Amy came out of her boss's office; fingers shaking and pulse racing. She had only been on the job for a week and already the vice president is asking her to write an important memo. Secretarial school had taught her the proper format of a letter, but no one had ever taught her how to write an announcement telling the whole company that a senior manager had been fired. What if she did it wrong? Her boss had not been much help; in fact he appeared embarrassed to talk about it with her.
It was after 5:30 pm, the office was now as quiet and as cold as a tomb. She jumped when the printer whined. The office witch –crooked fingers, hunched back, thick spectacles and frowning face– shuffled stealth-like towards the machine. Amy visibly shivered as the hag eyed her.
Olga sniffed. "Working late are we."
Amy stammered, "Yes, Dr. Soon asked me to write a memo for him."
"Well, you best go and do it now."
Amy hesitated. She needed help. This was her first job and she wanted so badly to succeed but Olga was rumoured to have a mean temper. On the other hand, she was inexperienced and Olga had been with the company for so long her employee number was a single digit. The secretary cleared her throat.
Olga turned, just enough to see Amy from the corner of her eye. "Did he dictate the memo to you?"
"No, he did not. He said it would be a good way for me to learn to do things by myself."
"What is the memo about?"
"It’s to inform the company that Mr. Wong has been fired."
"And he asked you to do it on your own!" Olga’s eyebrow rose with her voice.
"Yes."
Crooked fingers picked up papers from the printer as the head above it shook and mumbled incantation-like words. Then Olga turned to Amy and said, "Come with me."
The young secretary trailed behind her like a wary, stray puppy being offered a meal by a stranger holding a thick wooden club.
First Olga told her to collect as much information as she could about the subject matter.
Information required
Office doing the announcement
Name: Soon Le Mah, Dr.
Designation: Vice President
Department: Sales and Supply Chain Management
The person leaving the company
Name: Wong Tsu Koo, Mr.
Designation: Senior Manager
Department: Procurement and Logistics
Reason: Discharged with immediate effect.
The person taking over
Name 1: Prunella Ding, Ms.
Designation: Procurement Manager
Section: Procurement
Name 2: John Deer, Mr.
Designation: Logistics Officer
Section: Logistics
Effect on Organization: Ding and Deer report directly to VP Soon
In-House Memo
Ref: SLMMemo/030107-01
Date: 3 January 2007
From: Dr. Soon Le Mah, Vice President of Sales and Supply Chain Management
Fellow Colleagues,
Re: Organization Announcement
It is with regret I announce that Mr. Wong Tsu Koo, Senior Manager of the Procurement and Logistics Department, will be leaving this company. I wish to use this opportunity to thank him for his past contributions and to wish him all the best in his future undertakings.
With immediate effect Ms. Prunella Ding, the Procurement Manager and Mr. John Deer, the Logistics Officer will take over duties handled by Mr. Wong within their own sections until further notice. Both persons shall report to me directly. Your cooperation in assisting Ms. Ding and Mr. Deer in the performance of their new responsibilities will be appreciated by the company.
Please contact either my office or the Human Resource Department for further clarification if you are unclear with regard to your role under this new arrangement.
Best Regards,
.............................
Dr. Soon Le Mah
Amy re-read the memo and looked up with a frown. "I don’t understand. Why don’t you add in the fact that he had been fired?"
"Some things are best not put in writing because Mr. Wong can sue the company for tainting his character."
"Will he do that?"
"We don't know, but any form of scandal can ruin the image of the corporation. Even if Mr. Wong was a dubious man, though I suspect it was more of a disagreement in management styles, the general public will lean more towards the individual than towards a corporation."
"But what if he really did something wrong?"
"Then he should be in jail. In fact, if we insist that he was wrong and we don’t charge him personally, the shareholders are going to wonder if we have swept anything else under the carpet with their money."
Amy broke into a sweat: What! You can get into that much trouble from a single memo?
Olga spoke, "It is best to keep scandalous information out of writing. Those who need to know about Mr. Wong's termination would have known about it already. You only need to tell people what is changing and how it will affect them. Anything more can get you into trouble." Then as though as an afterthought, she said, "Make sure that you have a reference number, and make absolutely sure that you never duplicate them. The date alone is never enough because there may be more than one letter issued to the same person or company in one day."
Amy mused over the instruction for a moment before asking, "Oh, that means I have to ready a list of codes and link them to the letters and memos."
"Don't make it complicated. For example in this memo I use the reference number 'SLMMemo/030107-01'. SLM is of course Dr. Soon's initials and the word memo is obvious enough. This clearly shows that the memo is issued from Dr. Soon's office. Then you have today's date, followed by a dash showing a running number, which shows that this is the first memo issued on the 3rd of January 2007. Make your system simple so that anyone whom you ask about it will know how to find the memo quickly from their files."
Amy said and smiled her thank-you then took the memo into Dr. Soon's office for him to sign. She came out a moment later, made copies of the memo and went to the mailroom to place a copy each into the managers' pigeon holes, knowing that their assistants will pin the notice up on the section's notice boards the following morning.