It was a large company and it often provided speakers to improve the quality of work.
The large function room was packed. There was an excited buzz in the room as this speaker had received a lot of hype, pinned up on dozens of noticeboards around the building. The room fell silent and there was a ripple of applause as he entered. The first thing he did was to put up a large poster, saying ‘There is no “I” in team.’ The audience, comprised of staff members from a number of projects around the company figured this was going to be about how individual team members should put aside their own personal needs and preferences and all work as part of a team.
He stood smiling into his audience for a moment before pointing at, and reading the slogan aloud. The first thing anyone noticed was his pronunciation of the word time, as ‘tim’, like the name. Naturally, this led many in the audience to speculate about the fact that the word ‘tim’ does in fact contain the letter ‘i’. These thoughts would have remained far more focused on that single, somewhat humorous issue, had the man not jumbled several of the poster’s other words as well.
There seemed to be some psychological scrambling of letters. Could it be that it was simply an inability to grasp the fundamentals of the English language? It was apparent that most listeners were left speechless by the man’s mangled words. Although, in truth, there were a number of those in the room that by their facial expressions and subtle lip movements could be seen earnestly attempting to figure out what he was actually saying.
At first they figured it was just his accent. Where was he from anyway? However, the wiser members of the audience came to the age-old conclusion. This was the problem with these big companies, they have so much money they’re really not sure what to do with it. They throw it around with one hand, while the other hand has no idea what’s going on. It was a safe bet that this guy wasn’t interviewed; just breezed in on his credentials. If someone had actually talked to him, his impediment would have been picked up.
More and more visibly, staff members were squirming as he went on in this completely unintelligible fashion for several minutes, before one brave soul, who obviously just couldn’t take it any longer, raised his hand.
“Excuse me. When you say, he read from his notes, ‘Or tim mimfers shad mawl pogester ib un hairmoongoose cripe,’ do you mean, all team members should pull together in one harmonious group?”
A number of women giggled.
The guest speaker looked annoyed, and glared at the women. He replied, “Ib corsh… wab alst worn e murf?” At that point the questioner shut up, and sat in silence with the rest of them.
At the presentation’s conclusion the small, silent crowd hurried to the exit. The one who had raised his hand with the only question had contrived to be the last one out.
“Tink yub!” he shouted from the door, then slammed it behind him.