The Curious Case of a Chocolate Flan

On the personal front, I’d started feeling that anyone interesting of the male variety I’d lately met (or not met), fell into five categories. By interesting I mean – humane, witty, intelligent and attractive (to me).

This only reconfirmed my theory refined over the years, that all the good guys:

1. Have left the country for the USA, UK, Australia, New Zealand or S.E.A.*

2. Are about to leave the country for USA, UK, Australia, New Zealand or S.E.A.

3. Are married or taken.
4. Are gay.
5. Are too young for me.

For obvious reasons I refuse to acknowledge those who were just not interested in me.

* These are the most attractive destinations for all working professionals out here. In USA it would be NY winning hands down as the leading destination of the pack.

Not that it mattered. My working hours and the way I consequently looked over weekends – eyes ringed with dark c’s, the occasional sniffle attack due to sudden transition from heavy cool air-conditioning to searing or humid heat – did not leave me with the time nor inclination to socialize. Story of my life, so far.

On this day, I was geared up for my first day long excursion with LL. Naïve newcomer that I was, as per his instructions, I’d shown up on the dot at 7 a.m. below his residence building and was instructed to wait in his car, manned by his driver.

LL joined us at 8.30 a.m.

Though my enthusiasm for the exciting day ahead had wilted somewhat, it quickly revived as we started our journey.

In stark contrast to our claustrophobic workstation sans windows, it was nice to look at the blue sky, puffs of clouds and the lazy marshes whiz by.

Running late for the first meeting meant that we were hard pressed for time, and by late afternoon, having managed to pacify and satisfy various clients along the way who were not expecting us to show up considerably more than an hour after the scheduled time, we unpacked our delayed lunch tiffins of biryani (LL’s) and soggy sandwiches (mine) as we drove to our final two meetings from the suburbs to the South of Bombay.

On such days LL’s car resembled a mobile makeshift office, with files piled up on whatever space the driver, LL and I didn’t occupy.

Both LL, I and the driver were usually on calls the entire time, with brief intervals of respite.

Why was the driver on phone? Because LL never spoke directly to his driver. All instructions were conveyed by LL’s wife from home to the driver.

For any last minute change in route, LL would first call his wife and then she would call his driver. Watching this ritual did get my blood pressure up a little higher, but I never knew why it was done, so don’t ask.

Despite everything, our meetings were successful and the view from the window again captivated me. Okay, so this time, it was more buildings, shopfronts, hoardings and less horizon, but Bombay looks progressively cleaner and somewhat wealthier as you head southwards which gives a feeling of ascension to something better that really lifts your spirits. Only true Bombay ‘burbies will understand this.

Just before we reached our client’s office, he called LL and cancelled the meeting due to some urgent reasons. This gave us a couple of hours to kill until our next one.

I stayed quiet, waiting to hear what his next instruction to Mrs. LL would be. Strangely, LL made no move to speed dial her number. Curious and curiouser.

“Oberoi chalo”, said LL, spraying Polo liberally all over himself.

The car swerved slightly.

Bablu the driver recovered quickly from his shock at being addressed directly and drove on.

I slid open my window slightly so I could breathe again.

For once, the scenic curve of Marine Drive failed to capture my attention. The expression on LL’s face was very familiar – I’d seen it before. On kids who’ve discovered the junk food stash and TV remote while their parents are out.

“Let’s take a break, eh? If Mrs. L calls up on your cell just pretend it’s on silent”, puffed LL. What fun. This was a side to LL I didn’t know existed.

We plonked ourselves down on the plush couches in front of the famous windows at the cafe overlooking the sea. It was exciting. In pre office days and window shopping at the Oberoi, I would look with wonder at all the super-busy men and women lounging around the lobbies and cafes for power brunches, power lunches and power teas. It was all so aspirational. I wanted to be part of that fascinating world.

And there we were. I was no longer awe-struck student, walking past looking at all the corporate movers and shakers, but felt at home amongst them.

Well, once you’re seated, anywhere in the Oberoi can make you feel that way.

