Contents
About the Book
About the Author
Also by Jilly Cooper
Title Page
Dedication
Introduction
Getting a Job
The newcomer
The hierarchy
Survival for the top brass
Advice for the imperfect sekketry
The office beautiful
Office happenings
Extra-mural activities
Visitors
Office pastimes
Supplementing your income
The firing squad
Social occasions
Copyright
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorized distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
Epub ISBN: 9781448107728
Version 1.0
Published by Mandarin 1990
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Copyright © Jilly Cooper, 1970, 1977
Drawings © Methuen, 1970
Jilly Cooper has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
First published in Great Britain in 1970 by Methuen and Co Ltd
This edition first published by Mandarin Paperbacks 1990
Mandarin
The Penguin Random House Group Limited
20 Vauxhall Bridge Road, London, SW1V 2SA
www.penguin.co.uk
Mandarin is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 9780749309329
To Derek and Christine
How to Stay Married
Jolly Super
Jolly Super Too
Jolly Superlative
Superjilly
Supercooper
Jolly Marsupial
Class
Intelligent and Loyal
Super Men and Super Women
The Common Years
How to Survive Christmas
Turn Right at the Spotted Dog
Angels Rush In
From the conservative dark
Into the ethical life
The dense commuters come
Repeating their morning vow
I will be true to the wife,
I’ll concentrate more on my work.
W. H. Auden.
IT IS NEARLY nine years since I had a proper nine to five job, but as I sit here typing in the garden looking at a torrent of bright pink roses, and watching my son dig up plants and sprinkle earth over the cats, I am still haunted by the days I spent working in an office. Offices, you see, are for organization men, and I – being a dyed-in-the-wool disorganization woman – was a disaster as an employee, getting through more than twenty jobs in thirteen years.
My first job, which was the only one I really loved, was as a cub reporter on a local paper. The editor was a wild Irishman who wrote like a dream when he wasn’t drinking like a fish. At the end of six months, he amazed the inhabitants of the town by walking the length of the High Street with a pink plastic chamberpot on his head. A week later I came in on Monday morning to find him crouched on top of his desk, squawking morosely, an empty whiskey bottle beside him.
“I’m a seagull,” he said after a few minutes, “and I shall fly around and do it on anybody I don’t like.” At lunchtime, the Office Crone noticed him and immediately telephoned the newspaper proprietor at head office. Later in the day, a plain van came to take him away.
It was the first instance of many in office life when the right but repulsive prevailed over the wrong but romantic. After that a more sober editor was appointed, but the job never again reached the same peaks of inspired lunacy, and a few months later, lured by Mayfair and the fleshpots, I left journalism to become an account executive in a public relations firm.
After that the jobs came fast and furious – copywriter, editor, publisher’s reader, receptionist for a motor firm, demonstrator at Earl’s Court, temporary typist, a nymphomation officer in advertising, a telephonist, a puppy-fat model, and finally even a director of a company. So I can say truthfully that I have a non-working knowledge of most levels of the office caste system.
Offices, I found, were too much like school. There was the same nightmarish first day, when it was better to be seen and not heard, the same hierarchy, where it was not done to make close friends with one’s seniors or one’s juniors, the Personnel Department in a permanent state of bossy bustle like Matron and her minions, the notice boards on which pointless messages were pinned, lunches in the canteen exactly like school dinners, the responsible members of the staff behaving like form prefects, board meetings like staff meetings (‘what are they saying, are they discussing me?’) and finally, whether you’re a writer or a typist, the awful sense of handing in your prep and having it returned the next day: ‘C+. Could do better.’
The only difference is that as schools get paid (instead of paying you for your services) they are less trigger happy about booting you out than offices are.
I was the one that got away, but I still think of the thousands of people fighting their way to the office every morning.
HAVING HAD SO many jobs in my life, I consider myself an expert at interviews. Never be depressed by the high-powered-sounding advertisements on the Appointments pages, the columns and columns of ads offering unique opportunities at attractive salaries to the right candidate: “We are looking for a young dynamic engineer,” they say, “someone with drive and enthusiasm and a keen interest in re-inforced concrete, who is willing to settle in Australia. A knowledge of explosives would be useful.”
The Advertising ones are even worse: “We at Fishbone, Codpiece and Nutter aren’t afraid of competition. We’re looking for a young creative genius who can write us all into the ground.”
The sits. vac. for persons aren’t much better: “Hey there, Eunuch Friday. I’m looking for someone to step into my shoes (size nine) and look after the most lovable Production Manager in the world. I wouldn’t be deserting him if I weren’t expecting a baby next month. Luncheon Vouchers, sickness benefit” (morning presumably) “three weeks holiday.” They’re always wanting: “Very fast shorthand typists” when you have given up sex for Lent, or offering “Mature persons periods of exposure at Board Level”, whatever that may mean.
Even when you’ve found the kind of job you’re looking for, there are phrases to watch: “The successful candidate will be expected to deputise for the departmental head in his absence,” which means the departmental head is probably an alcoholic or a sex maniac.
“We’re looking for a person who can introduce staff changes where necessary.” They’re chicken about doing their own sacking.
“Capable, unflappable person, who is not afraid of hard work needed for busy office.” They’re a lot of layabouts, and you’ll be flat out from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. The letter of application is the next hurdle. It should be a masterpiece of fiction, papering over all the cracks. Get it properly typed on decent writing paper. Never let it run over the page, people get bored with reading. Never send a roncoed curriculum vitae, or start off: “Dear Sir, You need me/I’m the man you are looking for,” which automatically puts people off.
If you’ve changed jobs many times, pick out the five most impressive ones, and pretend they lasted longer than they did. Always conceal long patches when you were out of work. Never say you left a job for “personal reasons”. No one will believe you.
Before you’re given an interview you may well be sent one of those terrible questionnaires to fill in about what games you excelled in at school, and whether the parrot’s had any serious illness and what sex you are. Pure 1984. Resist the temptation to mob them up. Be careful, too, of those eleven plus psychology tests: “Which is the odd man out—goat, ardvaak, warthog, giraffe, snuffbox, goose, Tramps?” It’s sure not to be Tramps.