatory fantasies and is entirely responsible for my career success.  It’s not a route most career counsellors will recommend, but thankfully it worked very well for me.

Four years ago I took a short term contract at another oil company, in spite of spending most of the intervening years in pharmaceuticals and medical devices.  Post-Brexit the future of pharmaceutical investment in the UK looked rocky, so I was keen to get into a different industry and this company seemed to have money to burn.  It was a 6 month contract, and at 5 months the almost-inevitable contract extension question was raised.  By then I’d got a measure of the company and would rather have pushed pins into my eyes than sign up for a further 6 months.  When I rejected their offer they started casting about for a replacement for me.

When M’s name was mentioned I did feel a bit of a knicker-wetting shudder, but I expected it to be another man with the same name – it’s a common enough name and surely in the intervening years he had moved beyond the roles I was taking (I am senior enough but M had always had his eye firmly affixed to the C-suite roles whereas I’ve never been so ambitious).

He was successful at interview and at length he arrived on site, thinner of hair, more lined of face but still in a pristine brilliant white shirt.

What a complete wanker.

Honestly, he was the sort of man who had lived a million lifetimes, been everywhere and done everything until you tried to discuss specifics, when it became clear he was just completely full of shit.  If you’d been to Tenerife he’d have just got back from Elevenerife – you know the type.  I texted a mutual ex-colleague with whom I’m still friends “Was M always a total arsehole or is this a recent thing?”, only for her to reply that actually he sounded as though he’d improved with age.

If time travel ever becomes reality I intend to take myself back to the 1990s and give late 90s me a good slap upside the head.  What the hell was I thinking?