We Won’t Know Where We’re Going Till We’re There
But not the old taboos
On asking where they’re going,
Or what it’s for, and whose.
We’ve been M.B.O.’d and Down-Sized,
We’ve been T.Q.M.’d, Divested;
Process-Cost-Re-Engineered,
Re-Structured, Dis-Invested.
Kept up with all the ‘ologies’,
Each ‘Go-for-Change’ idea;
Read every trendy guru’s book
And business panacea;
Consorted with consultants,
Bought their ‘this-should-fix-it’ isms,
Gone round and round the circuits
Of computing cataclysms.
The Times they are a-Changing,
But not the old taboos
On asking where they’re going,
And who will get to choose.
The message is, just move it round
Like Alice’s Mad Hatter,
Back or forward, where it’s bound,
Is quite another matter.
Shake it up and slim it down
Is mainly what enthuses;
Don’t spoil the fun by asking which
People are the losers.
So, keep the gimmicks coming, Lord.
To keep us all from needing
Such obsolescent, antique things
As caring, thinking, leading.
Bertie Ramsbottom © Ralph Windle 1994
‘The Poetry of Business Life’, An Anthology, Canto VIII, Technology and Change,
Ralph Windle (pub Berrett-Koehler USA 1994).