Corporate Fog 😶‍🌫️

I'm lost in corporate fog. Everyone goes:

• "We have to make an impact!"
• "We have to secure relevance!"
• "We have to create value!"

What is everyone talking about?

It used to be different

When I started, things were different. A small design agency with around 30 people. That's the company I joined.

Of course, it had only previously been bought by a big corporate enterprise with more than 700K employees. But we were the cool design agency, unbothered by corporate dynamics. When I started, we didn't play by the same rules.

Three kinds of people

More than five years had past since I joined and when I returned from a year travelling past February, everything around the office had changed. A weird "fog" seemed like it had emerged. It made my co-workers, people that were once like me, suddenly talk gibberish:

• "What's the deliverable?"
• "That looks like a quick win to me!"
• "Let's focus on the low hanging fruit."

Can you talk like a normal human being, I thought to myself. Has everyone been talking this way and I just didn't notice? Did I once talk like that? Or is it the fog that's taking its toll on my co-workers—people I once could have a regular conversation with?

Over the first weeks back, I noticed an undoubtable presence of corporate fog and decided that my co-workers all fit into one of the following three categories.

The first kind is completely unbothered by the fog. They wear outfits that are smart and casual. They climb up the corporate career ladder. "We have to create value!", they yell.

The second kind gets irritated by the fog, but only in the beginning. "What strange world", they wonder. But soon they accept it as the way things are, and shrug it off. "We have to create value!", they yell in unison.

The third kind gets dizzy by the fog. They are disgusted by the non-words that their co-workers proclaim. "What has this place become?", they ask themselves.

Cut the crap!

I wonder whether it has always been this way or if I had to be away for this long to notice the fog? But slowly I realise that I never meant to work in a corporate job ever again. And yet, here I am and it's as corporate as it gets.

Dear world of corporate enterprises, design agencies, and consulting people! May you make your impact, secure your relevance and create your value. May you figure out what the deliverable is, embrace your quick wins and pick your low hanging fruit. But I've seen enough. I'm out.