Goals by Karen Blayne

Oh by the way red tape first.

Be warned these short stories contain mature content or naughty bits and as such may corrupt you if you’re under 12, 16, 18, 21 or 25 depending where you live thus they are not suitable for you so put them back on the shelf and let them age for a year or two.

They were sort of scribbled for fun. They were first posted on asstr.org. If you’ve paid money for this book just be aware the author has not received any payment. In fact no one has permission to charge money for this book and copyright is retained by the author. ©2014 All copies must be of the complete document. Asstr.org accepts donations if you’re feeling rich or even if you’re not.

Luv Karen

Henry signed the final paper to collect his inheritance. “I don’t suppose you’d like to purchase an office block would you?” The lawyer asked. “The owner was into property speculation and over reached himself and now the bank is threatening foreclosing. I can get you a very good price.” Henry thought about it and offered a fifth the sum mentioned by the lawyer “and the offer is only open until midday tomorrow.”

At 11 am the next morning the lawyer delivered the keys. “I could show you round the building.” She offered. He was introduced to the speculator’s secretary Veronica and small office on the 13th floor and agreed that she should continue since she knew the tenants and the building. “Now the major tenant is a software company who signed a twenty-year lease last year.” Well that sounded safe enough. It was only when Veronica took him on a tour later in the day that he realised the software company was one that set goals and targets which made him a little uneasy, but there was a brunette on the eighteenth floor that he exchanged a significant glance with. Back in their office he asked “Is there much to do on a day to day basis other than responding to the client’s concerns?” “Not too much but I keep busy with some charity voluntary work and there are a couple of co-ops that I keep the books for and do the day to day office work. Oh and there’s Amy of course.” “Amy?” “The office junior, she’s out delivering some letters this morning but she’ll be back after lunch.”

Henry tried the café out on the ground floor for lunch and found it suited him. After lunch he returned to the office to find a young blonde in a very short skirt whom he nodded to assuming it was Amy then started back reading about the elevator regulations once more only to be interrupted by Veronica. “What have you done to upset Amy?” “I didn’t even speak to her.” “Oh that explains it. Amy isn’t the brightest pebble on the beach but she is useful in that once she’s learnt how to do something, she is happy to sit and do it no matter how boring you or I might think it to be. At the moment one of the charities has a few thousand envelopes that need stuffing which will keep her quiet for at least two weeks apart from her training. I’m teaching her to read by having her read to me out loud for an hour a day in the afternoon. She has this idea her job is safe provided you admire her beauty so to save you or I from stuffing envelopes you’d better admire her.” “Amy.” She called and Amy came trotting in eager to please. “Now then sit on Henry’s lap and give him a kiss.” Henry exchanged a look with Veronica over Amy’s head. “There you see he was just being shy. Now take his hand and move it over your breast.” Amy eagerly covered Henry’s hand with her own and moved it round over her breast until Henry took over the movements. “There you see you’re admired he was just a little shy, now off you go and do some envelopes.” Smiling Amy got up and wiggled happily back to her cubicle.

Later that afternoon Veronica suggested he listened to Amy’s reading practise. Amy came and sat on his lap and started to read out loud from a Harlequin paperback with a red cover. Amy struggled a little at some of the words and asked him to explain what they meant, then she carried on. “But why does it say she melted inside?” Henry glanced across to see Veronica grinning at him and was uncomfortably aware of the problems that parents of teenagers must face. “Well let’s think about what was written, first a kiss.” He kissed her on the lips and deepened it after a moment or two, “Then she felt his hand slide up her thigh under her skirt.” He placed his hand on her thigh and slid it up an inch under her very short skirt coming to rest with his thumb on the front of her knickers. “Feeling a bit warm?” Amy nodded and Henry couldn’t resist caressing her with his thumb and watching her face grow pinker. Veronica stepped over and moved his hand away. Henry thought he was about to be reprimanded but no she held some sort of massager in her hand and held it against Amy’s crotch. Amy’s face grew more flushed and she gave a small moan. Veronica slipped the massager into Henry’s fingers and stepped away whilst Henry marvelled at Amy’s reaction until she gave a shudder and collapsed against him. She hid her face in his shoulder and murmured “Now I understand why she melted inside.”

