Let’s take it offline: Difference between revisions

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A sure sign, in an [[all-hands conference call]] , that some ingénue has made the fatal mistake of dropping through the cloudbase of cliché and into the inconvenient world of substance and detail, a grim place of intractable ugliness that is immune to resolution by crystalline management theory. You have as much chance of persuading a management consultant to embrace the actual workings of daily life as you have persuading someone who quite likes steak to help slaughter a cow.
A sure sign, in an [[all-hands conference call]] , that some ingénue has made the fatal mistake of dropping through the cloudbase of cliché and into the inconvenient world of substance and detail, a grim place of intractable ugliness that is immune to resolution by crystalline management theory. You have as much chance of persuading a management consultant to embrace the actual workings of daily life as you have persuading someone who quite likes steak to help slaughter a cow.


Fortunately, there’s a ready made defence. Expect a hasty plea to “[[take it offline]]” which, by tonal inflection, you might read as “let’s set aside some time to [[drill down]] into detail just the two of us, sort it out, and [[circle back]] with a bit more [[granularity]] later in the day” (''benign''), or “ugh — let's [[kick the can down the road]] and maybe something else will intervene to mean we never have to figure out the answer to that” (''neutral''), or “how about you just shut your cake-hole and let the [[change management]] [[workstream]] lead run the project, counselor?” (hostile).
Fortunately, there’s a ready made defence. Expect a hasty plea to “[[take it offline]]” which, by tonal inflection, you might read as:
*“let’s set aside some time to [[drill down]] into detail just the two of us, sort it out, and [[circle back]] with a bit more [[granularity]] later in the day” (''benign''); or  
*“ugh — let's [[kick the can down the road]] and maybe something else will intervene to mean we never have to figure out the answer to that” (''neutral''); or  
*“how about you just shut your cake-hole and let the [[change management]] [[workstream]] lead run the project, counselor?” (hostile).


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Revision as of 15:50, 9 October 2017

A sure sign, in an all-hands conference call , that some ingénue has made the fatal mistake of dropping through the cloudbase of cliché and into the inconvenient world of substance and detail, a grim place of intractable ugliness that is immune to resolution by crystalline management theory. You have as much chance of persuading a management consultant to embrace the actual workings of daily life as you have persuading someone who quite likes steak to help slaughter a cow.

Fortunately, there’s a ready made defence. Expect a hasty plea to “take it offline” which, by tonal inflection, you might read as:

  • “let’s set aside some time to drill down into detail just the two of us, sort it out, and circle back with a bit more granularity later in the day” (benign); or
  • “ugh — let's kick the can down the road and maybe something else will intervene to mean we never have to figure out the answer to that” (neutral); or
  • “how about you just shut your cake-hole and let the change management workstream lead run the project, counselor?” (hostile).