[ WP ] '' You have the emotional attachment of a dandelion in a windy day . ''

Efficiency was heading to an all-time low in the Transportation and Excellence department of Stanley & Stanley. Fearing the worst, corporate had called in the best to face the challenge of getting the department back on track. 
 
 K -- a fresh, hot-shot straight out of one of the country ’ s most coveted and esteemed management programs -- was more than up for this task. And why should n't he feel confident? He was abundantly equipped; not only did he have the latest, most RCT-tested and supported managerial technologies, but more than that, K had the trait of greatest importance to anyone who dares to step up to the demanding plate that is work-environment governance: he had a heart that burns for people. 
 
 As proof of his skills, on the first day on the job, K engineered an ever so subtle act of legerdemain by disguising himself as a new hire. Guided by the pit-boss at the Transportation and Excellence department, who unwittingly thought K was training a Stewart Manley, high-school dropout, K had managed to get a barr-none, tell-all view of the real down to earth happenings of what would soon become his challenge-force. 
 
 During this first espionagic foray into the guts of his people, K was not, shall we say, `` impressed with what he saw''. All along the linings of the overly fat, complacent bowels, K spotted issue after issue: tardiness, tiredness, time-wasting -- and those are just the T's. And so, the following day, when K turned up dressed resplendently in his usual business attire, K got straight down to business, cut to the chase, and laid problem numero uno right out on the ground for all his stunned staff to see: 
 
 “ The biggest problem, friends, is one of mindset. You lot are facing your various challenges with the emotional attachment and energy of dandelions on a windy day. You come in here every morning and it ’ s just work, work, work. I see it in your face, your eyes, well..it makes me sad. With such a mindset, no wonder the ship has sunk so low. But fear not, friends, as I was scouting out the innards of the challenge-place, I noticed, underneath that debilitating pall, a spark of hope in each and every one of you, and I believe, with the proper time and effort, that you all and I, in one great synergistic amalgam of understanding and caring and compliance -- that we will all, as a team, be able to reignite our passions, so that from hereon no one at the transportation and excellence department of Stanley & Stanley will work another day. 
 
 Thus began K's watch. 
 
 His first success at shaking-up the old and tired was to put into action a casual-dress day on every second Friday. In this way, by having the staff enter the department in the hip clothes they wore about the town and leave behind the drab departmentarial uniform, with its depressing blues and its rigid square patchwork, K had his challenge-force also leave behind the many understandable, but unproductive habits into which they had fallen and which were clogging up the department ’ s efficiency-flow. This injection of the new resulted in a 12 % decrease in returns and a 15 % ( yes, 15 %! ) decrease in mishandled orders. 
 
 But impressive as those numbers may have been, K was not the type of manager to be content with resting on his laurels. 
 
 Today, he had trudged once more from the office to the warehouse, down to the front-lines, and today, alongside the suave and jovial grin, K was a wielding a second, larger hammer of change. 
 
 “ Greetings my lovely Dandelions. ” 
 
 K paused for a moment to allow the gathered challenge-force their laughter at his humour. 
 
 “ Yes you, you all who previously had a level of emotional attachment to your challenges akin to that of dandelions on a windy day. Oh I can see your past lackadaisical selves blowing in the breeze. Anyway, for you, friends, I ’ ve come today wielding a second, larger hammer of change, with which we shall swing against -- ” 
 
 “ Can you please, just stop, ” said one of K ’ s staff suddenly. 
 
 Oh dear, thought K. Such an interruption might, in the past, have frustrated K, but he had learned in his many difficult years of study ( both official and self-directed ) to understand and even value the differences between people. Not everyone, he had discovered after careful analysis, was able to appreciate the subtleties of the poetry that is managerial discourse. Some people -- and K would not make a comment on the specific, ignorant type -- needed words that were a little more concrete. 
 
 “ Ah, yes, my apologies... Rowan... I was getting a little carried away with the metaphors. So as I was saying -- ” 
 
 “ No, I do n't mean that. Can you please just stop in general. We're not organizing the President's motorcade. `` Transportation and Excellence.'' We just move boxes... from that point over there to there. Sometimes we slap a label on them. That ’ s it. That ’ s literally it. ” 
 
 Aha, thought K. He had stumbled upon yet another member of the obstinate old guard. If K remembered from his files correctly ( which he did ), this displeased staff member, Rowan Tates, hailed from a small town outside of the city, and like most people from such provincial origins he was crippled by an equally provincial world-view. Also, if K remembered correctly ( which he did ), Rowan Tates had also not graduated high-school, and so he was ever more one of those salt-of-the earth types, being born no doubt to a blue-collar family, the same type who, understandably, express so much sensitivity regarding the application of cutting-edge technologies because it is only human-nature to fear that which one does not, or can not understand. 
 
 “ Now, now, Rowan, as I explained in the brief, which I'm sure you read, the challenges -- ” 
 
 “ Challenges? Challenges! Call it what it is. Work. It ’ s just work. Why the fuck do you speak like that. Also, I don ’ t care if you call me “ salt-of-the-earth ” or compare me to a daisy, but are not you not embarrassed when you refer to yourself as a hot-shot. That's ridiculous. You don ’ t get that right. This isn ’ t top-gun. God... God fuckin damn it... I ’ m so sick of you people. ” 
 
 “ Excuse me... you people? What do you mean by, you people? ” 
 
 “ Oh. Jesus. Christ. I don ’ t care what you put down on your application form for that scholarship, you ’ re not one-sixteenth Cherokee. Your last name is O'Brien and you can ’ t even make the distance from your car to this warehouse without getting a sunburn. ” 
 
 “ Now I ’ ll have you know my ancestors -- ” 
 
 “ Kill yourself. ” 
 
 Yes, as was very obvious to see, K faced and would face many, many blockades in the long journey ahead of him in which he was to steer his challenge-force through the precarious and winding road which lead towards the bright and hopeful and productive future.