It was two weeks later that Veronica interrupted him to tell him that the bank account hadn’t been paid that month’s rent. “Give them a ring and remind them in case it's an oversight.” But just as a back up he arranged for a locksmith to change the building door locks after the workers had gone home and for a professional bailiff to guard the front door the following morning. He also posted the formal notice on the door saying as per the lease agreement since the rent was late the tenant was deemed to have broken the lease and penalties were now payable.

Next morning he took his place at a table in the ground floor café to await developments. When Veronica and Amy arrived he caught their eye and told them to take the day off. One of the managers he’d seen on his tour had a discussion at the front door with the bailiff who directed him towards Henry. “What can I do for you?” He asked when the manager approached followed by the large imposing bailiff. “Let us into our offices for a start.” “Just as soon as you pay the rent.” The senior manager looked threatening for a moment before he remembered the bailiff. “Oh god I suppose the whole house of cards will come tumbling down now.” He turned and sat down by the window, Henry motioned one of the servers to feed him a coffee. “I think he’s safe enough now. I'd best return to the door.” Mentioned the bailiff as he turned and left.

The mayor made an appearance “Can’t you cut them a bit of slack? You can’t put all these people out of work, think of all the other companies that service them. Throwing that many workers out of work will have a huge impact in the city.” “I’m not a charity, if the banks thought they were viable they would have come forth with an overdraft.” The mayor shrugged his shoulders then went to commiserate with the senior manager. Henry motioned to the staff to serve the mayor a coffee on his tab.

The next arrival at his table was the smartly dressed brunette young lady he’d noticed on his tour. “The wicked landlord I presume.” He grinned back at her “All landlords are wicked at sometime or other.” She lifted her mobile out and spoke briefly into it. “Come to the café on the ground floor and I’ll be there.” She slid onto the bench besides him and slipped her hand onto his thigh her fingers lightly flicked against his testicles. “Now then what can I do to convince you not to turn us all out into the street?” “Pay the rent?” “Tricky that.” She left her hand caressing him whilst she thought what to do next.

“Hi Melissa is this the wicked landlord then?” He gave her a look, “Oh I think you must be, I’m Jennifer and I’m the lawyer who is handling the bankruptcy. Now the first thing is, can I convince you to buy the company as a going concern?” He looked baffled. “Well its software and by the time we go through the courts it will have lost all its staff, customers and value. With your penalty clauses on the lease you’re the major creditor so I could just hand it over to you as a going concern.” Melissa perked up, “I’ve got all the accounts on my laptop, the main part of the company is fine it's just the new wonder whatever that’s been eating up all the money. I’m sure it's only a cash flow problem.” “I could spilt the company in two parts?” Offered Jennifer. Melissa’s hand moved back onto his thigh. “Show me the ISO 9000 and ITIL documentation.” Melissa looked confused “I don’t think I’ve heard of them are they some type of accounting documents?” Henry smiled inwardly to himself “No nothing to worry about just red tape.” But documenting processes and best practises would save money, he didn’t really want the company but he might be able to do a quick salvage job and sell it on. “Fetch the mayor and the CEO over and we’ll see what we can come up with.”

“Jennifer is talking about splitting the company up, would you like to buy the new software side of things in a management buyout? I’m sure Jennifer can come up with an acceptable price and I’ll match whatever funds you can lay your hands on.” The CEO looked stunned, “You mean we can carry on?” “Yes but it will mean mortgaging your homes and there is a risk involved.” “I’ll sort it all out the guys will be with me.” “Just let me know how much floor space you want. I'll bill you at the end of a year.” Henry turned to the mayor, “I’ve an office building with lots of expensive adaptations for disabled people but I’ve yet to see one wheelchair in there. Can you sort me out half a dozen disabled graduates?” The mayor looked at him “Are you sure?” “I’m sure.” “How long a contract do you want them for?” “Permanent staff.” The mayor started to his feet shaking his head. “Oh and can we borrow the town hall for a meeting?” The mayor nodded. “Melissa, can you get a few messages out and get the workforce down to the town hall?” Melissa nodded.

