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Gorillas In Our Midst

© 𝕾𝖆𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖍 𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖓𝖉𝖗𝖆

Part 1 of 5
 
All normal disclaimers apply including “your mileage may vary”.

The murky origins of this long piece - I fell asleep while watching the lovely Ms. Sigourney Weaver portraying Ms. Diane Fosse in the movie Gorillas in the Mist some years ago. In the movie Ms. Weaver (and in real life, Ms. Fosse, of course) went to Rwanda and lived among the gorilla population to learn about the primates and perhaps about us humans. I think she could have learned a lot more and a lot faster too had she tried living in any IIT Residence Hall for a week. Tops! And then perhaps a follow-up study of any IIT WhatsCrapp group. But I think she probably wanted reassuring signs of human evolution towards a civilized society, which can be rather difficult to find in your average Residence Hall, especially on weekends. Or in any unsocial media group settings.

Fast forward a couple of years later, another fascinating book of cartoons by Steven Harris surfaced. As I unpacked a box labeled “sh..tuff” that had not been opened through three household moves, I found one of the cartoons showing two scientists walking out of a facility with the usual claptrap of test tube, beakers, dials and gauges and stuff. Sign at the top says “Primate Research Lab”. One scientist is talking to another, “Matthew hungry. Matthew want milk. Matthew want bananas”. And pieces of the puzzle started falling into place.

Have you noticed that at your workplace there is now more and more usage of phrases like “don’t monkey with it”, “monkey wrench into the works”, “feed the monkey”, the “meeting big gorillas downtown”, “monkey see monkey do”, “going ape$hit”, “get the monkey off your back”, etc. etc.?

The following applies to most tech organizations but may be true for other organizations in general.

Most techies start their working careers as what may be called the Organ-grinder monkey stage. These are the average joes who did their time and were let loose from those hallowed halls of learning. Eager to acquire a gas guzzler. Itching for more cool electronics. Ready to change the world, in no particular order. They are the ones without well-padded trust funds. Among the ones that didn’t join their father-in-law’s Mega-consulting Office of Nifty Know-It-all-Non-Sense Enterprises for YourOrg (MONKINSEY) so popular these days with your company’s upper management. Look around, you will instantly recognize many of these Organ-Grinders in your immediate vicinity. Some are probably hovering around the main lobby of your building at the moment bothering the receptionist. Wandering clueless by the coffee machine. Looking for the washroom in obvious distress. Working at a CAD terminal or two trying to decipher the differences between the “return” and the “enter” keys, scared by a sudden recognition of the fact that Da Tech taught them why things should work but not why they don’t.

Some Organ-grinders have been known to hum company songs to scare their offspring to sleep. They wear apparel with company logos to social get-togethers with other Organ-grinders. Talk at such gatherings revolves around imaginary facts and figures, made up on the fly.  Quoted from some vague sources. Liberally sprinkled with newly learned corporate-speak phrases. Many Organ-grinders quickly grow out of this stage. But some actually manage to find happiness and plenty of satisfaction in their role as Organ-grinders. They stay at this stage all their lives while others may decide to go to other companies and start afresh as ... Organ-grinders.

(To be continued...click arrow button)

 © 𝕾𝖆𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖍 𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖓𝖉𝖗𝖆

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