All around us were people just like us, seemingly in between meetings or conducting them. It was fun to mimic their snooty expression while glancing over to check them out.

LL, feigning disinterest, tried eavesdropping on the conversation at the next table. He fed me snippets of what he occasionally overheard.

I wondered though if that’s all he would feed me on.

I also wondered if it was okay to order myself, or wait for him to ask. I tried recalling etiquette pointers on ‘when unexpectedly out with the Boss, first time’**, but nothing really came to mind. Slightly tense and conscious, I wanted to avoid a faux pas of any kind. Or what LL the Martian, oops sorry, LL the Marrkitian would consider one.

Even after half an hour of arriving, LL showed no signs of encouraging the occasionally hovering server.

I remembered how my day had begun and steeled myself. “I think I’ll have a juice”, I ventured.

“Sure! Ofcourse!!”, said LL, ever the gentleman. “In fact, I’ll have one too!”, he boomed.

Midway through our juices, LL had thawed greatly.

This was partly because, given his uncanny luck, the conversation he’d eavesdropped upon had yielded results. One of our client’s competing product’s advertising strategy was being laid bare by the loud and eloquent ad account manager to our left, straight into LL’s eager ears. Having secured this little titbit of a nugget, LL leaned over to wink and whisper, “His voice got louder after he saw you. What a show off!”.

I didn’t get it for quite some time. Hey I was younger and innocent then. Ofcourse it stumped me. A compliment? From LL? I didn’t know how to react.

The other reason LL was really happy was that a group of newly hatched, smart MBAs at another table had recognised him and clustered around briefly telling him how much they admired him. Nothing made LL’s day more than public recognition. After subjecting them to a fifteen minute homily, he’d let them go.

Meanwhile, LL, feeling expansive, said, “Let’s celebrate. Order anything! This is for you, you deserve it!”

Recovering from this shocker, I took the menu he proffered. I knew him well enough to wait a bit.

“From here”, he suggested. He pointed to the truffles and pastries section. He still held on to one end of the massive menu so I pretended to study it and waited some more.

“Let me help you. How about the chocolate flan? It’s really good here, you must have it.”

I can never say no to chocolate but I knew LL well enough now not to get my hopes up.

“We’ll have a chocolate flan pastry”, said he to the server.

“Just one?”, the superior looking server raised his eyebrows, flicking his glance at me.

Just in case you’re wondering, the times I speak of, were not those of recession or economic slump.

“Yes, yes, just one will do. It’s for her, my colleague – I’m not allowed to have all this. I was telling her it’s the best here”, said LL loudly, playing the part of magnanimous, indulgent boss taking his employee out for a meal, for the benefit of his fans at the next table who were paying us a lot of attention.

The flan arrived and I suddenly realized that it was a wise move on LL’s part to order just one. It was massive, and flanked on either side by two dessert spoons. The server strategically placed it in the exact centre of the space between LL and me.

I picked up my spoon and waited for LL’s move. He slid the plate slightly closer to my end of the table.

Here was another etiquette related quandary. Given his oddities, would LL really not mind if I dug into the same pastry he would later have? Did he really want me to have it all?

“I’m not allowed, this is all for you”, he mourned.

Unable to resist the charms of a good chocolate for long, I dug out a minuscule piece. It was melt-in-the-mouth gooey, dreamy, dark chocolate, and I couldn’t wait to have more.

I pushed the dish over to his side.

“Do have some, it’s great”, I offered, inviting him to taste it before I polished the rest off.

“No, no, I really am not allowed, if Mrs. LL finds out…” His gaze was fixed on the flan and his fist was clenched hard around the dessert spoon.

Perhaps I’d misjudged LL. He wasn’t all self-centred and self-serving. I felt glad that he meant it this time and wasn’t faking it. It’s always a pity when people have to deprive themselves of the good things life has to offer. For the first time, I looked at LL with new eyes. I was slowly getting to see the real persona behind his “Boss” image.

I waited for form’s sake while he took a call on his cell. The loud-spoken agency guy had apparently finished his meeting and I watched him swagger out with his client.