“I think Ms. Silver here has named me the wicked landlord. Well it's true. I'd like some rent. What the lawyer has proposed is that we split the company in two, the exciting get ahead part that will be headed up by your old CEO and the other mundane part which I shall run. It’s basically up to you which company you join if either but I note that according to the accounts very few of you have had any training recently so if you join my mundane company we’ll be spending money on training to bring you up to speed with things such as ITIL and so forth. Except for trainees there will be no pay raises for a year whilst the company sorts itself out. Which means you will not have any goals or targets to aim for other than survival. Now I think you old CEO wishes to have a few words, after his words of wisdom you may sign up with the new section or the established side of things.” He sat down and the CEO gave his Ra Ra speech and how he personally was going to mortgage his home to provide funds for the start up.

That afternoon saw a trickle of disabled people enter the building. Rather more than the half dozen he had envisaged so he gathered them up and took over the board room on the twenty fifth floor. He looked them over before addressing them. Somehow he’d been expecting them all to be in wheelchairs. “The company has no ISO 9000 certification or ITIL processes in place.” He paused noticing that at least one person with a dog wearing a jacket looked puzzled. One of the wheelchair occupants motioned them across and pulled out their lap top and started typing then paused and looked at him expectantly. It took him a moment to put two and two together then he continued and the wheelchair person starting typing once more. “Companies that have them make fewer mistakes and have lower costs once in place. So I need people to document processes which means I need a mixture of talents, ones who gather information, ones can write clearly, ones who can analyse. I need technical staff so if you have any technical qualifications please let HR know. Finally I need managers as it appears many have chosen to join the sister company. To that end I’ll ask you to fill in the questionnaire that is being handed out. First and foremost I’m after particular personality types for specific roles, so there are no correct answers so don’t try and second guess them.” “Why us? Is this job creation?” “I need half a dozen graduates fast. You're unemployed to start with. I need your brains not so much your bodies. There is a risk with the company which means I might not be able to attract the staff I require and finally disabled staff have a lower turnover which means lower training costs for me. Please indicate on your form if you are willing to work at home and also whether your disability is worse on some days than others, if it is we’ll just put you in a job that doesn’t have critical deadlines. As to is it job creation no by implementing ISO 9000 and ITIL I expect to save substantial amounts of money certainly far more than I’ll be paying you. Basically in the true capitalist tradition I’ll be making money out of you. I confess I was expecting wheelchairs only but I can see from the guide and hearing dogs we have a wider range here. You’d better indicate on the forms exactly what your disability is and what adaptations you’ll need.”

He looked through the application forms and weeded one or two to one side then handed the two piles to Melissa, “Offer this lot jobs at office junior rate, those get offered jobs as managers so the next band up, tell them management training will be provided. Get hold of the local college and see if they can run some management courses for us in the summer vacation.” “But shouldn’t we be paying them higher salaries for being a manager?” “What to sign leave forms and so forth, we’ll try cheap to start with and increase their pay over time.”

The next day at the office he called in the managers he had left into the largest conference room they had. “OK you’ve heard Ra-Ra speeches before but this isn’t a conventional Ra-Ra speech. You have no targets, you have no goals, this is a big corporate culture change and corporate culture changes are difficult and dangerous. What I’d like you to do is listen to the customers and your staff and make incremental changes that make their life easier. Actually I lied, you have target of a minimum of 2% of your budget will be spent on training. There will be a new team that will document our processes for ISO 9000 certification and I trust you will cooperate with them. All staff concerned with computer systems will become ITIL certified within a year, if not we will find them other positions within the company. I’d like those new employees who have joined us today to remain behind after this meeting. Any questions?”

