chapter
7
Very interesting, Mr Bond
Jerry once came back from a meeting with HR and informed
us that he had been told to brush up his appraisal techniques.
‘They’ve told me that every negative comment has to be preceded
by some positive news.’
Jerry looked out of the window. ‘What a beautiful day,’ he said.
And then he looked at Jonathan Spurrier. ‘And you are the
biggest idiot that ever walked across the earth.’
By now Jerry’s workforce was thirty-strong and we all laughed.
But I was starting to feel sorry for Jonathan. Jerry’s humour often
crossed into bullying. His latest torture was the Rapid Fire Round.
At the end of each day Jerry would pick someone at random.
They were given an evening to prepare a topic. The next morning
they had to stand up in front of the whole department while
Jerry red off questions. It was an ordeal all of us had to suffer but
Jonathan was chosen more often than the rest of us put together.
One morning Jerry, his clothes reeking of cigarette smoke and
gin, made Jonathan stand up and tell us what he knew about
bonds.
The old principle/principal trade-off
‘A bond is a debt obligation.’
‘What does that mean?’ Jerry interrupted.
‘It’s like an IOU. A company or government issues a bond. It
promises to pay the investor interest payments and to pay back
the amount of the loan.’