My gaze wandered to the spectacular view which relaxed and mesmerized me once again. The gently swaying palms and the wide expanse of the aqua sea looked beautiful through the tinted windows.

LL was right. I deserved to indulge in chocolate like that. Eagerly anticipating the rest of it, I decided to pull the plate back to devote myself exclusively to the flan as the mandatory polite interval from the time I made the offer had passed.

I turned around and reached out. To an empty plate. And saw LL, licking the last few crumbs off his spoon.

It hadn’t even taken him a minute. More fool me.

He caught my eye. “We won’t tell Mrs. L about this okay?”, he winked.

“Sure”.

**Author’s note: Given my valuable experience working with LL all these years, I decided to pen my own helpful list called “Etiquette pointers when out with the Boss, especially if he’s LL “. Flatteringly, the list became worth it’s weight in gold and folklore amongst Marrkitians old and new. Will add it to the archives another time, if you like.

Resuscitation

It was one of those days again.

Had reached office at 8 a.m. and a whole 12 and a half hours later, was still there.

Did I mention that we were understaffed and overburdened? Or that we could have held a record for the highest attrition? Lately, I’d forgotten what sunlight looked like.

Since it had always been my burning ambition since childhood to be ‘independent’, I was happy to be working in an office, earning my own income, rubbing shoulders with – well, not exactly the ‘who’s who’ of the advertising and marketing world, but quite close.

Plus, the terrible impression I had of those who worked in “business” was slowly changing. Some of the people who did this were actually human. Not heartless, cut-throat, ready to sell their own grandmother.

‘Some’ is the key word here, of course.

LL was a brilliant orator and he was quite different while interacting with our clients. He was charming, affable and humorous. He bent a sensitive ear to our clients’ woes when required and when a client wasn’t quite convinced, he was passionate and forceful in making his point.

Witnessing this for the first time, I was amazed at the transformation. I counted myself amongst his many admirers, for his intelligence and genuinely successful marketing tactics. And I was still proud to be amongst the chosen few recruited by him. (Notice the subtle self-flattery).

Thinking back, this must have been the quality that Adolf H. aroused whenever he spoke publicly. I’d read somewhere that without quite being able to recall any particular sentence of his speech, budding or fellow Nazis were willing to follow his ideology blindly, once at the receiving end of his magnetic oratory.

I was similarly still overawed by LL and admired the fact that he had set up a whole organisation like this, which ran on professional lines.

Ofcourse, I had many misconceptions as will become clear over time.

This was one of the days everyone at work had witnessed him being unnecessarily nasty with a newly recruited sweet, timid girl who had made a simple error in a communiqué to the client. His sarcastic comments yelled at the topped of his voice reduced her to tears. We also watched him spectacularly lose his temper with another guy who’d dared send a press-release write-up to the client without LL’s having seen it first. What upset him primarily was that his own quote was not included in the press release. LL did not like losing any opportunity of being quoted in media and ranked any journalist’s call as the highest priority.

I was sure he’d have a couple of resignations on his table by tomorrow morning. And we’d continue losing people almost as fast as we hired them.

All us Marrkitians* soon understood that LL was rabid about getting credit for his contributions no matter how negligible. We were so used to him taking credit publicly, even for our team’s ideas that we never thought about why he couldn’t share the credit a bit. Or use “we” instead of “I” while talking of a successful launch or repositioning.

*Refer to ‘Glossary of Marrkit’s Marketing Terms/ Office Jargon’ section for meanings

Still trying to come to terms with what colossal ego could get a kick out of picking on youngsters like that, I was revising my earlier impressions of him – largely got from his media personality. Oh yes, he was very often to be seen on the business news channels and widely quoted in marketing articles.

Did I mention already that we all had many misconceptions?

