Education

TIME TO STRATEGY EXECUTION: 45 DAYS

The global strategy is now officially in “deployment,” the initial step in its execution, which is being managed by the Strategy Tracking, Response, Integration, Development, and Execution (STRIDE) office’s Execution group. Our General Assistance and Processing (GAP) team expected that this wouldn’t have an impact on us since we report to STRIDE’s director, Samantha Lazlo, but we were wrong.

“Having taken the initiative to educate the public,” Samantha began in a remote meeting with us this morning, “you will be exclusively helping the Education group roll out its public training program.” I glanced at Maura and Al, who looked as surprised as I was. “Their brainstorming with the test communities has yielded some promising results,” she continued, “and Victor Lansing is anxious to get you involved in field testing them.”

“Is Victor’s group now part of the Execution group?” Maura asked her.

“I’m sorry. I misspoke. Since the Education group also has other responsibilities, within WICO and on other projects, their Extinction Strategy Support team will be a functional report to our Execution group, and you will be reporting to that team. Victor is now exclusively managing its efforts.”

I couldn’t resist shaking my head in disbelief that such bureaucratic nit-picking still mattered. “Will we have any say in the content?” I asked hopefully.

“That will be up to Victor, but I expect not. However, Sally has expressed interest in pursuing any suggestions your team may have, since she is now managing WICO’s response to direct public inquiries. The CORE training you did yesterday was particularly helpful to her.”

“I’ve been wonderin’ what the cybercritter’s new role was gonna be,” Al said.

“That’s just one of her roles. To her, I think it’s more of a hobby.”

“Sure it is,” Al muttered.

Maura called Victor after the meeting. He will give us an in-person briefing this weekend. In the mean-time, he wants us to document what we already shared with the public, going back to our first PEAK tests.

“It’s like submittin’ a sample for a freakin’ job application,” Al said, reflecting my own reaction. 

Maura looked pensive. “I’d like to know what else he plans to do with it.”

Reality Check

My personal experience with organizations informs this scene, along with interest in exploring an intersection of two of my careers: as a test engineer, and as an educational developer/consultant.