The Expert on Everything

When the new manager arrived, he immediately announced that he was an expert and the Christmas party was going to be early. This was because his preparations for the upcoming and very busy winter season were already underway. All the staff had better be bracing for “The busiest season ever.”

Because of all the bluster and the storm of emails that were apparently as foreboding as they were numerous, everyone was ready for a Christmas party.

In preparation for “the party,” the new manager was asking that all the staff write letters to Santa and deposit the notes in a “mailbox” set up in the breakroom. The letters should be anonymous—the new expert manager explained—because an unsigned letter would be better when the letters came out at the upcoming party.

One by one, the letters from the staff began to fill the slapdash Santa mailbox. Despite a few giggles when the letters disappeared in the slot, and open criticism when the new boss was out of earshot, the correspondence to Santa began to accumulate.

On the evening of the party, pizza and soft drinks made a less than impressive spread on the table of a conference room. After the reluctant staff had only a moment to socialize, the strict new boss began to explain the exercise with the Christmas letters.

When everyone was sitting before him, the boss smiled his creepy smile, opened the mailbox, and produced the first letter to Santa. For the “party,” the new boss had prepared an overhead projector. Without preamble, the first letter, complete with folding seams and a childish scrawl, appeared in a harsh projection.

With almost everyone beginning to giggle under covered hands at the wording of the first letter—who was clearly a young woman voicing her wishes that Santa bring her a new boyfriend for Christmas—the new boss and expert on efficiency began to explain the proven science and history of handwriting analysis.

With every staff member at the party suddenly past giggling and now bordering on apprehension, the new boss began his explanation: “The first publication regarding the analysis of penmanship was in Italy in 1622 and given the title How a written message may reveal the nature and qualities of the writer. In 1870, a French Priest began cataloging handwriting traits and gave birth to the term graphology.

In the early 1900s, graphology became a method to determine loyalty in employees and possibly detect criminals. In 1933, the FBI began to study the graphology of ransom notes in kidnapping cases, but the handwriting analysis of criminals did not emerge as a forensic science until later.”

Suddenly, and without warning, the “Christmas party” began to feel like a trap, and more so when the creepy man who was the new boss snickered and began to explain that the letter from the young woman wanting a new boyfriend was showing the writing traits of a person who was ridiculous and a hopeless romantic.

The next letter to Santa was clearly “a joke,” the boss explained with the sly grin of a Grinch. This was a person requesting a pay raise and paid time off to visit Santa at the North Pole. The penmanship revealed the author was clearly the “class clown.”

As the following letters came out, the new boss continued to ridicule the authors. One letter was clearly written by a perfectionist and instantly identified the author as the Internet Technology provider. She was asking for a high-tech device she had been requesting for weeks. The new boss then confessed that the IT job would soon be obsolete and replaced with artificial intelligence.

One by one, the projected notes fell under the scrutiny of the new boss. With at least a quarter of the letters, everyone instantly knew who wrote the note, because most of the staff were friends.

When the final note for the evening came out, the new boss could not stop his sudden scowl. The letter was short and to the point. Unlike many of the others, the author of this note was a mystery. The spidery writing was slanted, cramped in an extreme fashion, and did not appear as the other friendly scribbles of the previous letters. This letter was requesting a list of unusual hardware items that were clearly noxious and bizarre.

After more than a moment of awkward silence, the new boss shook his head as if to clear a runaway imagination. He then began to scrutinize the staff who were not the obvious authors in the sneaky handwriting evaluation.

The members of the staff who were still anonymous were stoic. There was no clue waiting in the silence as to the author of the murderous list of dangerous articles. The new boss went pale as he searched the faces of those who were watching.

The following day, the new boss resigned. The owners of the business announced they were now searching for another manager, but this time they were looking to promote from within.

When the next new manager, who started as a kitchen helper, became the new boss. The young woman who was the Internet Technology provider peeked in the office door that was now always open.

“Just so you know,” the IT girl began, “I overheard The Expert on Everything bragging on the phone about how he was going to shake everything up at a bogus Christmas party and learn how to exploit everyone with his superior knowledge of handwriting analysis. After that, I copied a serial killer’s writing I found on the internet and slipped it in with the rest of the letters. After hearing the jerk brag about being such an expert on everything, I knew he would leave when he thought his job might get dangerous. Congrats on the new career. Merry Christmas!”