Wednesday, February 09, 2011

Out of syllabus



One of the things no business school in the country teaches you is common sense and its application. If nothing less than a case study will convince you, here is one.

A well known consulting company wanted to hire a few Spaniards for a specific project that required a proficient knowledge in Spanish. I was asked to give them a poster. I wrote a poster in Spanish and mailed it to the beautiful lady from the Marketing Communications (a post graduate from a reputed business school) department who had handed me the job. The conversation that followed went something like what is given below.

Lady: “This is not happening.”

Me: “Why?”

Lady: “I did not understand this.”

Me: “Well, it’s in Spanish.”

Lady: “Yeah. I did not get it.”

Me: “Do you understand Spanish?”

Lady: “No.”

Me: “It is for Spaniards, isn’t it?”

Lady: “Yes.”

Me: “They understand Spanish, right?”

Lady: “Yes.”

Me: “They are the ones who are supposed to read this and respond, right?”

Lady: “Yes.”

Me: “So, it is fine, right?”

Lady: “No.”

Me: “Why?”

Lady: “See dude, it’s not just about me.”

Me (pinching myself): “Yes. I am listening.”

Lady: “Nobody in my team understood it.”

Me: “Do you have Spaniards in your team?”

Lady: “No.”

Me: “Do you have anyone who understands Spanish in your team?”

Lady: “No.”

Me: “That explains it, doesn’t it?”

Lady: “It doesn’t/ Look… We are a bunch of senior people here and the guys we are hiring are all junior level people. So if we don’t get it, how can you expect them to?”

I gave her a poster in English with a bullfighter on it. She bought it without as much as a hint of hesitation. Bravo!

Note: Spaniards and Spanish were used instead of ‘C Programmers’ and ‘C’ respectively for the benefit of the non-tech-savvy public. And I don’t speak Spanish.


5 comments:

Prathima said...

Did it really happen!!Very Funny:)Hope that beautiful lady does not read this:)

phoenikhs said...

Unfortunately, it did. And I hope the beautiful lady reads this. Whether she gets it or not however, is another story.

Jigyasa said...

Very funny & amusing! But yes its true....I too have come across few of such b'ful people..

Finalblur said...

So..how did you make a bullfighter relate a techie?
Or was it a poster with..a charging RAM..in it..i think ill go kill myself now, for criminal punnery.

PS Incredbile job at commenting against sangeetha on the facebook purehands page.I got my first good laugh out of this contest through those comments.

phoenikhs said...

@final blur - Criminal punning, it is. And yeah, the bullfighter was symbolic.

Oh, so you got here via Purehands? Finally something good came out of that scandal. :D