One of his favourite quotes recently was that the fifth ‘P’ – ‘People’ are most important in an organisation and must be treated well. Well, he didn’t seem to be acting on it himself, did he? I did reflect on how he had never taken such liberties with some of us who were still loyal. I would never have stood for this sort of treatment. I’d made errors in judgement too, but followed that adage of never repeating a mistake again, which was getting me ‘good’ to ‘excellent’ performance ratings every quarter. (I’m sure you’ll allow the continuing self-flattery here)

He also chose to mentor me, as this was my first job. This meant I was exposed to long, lengthy reminisces from him of his first job and subsequent ones. By now I knew his life history by heart. He was highly experienced in the corporate way of life, and passed on lots of useful tips on handling various situations, clients, people. I appreciated this interest and this was one of the reasons he fostered loyalty.

Over tea (for him), coffee (for me) and soggy biscuits in his office, he would narrate many interesting anecdotes from his early working days. I found these fascinating – each episode ended with him achieving fantastic targets, or reaching glorious new levels of sales for the companies in question, or devising a brilliant marketing strategy in the nick of time to save the brand from ruin by the new, deadly competitor. Or reaching hitherto unaccessed markets in remote locations and placing the product there.

I was enchanted and saw him as the gladiator of the sales and marketing world, who had now retired into consulting for lesser mortals.

Or perhaps it would be more correct to say – he saw himself that way.

I was beginning though, to feel uncomfortable about the fact that I was tending to take the easy way out. By simply doing everything his way – compromising on what anyone else thought was best for the situation, including my own judgement. To use a trivial example, in any press release we penned on the client’s behalf, I would automatically include a discerning quote from LL, which he sometimes found good enough to not improve on at times. One clearly needed to develop a very thick skin to be working with him. Was I getting one? Telling myself that I had to earn a living and that he was basically honest and ethical as far as I could see, I decided that we had no right to question any of his tactics. After all, we were earning a living thanks to him, and it was his company. Things could be worse.

All in all, the day was one of those which whizzed by with unimaginable speed, ate up my lunch break, and included uncomfortable thoughts crowding in, about my employer.

I badly needed to cheer up, get home, relax, watch some Frasier.

And an ‘approval’ from LL on another strategic note drawn up and his signature on it. Knowing that once I got this, I was a free bird for the day, nay, for the evening, I barged into his cabin.

I knew he was getting an update from another Sales head (let’s call him Mr. Milkah) on what was going on in his territory. Mr. Milkah had a naturally lugubrious countenance and I wondered why the atmosphere seemed funereal.

This was not one of my clients, however, so I barely listened to what was going on.

LL didn’t mind that I’d intruded. He knew that this note had to be sent right away. While nodding at Mr. Milkah across from him, he casually skimmed through my file.

“And our team is doing a really good job. We have expanded in many new territories already. A lot of first-time orders”, said Mr. Milkah, looking mournful.

“Good, good..”, said LL absentmindedly. His Cheshire cat grin was in place like a fixture. Depending on his mood, it could make him look menacing or happy.

“And we have even converted some outlets completely. They have stopped keeping our competitor’s product”.

“That’s great news. Congratulations..”, chuckled LL, still not looking up.

Mr. Milkah didn’t mind. He was on a roll.

“All thanks to you Mr. LL”, he said dolefully, giving credit where it was due.

Now I started to pay attention. I badly needed to hear something good, something that would affirm that I was working for a marketing whiz and that all this daily drama with emotionally battered colleagues, was worth it.

I looked over at Mr. Milkah. He finally smiled and so did I. LL very flatteringly introduced me as one of his brightest and best and spoke of how my clients had increased their business with us since I’d taken charge. Flattered, I promptly forgave him his past sins.

Yep, back in those days, it was usually that easy with me. And well, timely bonuses and pay hikes also helped.

Mr. Milkah decided to impress me, though his words again seemed at variance with his demeanour.

“You know”, he added, “Thanks to LL, our business has increased and my area’s sales have gone up so much that our Directors are really happy.”

“That’s wonderful”, I responded. “But I’m not surprised. That’s what we usually deliver for all our clients”.

“And that amazing idea he gave us, was so good..”, Mr. Milkah continued, looking even more depressed. I wondered if something was wrong, despite the breaking news of record sales he seemed to be reporting.

LL pointed out a minor rephrasing to me in the document. I peeked over while nodding at Mr. Milkah, now paying attention to what LL was trying to whisper.

