American Pie: Virtual Business Can Be Too Real - Actually
We are still basically a tribal species, says John Merchant as he ponders the down-side of home working. "In this virtual business world we're reduced to a tribe of one, but that hasn't eliminated the need for power, influence and domination over other tribes.''
When I waved goodbye to the corporate scene, it was with joy and rejoicing.
I had long dreamed of crafting articles and essays in the best prose I could command, in an environment of my own creation. The last thing I imagined was that I would unwittingly become enmeshed in the invisible but real, none-the-less, strictures of one of today’s cottage industries, the Avirtual corporation.@
The awakening from my dream began when a friend offered me some PR writing assignments. The fee base was modest, but I was encouraged and flattered to find a paying project so soon. The work involved e-mail and phone interaction with my friend's clients, and various other components in the endeavour: editors, news services etc. The fact that these component organizations were scattered around the USA and the world, initially seemed exciting.
Here I was, in the calm and quiet of my own home, with no one to tell me how to dress, when and if I could take a vacation, etc, and at the same time operating in the mainstream of the business action, and getting paid. When social conversation turned to who had the most horrendous commute, as it inevitably does in the New York area, it was my smug delight to chagrin the group with the news that I had reduced mine to the ten feet from my bedroom to my office.
My erstwhile friend, now my virtual business colleague, soon, however, began to exhibit behaviour I had never suspected was in his nature. If I had to describe his newly revealed persona in one phrase, cheap, paranoid, control freak, comes to mind.
It began to dawn on me that what appealed to my colleague about the virtual corporation was not freedom from the corporate edifice; but freedom not to hire full-time or even part-time employees, or to provide equipment and a workplace; not even a water cooler, pens or paper. His need for total control became apparent through the onset of a flow of Aprocedures,@ and through painfully detailed instructions about how to deal with any given situation.
His paranoia permeated every working moment. From quizzing me about my whereabouts if I didn't pick up the 'phone each time he called, to insisting on three-way phone calls if I seemed to be getting along too well with one or other of his clients. His frugality precluded purchasing even the most fundamental element of virtual business, a computer, so I soon found myself acting as the e mail link and part time secretary for his global communications.
The luxury of working in my jammies, and the easy commute from my bedroom to my office still had its attractions, but my dream of peaceful, independent solitude and endeavour dissipated with every e-mail message. I soon concluded that virtual corporateness can be every bit as irksome as the real thing.
I guess it all comes down to the fact that despite the sophisticated veneer of modern society, we're still basically a tribal species. In the virtual business world we're reduced to a tribe of one, but that hasn't eliminated the need for power, influence and domination over the other tribes - precisely the engine that drives the real corporate world.
Recently, I read that military strategists are projecting that future wars also will be virtual; fought on, or even by computers. ABig Blue's@ chess battles were just a hint of things to come. I suppose that seems like good news, but if my own, small experience is any guide, we'll still find ways to annihilate one another, if only virtually.
