My strangest Assignment yet

When one has spent a few years as a revered Businessman and pillar of the community, it can be tempting to assume that one has, to a certain degree, seen it all. I have long thought that one of the (few) advantages of the odd sprinkling of 'Salt' in the overall "pepper' of one's hairstyle is that it confers an air of wisdom, of gravitas, of having been around the block a few times and successfully found one's way back.

So imagine my chagrin last week when I was put onto a new client assignment, that of organising an Open Day FOR A CREMATORIUM.

Forgive my naivete dear reader, but it rather took me aback to get such an assignment, but no in all seriousness (to be fair, Crematorium staff do not go in for jokes too much for obvious reasons), there IS to be an Open Day and the client wants our firm, i.e. yours truly, to spearhead the planning and organisation of this 'not to be forgotten experience'.

It gets odder, it appears there is a 'Crematorium of the Year Award' too and my client has finished second more times than he cares to remember and wants to use "Initiatives" arising from the Open Day, as a major part of a Strategic 'Push' towards the top spot he so craves - is it me?? I have a real worry that the client is going to invite me to next year's award ceremony if he is successful in his quest - how wierd would that be? What awards do they have "Best Garden of Remembrance, Best Cremation? Flue of the year? What award do you get? I imagine a little golden coffin, perhaps with a golden star on the top.

So we had our first 'Kick-off' meeting at the end of last week, I am to work on this project assisted (I use the term advisedly) by my new Junior, Lance.

Now I don't want to be too scathing about Lance, after all, he is some (poor) mother's son but really! He wants me to 'Connect' with him on Bookface and says he wants to 'Tweet me'! I thought he had a speech defect, treat me to what? But no, apparently he wants me to start a Profile on something called Twittering so he can send me 140 character snippets of what he's up to. "140 characters"? I told him, "I want full page reports of what you are up to not tweets or whatever" - this, it has to be said, did not go down well, I believe I heard the word 'Luddite' muttered more than once.

So we had the Kick-off, an experience that was simultaneously bizarre, unreal and mind-fizzingly mundane. Lance suggested we have an 'interactive experience' which, against all odds, the client seemed to quite like! What sort of interactive experience you would want of a crematorium one can only guess at. I clung to the idea that it was all just a poor taste joke and thought I would enter the spirit (no pun intended). I suggested we should do a SWOT analysis (the consultants' favourite knee-jerk) which was eagerly accepted as a serious contribution. What would one say are the "Opportunities" for a Crematorium, perhaps there would be a homicidal maniac move into the locality and start a homicidal killing spree? That should drum up some business. What about 'Threats', perhaps people would start leaving their departed loved ones out for the bin men instead of going down that old tired model of burial/cremation. Question, would they do it on a Grey Bin day or a Green bin day? Green surely? Grey would be too disrespectful don't you think?

Buoyed by the positive response to my SWOT idea I got into the spirit of the thing rather, although I did get some funny looks when I suggested we have a bouncy castle and face-painting! To show his total lack of an irony gene, Lance made the comment that a bouncy castle would be inappropriate and in any event could not take place because the only appropriate site had already been claimed by the 'Build your own coffin from household refuge' Exhibit.

Perhaps there WILL be room in that Grey Bin after all...