This story is dedicated to all those who attempt to do creative work within the confines of the corporate world, or to anyone to whom this statement sounds familiar: "Draw me a picture of a forest. Try not to get too many trees in it."


Kathy Sherpa was a woman of few words and a remarkably-appropriate last name. This had not always been the case. She had become that way after spending ten years as a graphic designer at a large advertising firm.

Monday morning had passed quietly for her, working on a billboard design for the agency's newest client, a national dairy product distributor. It was a simple but clever billboard, featuring the companies famous blue and white milk jug on the left and the words of their famous slogan on the right. The letters were white and bold and stood out nicely against the deep blue background. The words were small enough not to crowd the space but large enough to be read easily by passing motorists. The design was simple, clear and attractive. It possessed all the qualities an effective billboard needed to have-- at least it did until the arrival of the committee-in-charge.

The committee-in-charge consisted of Gerald Meaney; Herminie Gustafson; and Moe Tucker, known around the office as Meaney, Miney and Moe. Together, it was their job to take charge and make the important decisions. It is a well-known fact of corporate life that committees always make better decisions than individuals do.

To qualify for membership on the committee, an MBA is required. While most people think that MBA stands for 'Masters of Business Administration', people like Kathy understand that it really means, 'Mystical, Bountiful Abilities'. Once one has acquired mystical, bountiful abilities, one is empowered with magic knowledge and is given undisputed mastery over every other job in the company-- including that of graphic designer. Despite the fact that no one on the committee had ever drawn so much as a straight line, their MBA's made their design decisions far superior to Kathy's.

"I just don't know about that blue background.", whined Miney. "Make it olive-green instead."

Kathy did not say what she was thinking. She almost never said what she was thinking.

"Olive green will look absolutely hideous.", she thought, as she double-clicked to change the blue to green. It looked hideous.

"That looks marvelous.", said Miney.

"Now make the jug bigger.", ordered Moe.

"The jug already fills the height of the billboard.", thought Kathy. "If I make it any bigger, the top will get chopped off." She sighed in resignation, then made the bottle bigger.

"Now Kathy", scolded Moe, shaking his head, "You chopped off the top of the bottle!"

"I know!", cried Meaney, "We could turn the jug sideways! Then it would fit!".

Kathy turned the jug on its side. "This is idiotic!", she thought, "It looks ridiculous and no one will be able to read the label!"

"That's much better!", exclaimed Meaney. "Except now it's hard to read the label. Why didn't you turn the label around so we could read it?", he demanded.

"Because none of these jugs have ever had sideways-labels, you moron!", Kathy screamed in her mind, as she turned the label. "It doesn't even look like their brand!"

Now that it was larger and sitting sideways, the jug covered more than two-thirds of the billboard and was crowding the words. Kathy was shocked that one of the brain-trust actually noticed this problem.

It was Moe. Like the other members of the committee, Moe knew just enough about design to be dangerous. Once, long ago, he had heard that printers and designers had names to describe the various styles of letters. He knew there was a style called 'Helvetica' and he thought he had once heard of another style called 'Times'.

"Now, we have to do something about those words.", said Moe. "Make them... Helvetica!"

"They already ARE Helvetica, you ninny!", cried Kathy to herself. She clicked on the letters, then chose Helvetica from the font list. The words blinked on the screen, then reappeared exactly as they had been before.

"Ah... much, much better.", said Moe, smugly. "Now make them bold. Make them italicized. Put them all on one line. Make them smaller... good... even smaller than that. Change the font to 'Times'. Now make them lower case. Put them on three lines. Take the middle line and move it over... to the left. That's better. Now back to the right. Now up a little bit. Now move the top line down and the bottom line to the right, just a tiny bit. Now make every other word brown." There was a pause while Moe plotted his next change.

"What should we do now?", he asked Miney.

"I think we should begin by shaving the head", said Kathy, "then we should make an incision in the scalp and remove a section of the skull, SINCE THIS HAS OBVIOUSLY GONE FROM BEING A BILLBOARD TO BEING (*!!#@**!) BRAIN SURGERY!"

The committee-in-charge stared at her in wide-eyed puzzlement.

"Oh... I'm sorry, did I say that out loud?", she asked. "I thought I was only thinking it." The committee shook their heads and sighed a collective, condescending sigh.

"This still isn't quite right.", said Moe. I have a few ideas. Turn the jug so it's facing the other way. Now move the letters over and make them smaller. Now make all the letters orange and stand the bottle back up. Make it smaller. Make it bigger. Un-italicize the words. Make the background red. Make the jug a little bigger. Change the font back to 'Helvetica'. Make the letters white. Now, make the background maroon. Make the background black. Make the background plaid. Make the background green." He paused and put his hand to his chin, trying to look thoughtful and inspired. "Ah-HA!", he cried after a moment of contemplation. "I've got it! Make the background a deep blue."

The committee-in-charge stood back to admire their handiwork. The design looked fabulous. It was simple, clear and attractive. It possessed all the qualities an effective billboard needed to have. The design looked exactly the way it had looked before the committee had started messing with it.

"Well", whined Miney, "It's not perfect but it will have to do. Print us out three copies. Our meeting is in five minutes."


EPILOGUE:

The billboard design was never shown at the meeting. Someone had decided a week earlier that the dairy company's entire quarterly advertising budget would be put toward radio ads, instead.



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