Mr. Milkah continued his woeful rave, “The team was so reluctant at first, but I explained it to them like LL had to me. We arranged a bus ride for them and called them all for a training…”

I listened with half an ear trying to simultaneously fix my expression such that either party would feel I was paying them attention.

“…I had to give them all, what is it called? My English is not so good. I am so bad at all these terms. Ah yes, mouth-to-mouth. I personally gave them. Each and every one..”

My attention snapped back. My God! He was describing a catastrophe. Hadn’t I read something about it in today’s papers? A bus load of tourists got stuck in a landslide? Surely that wasn’t Mr. Milkah’s sales team? And that too, headed for a training that Marrkit was indirectly responsible for!

LL too was looking over his glasses at Mr. Milkah. He looked over and noticed my expression. And went back to reading the file. Thick-skinned indeed.

Unable to believe that even LL could be so completely heartless to this tale of mayhem and horror, I stared with shock at Mr. Milkah.

“Oh my God, how are they now?”, I asked, not really wanting to hear the answer.

Mr. Milkah too, apart from his general expression of woe, seemed to be maintaining his composure quite well. He frowned at my question.

“Who?”

“The sales team!”

“They are fine, thank you”.

“Glad to hear it”, was all I could say, still in some shock. I imagined them all in a row of beds, in some hospital, recovering from the accident and showing up for work swathed in bandages.

LL finally looked up. “Mr. Milkah, Mr. Milkah…”, he chortled. By now I was feeling sick that he could giggle at such news.

“Mr. Milkah….”, LL said, wagging a finger at him, “It’s called ‘Word of Mouth’. Not Mouth to Mouth. Hahaha! It’s word-of-mouth marketing – THAT’s what it’s called”.

The Point is Missing

In the course of acclimatization to the new work-world, which seemed to have till now few opportunities of applying what we had slogged over in b-school, I sometimes felt that my new work life was full of plain good old troubleshooting.

At this stage, I was assigned clients for Account Planning/ Client Servicing, which is the function I was handling within my firm. A lot of it involved receiving and making telephone calls to clients, and ancillary organizations like ad agencies, outdoor media specialists, media agencies, direct marketing companies, PR firms and Event management companies.

Most calls were mundane; fairly routine in nature. However some ended up being a little unusual. Far from the hallowed semi-intellectual, insightful discussions I’d imagined myself participating in.

Particularly so when they were in full hearing of my by now inevitable audience. The same pair who witnessed my embarrassing personal call a few days ago, had walked into LL’s cabin where I had to take the call as per our ever helpful Executive Assistant’s suggestion. This maneuver was necessary as our workstation was so noisy that it easily sounded like peak lunch hour at an Udipi restaurant.

On this day, Mr. Sen, the General Manager-Marketing, of one of the largest industrial houses of India dealing in commodities had called up. India, still largely 70:30 urban-rural, this was one of my largest-sized clients in terms of revenue.

Mr. Sen was a somewhat elderly gentleman, and spoke with a lisp, in a pronounced Assamese accent, which took some getting used to. Every conversation with him usually left me with a surreal feeling, and this time was no different as I was still rusty at interpreting his accent. I liked him though, as he was always polite and spoke with respect, which was a distinct pleasure in the new circles I found myself moving in, primarily consisting of disgruntled and tough as nails sales managers.

“Ah shit… “, he drawled, “thank you for sending the meeting report on time.”

No, he wasn’t being profane. That’s how he pronounced my name, Ashita.

He continued, “However, as I went through it, I realized that the whole point is missing.”

Now, the last meeting was pretty much as per the agenda framed earlier and to my mind had gone well, with each point being discussed, debated upon and a consensus reached quite satisfactorily.

Consequently, getting this feedback from the client really shocked me. He was questioning the way I had planned it all.

“The whole point’s missing?” I blankly repeated. This was a person who usually never had a negative word, or always phrased things diplomatically. Plus, this was an account where I was involved right from the pitch stage and had the joy of having them sign up with us. I had left no stone unturned and had created new standards of servicing for them. Each interaction was a new discovery into the world of commerce, the diversity of each geographical zone and I was thrilled with mini-new epiphanies every now and then.

