Read Russell Wiley Is Out to Lunch for Free Online

and a long commute, I can’t imagine she and her husband allow a week, let alone twenty-five days, to go by without satisfying their wildest conjugal desires.
    I look at the agenda she lays on my desk in front of me.
    “That’s exciting. A new consultant.”
    “What is it with this fucking place? Henry can’t even take a piss without an MBA to hold his dick for him.”
    “You know how it works. It’s not just Henry. Everyone’s too scared to decide anything without an independent perspective.”
    “What are we going to find out now? That we don’t know how to do our jobs or manage our own business?”
    “That’s not the point. Most companies think their problems can only be solved by outside experts. You know that writer I was telling you about, Christopher Finchley?” I reach into my drawer, pull out a file folder that contains several stapled copies of an article I’ve saved specifically to share with others. I hand a copy to Susan. “Check this out. Maybe it will make you feel better.”
    Susan reads the headline aloud: “‘Fool’s Gold: Is Your Consultant Practicing the Deceptive Art of Rainbow Painting?’ What the fuck does that mean?”
    “It’s actually pretty interesting. This Finchley guy talks about the pressures companies are under to find big ideas to reinvigorate their businesses. But because their employees are so overworked, underpaid, burnt out and frustrated, management can’t trust or value the ideas they come up with anymore. So they go out and hire consultants to study the big picture for them. The consultant’s job is to sit back, chew on a piece of grass, understand the landscape and then paint a rainbow on it. After that, the consultant leaves and the overworked, underpaid employees are sent off in a new direction, searching for a pot of gold they can never find because it doesn’t actually exist.”
    “Like those last guys who told us we could cut our ad rates fifteen percent and more than make it up in volume?”
    “Exactly. The Rainbow Painter’s job is simply to keep management’s hope alive, to convince them that the pot of gold exists. Legitimate facts to the contrary will not be admitted into evidence.”
    Susan talks for a while about the fiasco that ensued after our last consulting firm left us all holding the bag when they moved on to their next corporate victim. Within a month, year-over-year advertising revenue was down twenty-three percent and we had to revert to our former pricing model to avert a complete disaster. Maybe it’s fun to relive this stuff for a minute or two. But suddenly, I’m bored. She’s going on too long and I want her to stop. I begin offering nonverbal cues to signal that I’d like her to wrap this up and get the hell out of my office. I start by looking in my Livingston Kidd folder and scanning last year’s proposal. Susan is unfazed. I pick up my pen and begin making notes in the margin.
    I glance discreetly at my watch, wondering if I’ll have time to make any real progress on my project before the end of the day.
    Finally I start tapping out pithy emails to the managers on my staff.
Pete, GREAT WORK on that IBM proposal! You rock!!
     
     
Meg, AMAZING ideas for Audi! Let’s discuss!!
     
     
Roger, LOVED what you did for Pfizer! I owe you one, buddy!!
     
    Usually a few minutes of inattentiveness is all it takes for Susan to get the message.
    “I’ve got to go,” she says, standing abruptly.
    “Sorry. God, I hate it when people multitask,” I say. “Have I at least talked you off the ledge?” I ask.
    “What do you mean?”
    “When you came in you said you couldn’t take this place for another fucking second.”
    “Yeah, I’m off the ledge.”
    “And you’ll be here Monday?”
    “I’ll be here.”
    “And you’ll read that article?”
    “I’ll read it.”
    After Susan leaves, I take a few minutes to reread the article I gave her and commend myself for introducing another reader to the extraordinarily perceptive