Mr Barnacle

Two of the smaller taboos that remain unbroken are: admitting that you enjoyed a funeral (catchy imaginary marketing tag line “putting the fun back in funeral”); and openly confessing that you found a health and safety course interesting. If the former comes across as crass, insensitive or just plain tasteless, then surely the latter must be an oxymoron of the highest order?

And so it was with heavy heart that I made my way to the course this morning. Bracing myself for a day of unremitting eye-watering dullness, I shuffled into the room clutching a cup of tea as a kind of substitute shield. It soon turned out that five out of the ten expected attendees had inconveniently been laid low and taken the day off sick (...far be it from me to speculate wildly on the timing of this malady...). The rest of us, spread thinly down one side of the huge board room table, nodded grimly to each other and clasped our cups tighter on hearing this news. And then the trainer started...

And he was great. Funny, charming, entertaining – and yes, he managed to make the driest of dry subjects ("what’s the difference between a workplace and a working environment?", for example) an amusing, comprehensible, and yes, dare I say it, interesting topic. Maybe he was just a very talented trainer - a real life example of that saying about the medium and the message - or perhaps just one of those rare people who can convey their interest and expertise in a manner which inspires confidence and demands respect. I don’t really know but, Mr Barnacle (for that really is his name), I salute you.

As an aside, I should say that I can be a bit slow on the uptake sometimes. Witness the fact that it has taken me until now – 17 years into my working life – to fully appreciate that going to meetings (or indeed training courses) is sometimes exactly what I’m actually being paid to do. So rather than feeling eye-rollingly resentful at yet another meeting in my diary to get in the way of my work, I embrace it in the true and certain acknowledgement that attending the meeting will be, on that day and at that time, precisely what my work is.

If you also struggle with meeting rage, allow me to be so bold as to commend this mantra to you: However dull, however pointless, however full of hot air it might be, today’s meeting will not be getting in the way of my work; today, it will be my work for which I am being paid. [repeat as necessary]

Talk about a Damascus, scales-falling-from-eyes moment.

Or even better, let’s set up a meeting to discuss it. Shall we say Tuesday at 2?