Mr Davies and I meet with CIPA’s Head of Education, Ms
Sear. We are scared because we have
forgotten to bring any Learning Outcomes with us.
The meeting is about how naïve we are to think that the
patent administrators’ course can be updated and upgraded and brought under the
CIPA Academy of Outstanding Learning Excellence in time for the 2015
intake. The outcome of the meeting is
that Ms Sear tells us to STAND ASIDE so that she can project manage it all properly.
We say: “Yes, yes, please! Yippee!
Thank you! When can you
start?” But we try to sound reluctant when
we say it, because we are not sure it is the right thing to do, when you are
trying to take over the world, to delegate the project management to someone
else.
It occurs to me that this is how my mother gets out of
helping to make the tea when she comes to stay.
Ms Sear exudes exasperation, just like I do when my mother asks me what to
peel the carrots with and I resist the urge to lend her an angle grinder.
To lighten the mood, Mr Davies takes us on a magical mystery
tour of 95 Chancery Lane. On the fourth
floor, above the CIPA offices, the workmen have been knocking stuff about a
bit, and rumour has it that the landlord needs a new tenant for this thoroughly
knocked-about space. Mr Davies has a
twinkle in his eye. I realise he is
plotting to expand his empire floor by floor.
The fourth floor is indeed quite a nice space. You could imagine a Presidential Suite up there,
like they have at the EPO. (Mwa ha ha.) You could imagine a common room for visiting
CIPA members, with bean bags and scatter cushions and a bar in the corner and maybe
a CIPA bong (ceremonial, of course). But
Mr Davies is imagining more office space for himself, thank you very much. He has already decided where he is going to
hang his hat and where Unlucky Gary is going to sit waving the Post-It® notes
that have swear-words on.
Ms Sear keeps quiet.
It matters little what Mr Davies and I think because we could not
project manage our way up to the fourth floor without her anyway. She has a management qualification, a massive
Gantt chart and twenty-eight learning outcomes.
We have a load of daft ideas and twenty-eight rounds (in the libationary
sense, not the military) of misplaced optimism.
Ms Sear thinks we are funny. But
she is not particularly worried about our plans to take over the world.
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