The questions came fast and furiously most were answered with “I don’t know, do what you think best.” After they left he spoke to the two disabled people left. “You’ve probably been taught that managers know all about how to do the jobs of their employees. That’s not true, for the most part your staff have a better idea of what needs to be done than you do. Your role is to sort out the budgets, make sure not everyone takes vacation at the same time, sign the leave forms and the training forms. You probably have no experience supervising and we’ll try to get you on some management courses as quickly as we can. I wish you luck in your new roles. If you have any major problems talk to Ms. Silver here.” Afterwards he took shelter in his old office on the 13th floor where Melissa ran him to earth.

“I don’t understand what you’ve done. You’ve practically given away the development side, the managers haven’t been set any targets, how will we measure their performance? And the idea of having managers that don’t know what their staff do is ludicrous.” “Well sometimes goals actually get in the way, GM for example had a goal of 25% market share, they went bankrupt. Goals restrict your flexibility. The development side, well I’ll matching their funds so I have 50% of the votes and not all the other 50% will vote the same way. They only pay rent at the end of a year but that’ll give them a cash crunch and I can pick up the pieces even cheaper then besides it gets rid of a lot of target oriented managers."

They were interrupted by two girls, one in a titanum sports wheelchair, the other pushing. “I heard you were looking for grad cripples. Heather isn’t a grad but she’s in a wheelchair.” “I’m looking for experienced managers.” He said hopefully. The girl in the wheelchair pulled out her phone, “Dad get over here they’re looking for an experienced manager.” Henry closed his eyes for a moment. “It’s hopeless Crystal. Everyone wants bloody grads these days.” “And you think she’s capable?” “Well between us we are.” “Right then let us see just how capable you are.” He led the way downstairs to the empty offices on the ground floor at the rear. “I want a functioning day care by the end of the week, within three months I want one with at least twenty places.” Crystal looked taken back “Within a week no way, it needs permits and things.” The girl in the wheelchair smiled “We can do it Crystal, but we’ll need some money for toys and such.” Henry pulled out his wallet and handed over $500, “You’ll get paid junior office rate and I’ll want some receipts for the purchases. Anything larger goes through the 13th floor.”

He grabbed a coffee and a cookie and took ten minutes break at the café, by the time he’d returned there was a gentleman in his mid fifties waiting to see him. “I understand you’re after an experienced manager?” He handed Henry his CV and waited. “The problem is that we’re a software company that has split itself into the exciting bit and the boring bit.” “And you want someone to manage the boring bit.” Henry grinned and pulled out the org chart with half a dozen unfilled blanks in the manager slots. The would be manager asked lots of questions about each position which showed a good understanding of the problems then sat back. “Well I can do it, and I can find you good experienced candidates for the other vacancies you have but they’re all a bit like me unfashionable at the moment and over fifty but if you’re happy with that then we have a match.” “You understand we don’t have goals or targets?” “Well they only really get in the way so I’m happy.” “When would you like to start?” “It’ll take me a day or two to get in touch with the other laid off middle managers.” “So on the payroll today and in the office sometime before next Monday?” They came to an agreement on pay and shook hands. Both well satisfied.

By weekend an unlicensed day care for five children was functional, and there was a waiting list for more places. At the end of the following month Henry sat down with Melissa and one of the experienced middle managers he’d hired and was surprised to find the sales figure had shot up considerably. “Why?” “Oh that’s obvious your software is licensed by the year and most company’s financial year starts on the same date for tax reasons so I’d expect most of your renewals to be at the same time.” Melissa looked at both of them, “I never even thought of that.” “Spread the word no pay raises but 50% of the profit goes in bonuses divided according to salary.”

A little while later Amy came in to Henry’s office, “I’m sure he won’t mind, he’s very patient with me.” “What won’t I mind?” asked Henry in a threatening voice. “Nicole was wondering about the birds and the bees and things though what birds and bees have to do with kissing I don’t know.” Nicole had her hand resting lightly on Amy’s arm. Her white stick held out of the way. “Amy’s been acting as my guide for the last few days and she asked me what difficulties I had being partially sighted.” “Partially you can barely make out light and dark.” Amy scoffed, “But she’s ever so bright, she guesses what the words are even when I don’t know them.” “So how can I help?” “Well Nicole was wondering what male body felt like and she wasn’t sure who she could ask.” “Would you let me explore your body by running my fingers over it?” Nicole was young and she was pretty who could resist, Henry certainly couldn’t. “Let me sit down on the sofa then sit besides me then you can grope to your heart’s content.” Nicole gave a little curtsey in the direction of his voice and Amy guided her to the office sofa. “Now Henry likes me to run my fingers through the curls on his chest. Amy took Nicole’s hand and guided her fingers to Henry’s shirt buttons.

