Rick Cook - The Wizardry Consulted

"That doesn’t look like anything around here," one of the more alert councilmen put in.

"Those are magical isoclines," Wiz said hastily.

"Still don’t look like the country around here."

"It’s a transmorphic projection. Maybe we’d better come back to this later. Next."

The next slide was a pie chart, showing sales of Sara Lee pies for 1993.

The trouble with trusting a demon’s judgment, Wiz realized belatedly, is that it doesn’t have any. He was damn glad none of his audience could read English.

Wiz smiled brightly. "By now you are doubtless interested in the specifics of my recommended action plan. As soon as I have finished, my assistant," a nod to Malkin, "will distribute copies of the white paper emphasizing the highlights. Meanwhile, let us examine the critical challenges we must meet to empower our vision of empowerment."

The demon flashed up a slide showing someone going over Niagara Falls in a barrel.

"The first challenge is organizational. The traditional organization emphasizes musty, sterile parliamentarianism at the expense of action which would clearly reflect the true makeup of the council." That brought nods from the mayor, Dieter and Rolf, all of whom were absolutely convinced the council was really behind them.

"This means your present decision-making process is diffuse and suboptimal. We must proactively react to counteract this tendency with a broader vision which is only available at the top." The mayor beamed and Dieter frowned.

"However, given the present organization this is clearly impossible because of the workload such a top-down environment imposes on the mayor. Therefore the key to repositioning the products and services to build a corporate advantage is install an action-direction vision by creatively teaming together. To that end, we create an Office of the Mayor to actualize the latency by creative teaming. Working directly with the mayor on this critical team will be innovation powerhouses representing the major resources within the present council. While the mayor will clearly be the team leader he will benefit from the synergy and creative flow of ideas from the team structure."

Again smiles from the critical three. The mayor saw it as a way to subordinate his main rivals to him and the other two saw it as giving them a power base close to the top. That alone should guarantee absolute gridlock, Wiz thought as he paused for breath.

That was a mistake. "What about the rest of the council?" demanded one of the councilmen off to the side. "What about money?" demanded another.

"Yes, money. What about money? What about taxes?" several other voices chimed in.

"I’m glad you raised that critical point," Wiz said brightly. "That is the second platform of my recommendations, but perhaps we can deal with it out of turn.

"The important fiscal consideration is to provide revenue enhancement without increasing taxes. In fact, as you can see clearly from this revenue elasticity chart-" up went a phase diagram of the melting point of lead-tin-antimony solder alloys "-the projected revenue needs can be met with a decrease in current taxes.

"Clearly what is needed is a proactive, projective infrastructure investment of the revenue stream."

"There ain’t no revenue," one of the councilors objected.

"That is precisely why you apply the revenues projectively," Wiz assured him. "As you can see from this next chart-" up flashed a bar chart showing the amount of track laid by the Indian railways from 1850 to 1900 "-the revenues can be applied to development in a fashion which will encourage and develop the trade."

That produced an approving mutter from Dieter’s faction. The mayor’s people sat in puzzled silence and Rolf’s followers looked to their leader for their cue.

"Let us go back to the organization for a moment," Rolf said smoothly. "I believe there is more."

"There is indeed," Wiz said, relieved that he didn’t have to do his New Age Bugaloo around the difference between "revenue enhancement" and "tax increase."

Up on the screen flashed an organizational chart of the Supreme Soviet.

"Now this," Wiz said, gesturing with his pointer, "is your present structure. I’m sure all of you can see the inefficiencies and conflict potential implied here so I won’t dwell on them. Next slide," he commanded before anyone could object.

Up on the screen flashed the current Miss July, blond, pneumatic and airbrushed to perfection.

Wiz closed his jaw with an audible snap. "Uh, that was just to make sure you were awake. Next slide."

Up came an even more baroque organizational chart. Glancing at the legend Wiz saw it was for General Motors circa 1965.

"Here is my recommendation. A more modern, teaming approach to today’s challenges. Rather than concentrating the burdens, it spreads them throughout the organization to make management more effective.

"As you can see, this emphasizes creative teaming to empower all the members of the council to make the crucial decisions needed to create tomorrow. By establishing internal task forces, the Office of the Mayor can be freed from the day-to-day detail of running operations to concentrate on developing an action-directed migration plan to create tomorrow. These teams will prioritize opportunities for infrastructure enhancements using the new revenue stream as it comes on-line." That got a stir of approval as the council members considered the opportunities for graft. "Naturally, every council member will have several team assignments to fully tap into the organization’s creative resources. I won’t bore you with the details of these teams," mainly because I didn’t have time to work them out, "but I would like to point out the compensation committee, which will determine remuneration for the council members."

"You mean we’ll get paid for sitting on the council?" someone asked.

"It seems only fair," Wiz said blandly.

"And just who’s going to be on this compensation committee?" demanded a voice from the side of the room.

Wiz tapped the image at random with his pointer. "That is up to the personnel committee, here."

"And who’s on the personnel committee?"

"That is the responsibility of the organizational committee. As a consultant it would be unethical of me to advise you on the makeup of these committees. I’m sure you will be able to work out these details among yourselves."

A quick glance from the mayor to Dieter to Rolf showed them all deep in thought. Rolf was smiling benignly, Dieter was looking sideways at the other two and the mayor was rubbing his chin and nodding.

"Gentlemen, the tide has turned." Up came a tidal chart for New Bedford, MA. "Opportunity awaits us. Fortune favors the brave."

Up came the GM organizational chart once more.

"More importantly we must team together to form an empowerment matrix which will reinvent the corporation, uh, organization, in an entrepreneurial model to reach beyond the present to grasp the opportunities of the future!"

They didn’t quite give him a standing ovation, but there were one or two tentative claps from the back of the room.

Wiz let out his breath with what he hoped was a not-too-audible sigh. "Very well. Are there any questions?"

"Can we go back to that last-but-two slide?" came a tremulous voice from the back of the room.

Malkin didn’t have much to say on the way home. That was fine with Wiz. He was weak with relief and completely exhausted from everything that had happened in the last three days. What he wanted now was sleep, not conversation.