A new account for us, this was the crucial stage where the company could easily decide to cut their losses and move on (from us) if they were dissatisfied with anything. Also, their move would influence a lot of future, Potential clients. (Refer to the Glossary section for definitions).

Having an audience at the wrong moment, that too, the same one, was yet another instance of the aforementioned Murphy in my life. Why no one was around to witness it when I received a professional compliment, I could never understand. Yet, the first whiff of negativity from the client and hark – there you had a ready pair of interested ears perking up.

“Yes”, replied Mr. Sen with what seemed like ghoulish insistence on the subject.

Deciding to defend my reputation and put up a fight, I firmly responded with, “Mr. Sen, we went as per the pre-decided agenda, covering a few additional matters as well and we made great progress on several key issues”. As you can see, I’d by now got the hang of saying a lot without actually saying anything, if you know what I mean.

Mr. Sen responded very nicely to this and affirmed that yes, everything was covered, however the point, as he could see, was missing.

Despite the negative feedback, I felt a tingle of pleasant surprise. Till now, he had seemed a man of simple thinking, very easy-going, almost bucolic. While talking with him, one always felt that he wasn’t quite all there. Discovering this philosophical depth to his mind was intriguing.

Pondering on his comment, I had to agree. There were times when I’d wondered at the futility of what we did for the brands we handled as it seldom translated into the utopian objectives we had for it. Of course, I say this in confidence. You’d never catch me admitting this to a client.

What I mean is, I could make a research analysis interpretation on the product attributes with consumers sound positive or negative by interpreting it’s findings accordingly. Devious LL was an expert at this. My conscience was still alive and kicking so I’d managed to avoid manipulating results thus far.

Spiderman really had it all figured out. With great power came great responsibility. You’d have a hard time convincing LL of though. He would agree and yet manage to convince you that manipulating research results was being responsible. More on this some other time, though.

Anyway, getting back to the call, I decided to go with the flow, consequences be damned.

“You know, Mr. Sen, its true. This needed to be said. Am so glad someone did. I do think about it very often. Am relatively new at this and still trying to make sense of the corporate world, but working for someone who makes a hundred thousand a day while I make under a thousand and for clients who very often are purely into profiteering makes me wonder what the point of it all is. We get stuck with our own selfish money-making agendas and it’s not fulfilling…”.

“Yes, yes… so you’ll send me the point?” interrupted Mr. Sen who was clearly not paying attention.

“What???”. I wondered why Grammar was such a neglected subject.

Thinking feverishly about what he could mean, I gestured to my team-member who’d entered a minute ago, to bring me a copy of the alleged report of the meeting, from notes I had taken. Since I was now Manager, I had people reporting to me. In effect, the only difference was it meant that they keyed in the report, not me. And I could delegate the more boring tasks to them.

My hopes of breaking into new insightful territories with Mr. Sen was all too good to be true. He clearly wasn’t commenting on the futility of most of what we did. I thought about Mr. Sen and our past conversations. And suddenly got it.

I heard the door open and spotted my boss about to walk in. He was partly wedged into the room as his opening the door meant that my team-mate was half squashed behind the door and the cabin wall. No other sight made my mind race as much. If LL smelled a complaint, it meant a blot on my as yet unblemished record. Not to mention my reputation to be salvaged in front of my interested audience.

I suddenly felt a burst of goodwill towards Mr. Sen. Must be the endorphins from the adrenalin rush, a reaction to the stress I always felt on seeing LL. In a way, I was happy. With Mr. Sen, what you saw was what you got. I’d rather have a client who was easily satisfied. Knowing LL was keenly listening, I continued.

“Mr. Sen, before I respond, let me state how much of a pleasure it is to work with you and your team. Let me assure you that there’s no ‘point missing’. Yes, the automatic paragraph numbering in the MS-Word typed report has jumped from 14. to 16. Am planning to write to Bill Gates on this matter. Why the numbering goes haywire in a saved document, whenever a print command is given to the printer shall always remain a mystery to me. Meanwhile, I’m sorry for the inconvenience, and Seema will re-send the report with the correct numbering in serial order.”

