Bureaucratic Success Tip #342: Always have something in your hand when you walk the corridors! If a senior official encounters you you'll look purposeful, productive, praiseworthy, and maybe even promotable. The object you're toting can be an envelope, a scrap of of paper, a notebook, or just about anything else businesslike. But don't get caught empty-handed!

Apparently I've internalized this rule at a deep subconscious level, as part of my ritual for not losing my appointment book. A few days ago I discovered it was missing; I had left it behind in a friend's car when we went out to lunch. Walking back into the building I was carrying a little box of leftovers—and with my hands full my mind didn't register the absence of the Filofax. Oops!

(for another valuable organizational tip see TouchTheFlagpole (2005-05-30); cf. BureaucraticImmuneSystem (2000-08-09), OrganizationalInertia (2004-08-11), BureaucraticAcronyms (2004-08-23), PrimeDirective (2005-07-26), ...) - ^z - 2010-06-19