in many large corporations when a nasty technical problem occurs one of the first things to happen is a teleconference bridge line is established so everyone can keep up with the situation.

the tragedy of this solution is that the bridge line rapidly digresses to a who’s who in management and pretty soon the folks who should actually be working to resolve the problem are fielding questions and countering hail marys that four levels of management are chucking at them in an attempt to be the one scores the winning touchdown.

every time i’ve witnessed one of these calls i’m baffled by the irony that this many supposedly bright people can gather in one spot yet no one suggests abolishing the call to let the people who every other day of the week are considered the subject matter experts do what they are paid to do…