As I paused to draw in breath, Mr. Sen slowly said, “So, the point is not missing?”

“No, Mr. Sen.”

I sent an obligatory frown to Seema to indicate the least she could do was check the bullet point numbering on what was sent out. In case you are smarter than the average reader and use some an operating system different from Microsoft, then read this explanation. He had meant “a” point was missing.

A numbering point like this:-

1.Phase I of Product launch to be on Dassera*

2.Media rollout on 1st Dec

4.Phase II commences 15th Jan

Notice how 2 skips to 4. I swear it happens. For anyone who’s suffered this, and wants to gripe, do get in touch. Will be happy to offer words of wisdom and the solution.

(*Auspicious day of launch as per the Hindu calendar. All clients were deeply terrified of earning the ire of Gods by launching at an inauspicious time. All us Group heads had a mandatory calendar of religious dates taped to our desktops).

“Are you sure?”, repeated Mr. Sen.

Clearly he needed time to get used to the new state of affairs.

“Yes, Mr. Sen. Everything discussed and every decision taken has been included fully in the report. How did you find the report otherwise?” I quickly added.

“Oh, excellent, excellent as always” replied Mr. Sen, very gratifyingly, and clearly enough for LL to hear. “They are always helpful. So all points are there, eh?”

I reflected on how one never learned things like this, how to interpret and use keen psychology, deep perceptual insights, to understand what the client actually meant.

After due reassurance I bid adieu and turned to LL.

I felt naughty and bold. It was time to say it. Especially, with the right number of witnesses present. I looked straight at my nemesis.

“Don’t you think I deserve a raise, LL?”.

I saw my faithful audience nod.

Books to read to become a Marketing Consultant (in Recommended Order):

• How to Surprise Your Competition
• How to Kill the Competition
• Don’t Focus on Competitors
• Get Your Customer
• Know Your Customer
• Keep Your Customer
• What To Do When the Customer Starts Leaving
• Stop Selling, Start Living… Start Marketing
• Ageless Product, Timeless Profit
• So What if Your Product Doesn’t Meet Any Consumer Need?
• Reap First, Sow Later
• Principles of Marketing
• Business Ethics for Newcomers
• Marketing For Dummies
• Marketing Is For Dummies
• It’s Not About Marketing!
• It’s About Brand Building
• 360 Degree Communication
• Zen and the Art of Customer Maintenance

The Beginning

Let’s start with when I took up my first job. I was 23 then. A small marketing consultancy called Marrkit. People working for Marrkit were known as “Marrkitians”.

Am not kidding.

Each time I heard myself being referred to as one, I felt as if I’d turned into a distant species of some creepy-crawly alien life form.

The firm is headed by a super-thin and tall “Boss” whom you almost can’t see if he turns sideways. He’s called LL by most. Not short for LL Cool J, but Luvleen Lalitlalkishen. Don’t blame ‘em. There were a few diligent ones in our office who still persisted, or rather, laboured with “Mister Lalitlalkishen”. His wife called him Luvleen. I decided to join the throng of those who called him LL.

He loved jargon. For those who don’t know, jargon is official management speak. Let me elaborate.

You know how when you call up and the Secretary, oops, Executive Assistant* says, “He’s not available right now”? That really means, “He’s on his favourite toilet seat, pondering over the next marketing strategy. And taking way too long. Call later”. He also loved creating his own jargon.

My name is Aashita Joshi, of Hindu (Indian) origin, and means, ‘one who is full of hope’. I guess now I just have one small correction – ‘One who was full of hope’. I haven’t fully recovered yet.

Scott Adams had nothing on me, man!

*: At Marrkit, it was a mortal sin to call a secretary a secretary. You had to call her Executive Assistant. Yes, it was always a ‘Her‘ at Marrkit. You could tell which one she was as she was the only one who left at 5:15 pm sharp. Our office timings were from 9 am to 6 pm.