Michael, 41 Manager ready to snap (Male DOM path)

Michael Coriolanus, 41. A Manager who has been stymied in his career by the actions of several collegues and superiors.

Michael leaned back and threw the Bluetooth headset on the desk in disgust. This was utter bullshit. They already struggled with two big projects and not enough manpower...real manpower not a few stop-gap contractors who needed months of learning the very special tools and processes they used, and left again just when they got competent because the board decided to cut contractor budgets twice a year. And now he got handed "The Folly" with the explicitly stated goal to finish it within a year.

"The Folly" was the pet project of their former CEO and now Chairman of the Board. The useless idea to build a high tech, premium service business in bumfuck Africa. Not the arguably kind of wealthier parts, no Sir. Smack in the poorest parts, because of the "growth potential". Never mind that most people there had better things to do with what money they had. Never mind that there was no way they could build up the infrastructure from scratch. Never mind that most people didn't have bank accounts to make the monthly subscription payments the way the "plan" required. Never mind... a hundered more reasons this was stupid. Never mind that one year was not enough to get this going in a place like France or Australia where they could do normal business.

And everybody knew. Except the Old Man, obviously. They did the analysis several times over the years. They had teams over several times. Did meetings and workshops with local partners. Signed agreements. Failed. Every. Time. This was the Project-that-never-died and it killed the cerreers of more than one manager who had to take over that Charlie Foxtrott of epic proportions.

And now it was his turn it seems. Not enough he was still stuck at a Director level years after he was promised a VP slot.Next year would see his budget and headcounts slashed, accounts reassigned and his PA switched out for a dictaphone. If he was lucky.

He sat there boiling inside, but on the outside only the white knuckles of his right fist and a little throbbing vein on this temple betrayed his state of mind.

He was used to control himself utterly. It served him well when he was in the Army and again when he went into Business after...the incident.

A single, sharp intake of air and then he relaxed himself. 'Focus' he thought.

Situation? FUBAR. Solvable? Maybe, but not by conventional means, he lacked the backing and influence...or he wouldn't be in this situation in the first place.

He stood up and walked to the window of his office, looking outside onto the green strip between the building and the brightly lit parking lot beyond without really seeing anything.

He had been too passive, reacted instead of being proactive, defended when he should have been the attacker. He had thought like a civilian and a naive one at that. Maybe because he had been so fed up with his service time and rather pleased with the work he did with his team here, actually building something new. He had been to comfortable being a good manager, nice boss and good husband. Well, the latter had not really been true this last couple of years of struggling to stay on top of things.

He frowned and reached for his mobile, but stopped. First things first.

Jackson and Eve... that was the root cause. And to a lesser degree Raymond, the CEO. Jackson had been a rival since day one. Michael never had been sure why he had rubbed the Guy wrong, but he clearly had.

Tall, blonde, handsome, ex Athlete, MBA from Princton, the stink of old money from down east all over him... guy had it all in spades and a payed ticket to the very top in his pocket. But for some reason he seemed to feel threatened by the new guy and it remained so over the years as both made their way up in a similar pace. Maybe it was the overblown competitive spirit of his past, maybe something deeper. Michael did not really care that much, as he was not very interested in the office politics and high school drama many of his peers seemed to delight in. Obviously that had been a mistake, as he learned when Jackson got the VP slot that had been promised to him.

Eve...the ice-queen bitch of legal. Jacksons Senior both in age, position and brains. It was obvious that she had groomed the guy for a few years now. Probably to serve as an asset in her inevitable push for a seat on the board, replacing old Henry her direct Boss. Henry was a tough nut to crack, but the day he had enough and left to relax on his Ranch and spoil his grandchildren rotten could not be far off.

Raymond. CEO, charismatic gasbag and biggest Arrow in Eves quiver. Raymond was all smiles and handshakes and a real Star with customers and partners. Best salesman the company ever had, but that's about it. He had no clue about the rest of the business or even cared about it. Which served a lot of Board members and investors just fine. And Eve had some sort of pull with him, that eluded Michael so far. Maybe it was just sex. He would not put that beyond either of the two. Eve because she was laser focused on her career and Ray...well because he had a dick and an ego as big as his homestate of Texas. But it did not really add up, at least not in as easy a way as a simple affair. There must be more.

That took care of the opposition, now to his own options.

Option One: Give up. Do a half-assed job on "The Folly" while updating his CV and look for other opportunities. He had a good name in the industry and surely would get some offers. When the fecal matter hit the rotary device, he would take a nice big severance package and a sabbatical. Spend time with Laura. Maybe sail a few months in the carribean. Knock her up like he knew she wanted, even though she never brought it up. Kids would be nice, he had been stupid not to want any so far...

not after...

He growled and his teeth ground together loudly before he managed to control himself again. He would not go there, not again. It was bad enough that he still had the dreams from time to time.

No. Option One was out, even though it was alluring. He had been a fighter all his life, he would not go out without a fight this time.

Option two: Go through the Board to get rid of "The Folly". Yeah, sure. That was November Golf. He had no allies there and pissing off the Old Man would not improve his odds.

Option three: Play dirty. Since he could not succeed going through the usual channels, he had to go outside. He needed better intel. Jackson and Eve would not have started a power play if they did not have more cards in their hand than the one they played just now. Jackson because he did not have the balls... all those years he never directly attacked him. Eve because she was too smart not to have a whole bag of tricks in reserve. He needed to get an idea of what they were before he commited himself.

He needed more allies. He had a very good rapport with his peers and most of the VPs, but this went beyond their influence. With one exception. Carol, Eves direct subordinate and arguably the one who did most of the real work in legal. That would be tough, she probably was very loyal or the Ice-Queen would have had her replaced a long time ago. Still...

HR would be a very important asset. The Head of HR was Cassandra Mills. He actually liked her, but she was very good friends with Raymonds wife. Tricky. One of her lieutenants then?

He went back to his laptop and quickly clicked through the intranet, opening the org charts. Recruitement? No, too junior, hardly even finished her own onboarding. Payroll? No, Jerry Grimes was an asshole of epic proportions and a bootlicker extraordinaire, always trying to get Raymond to pull him into his inner circle. Hmmm...Employee Relations? Not a VP? The others all had gotten the bump last year when tricky Ray "trimmed down the overhead" by appointing more chiefs to oversee less indians. Catherine Jaeger-Browne. He had seen her a few times, but never really talked to her. She seemed rather likable. And easy on the eyes if he was honest to himself. Slender, but with womanly curves, moccha skin, very sociable. There could be an angle there maybe.

What else? The PA network. The ladies (and very few guys, the patriarchy still went strong) knew everything that was going on. They had to to do their jobs after all. He and his own PA Janice got along very well, maybe she could get him into the good graces of the Net...especially the PAs of Jackson, Eve and Ray would be a treasure trove of good intel of course. But even if he didn't get to them, there where several others well placed to aid him.

There were more, but he had to be reasonable, there was only so much he could do on his own. Maybe after he got a trustworthy partner or two...

Well and then there was the last option. He hesitated about that one, but this was not a moment to be squeamish. His In-Laws. Betty and Charles held a small but noticable chunk of the company and had some small influence over the board. Well Betty did and Charles waved it around to impress others and to piss off the plebejan ex Army Captain from Illinois who dared to marry his little southern Princess. Still, it got him the Job here in the first place and Charles did shut up most of the time, after he had proven to be good at his new Job, making enough money to afford the Princess' life style. Not that Laura really cared that much. She was much better than he deserved, at least lately.

Michael sighed and straightened up. The analysis was done, now to formulate a battle plan...