Amy’s reading improved by leaps and bounds, Veronica thought she ought to do some sums so now Amy was sat in his lap trying to make sense of a monthly salary and how to pay all the bills. She was coming on quite nicely, she needed a calculator of course but at least now she had worked out what the + and the - signs did. He made her read the bills out as well and explain to him what the on-peak, mid-peak and off-peak rates were and when was the cheapest time to do the washing. Veronica peeped over his shoulder, “Oh is that what all those numbers mean?” “They never told us about when to use washing machines when they taught us sums at school.” Henry lifted out another lurid romance and turned the page to where the heroine was about to melt from the hero’s hot lips and sort to distract Amy’s thought about the indignity of not being told that sums were useful.

Amy was invited out to a drive in, she was very excited about it and spoke to Veronica about what could she do to make the date a success. Veronica thought about it then suggested sitting next to Henry on the settee. “Now turn and kiss him, run your fingers over the back of his neck.” Amy had to be taught Henry’s sensitive spots repeatedly to make sure she got them right but was warned that her would be boyfriend might be slightly different and need a different technique but Amy thought she’d be more confident if she could practise on Henry. So Henry was practised on twice a day even to the extent of having Amy give him a hand job for as Veronica said if it got the sperm out at least it wasn’t inside Amy.

The company seemed to run itself, he heard rumours that the big breakthrough on the new software side was about to happen any moment now but discounted them. His experienced managers seemed better at nuancing which meant happier customers and less calls for help. His two type B wheelchair managers worked out quite well as well as they took their management courses, their staff certainly seemed happier. The variety of disabled workers enabled the software designers to work out how to cater for disabled people, with different options available for visually impaired etc. That was handy as it now met some sort of standard that government agencies had as one of their procurement standards. The sales staff appreciated it as they could suggest that including the relevant clause both looked good and guided the procurement to their product.

It was just about a year later that he was coaching Amy to write joined up letters which she did slowly with great concentration that one of the programmers he remembered had gone to the development work stormed into his office. “I give up, I can’t work for free, have you got anything?” He calmed her down and the sad tale tumbled out. She and her husband had invested their savings in the start up so she felt committed to it but they were running short of money again and so the inspirational CEO had first suggested unpaid overtime then later stock options in lieu of salary. Henry looked at the calendar. The magic year was up. “How far are they off?” “About two years if they keep adding new ideas.” He brought her shares at face value then told her she had a job but to take the rest of the day off. He picked up the phone to Jennifer and the bailiffs, by the following morning he’d forced a vote of the shareholders and sold the nearly completed software back to his first company for a pittance. His new programmer was asked which programming staff were worth keeping on and one of his experienced managers was given the project to tidy up.

Melissa wandered into his office “Now what have you done?” “Who me?” “Yes you. All those poor goal oriented managers who mortgaged their homes have lost money.” “Well they’re big lads and old enough to know better.” “What about you you must have lost money as well?” “Well not that much, they developed the software using 50% of my money so I lost that but it would have cost me more to develop it myself anyway. When the new product is released the company will gain in value and I can sell it off. I never wanted to own a software company in the first place.” Melissa looked shaken. “You mean you don’t want to be boss?” “Not really I don’t particularly enjoy it. It's just not my thing.” “But everyone says you’re the best at it.” “They’ll soon get used to someone else.” Melissa looked him in the eye and walked over behind his desk, kneeling before him she murmured “Well we’d better think of something to make it more enjoyable for you then.” She lowered her head and undid his zipper slowly. She teased his hardening rod out then lightly kissed the tip before lowering her lips over his rod. Amy wandered in and spotted Melissa’s head bopping up and down, “I’ve always wanted to try that can I practise next?”