NICOLA COFFIELD

They say that the five stages of redundancy* are 1/Shock and denial 2/Anger 3/Bargaining 4/Depression and 5/Acceptance. They missed out 6/Tidying and 7/Tedious maths.

I'll address 7/ first. I've been doing all manner of maths that frankly our HR department should be doing, because they are useless. So useless that they don't even call themselves HR, but 'Employee Services'. There's little in the way of service being provided though. The standard response to any query seems to be to copy you in as they forward your email to yet another clueless admin. The result of this electronic ping-pong is that I know I'm being made redundant in two days, but not how much pay in lieu of notice I'm receiving  nor when I'll receive it. I have a rough idea, but the draft redundancy schedule I've been provided has no breakdown, obscure holiday entitlement calculations, no end of notice date and no deductions for tax and NI. This has led to be discovering that there are a wealth of handy calculators online for trying to work out such things - it's a pity that our Employee Services bunch are clearly strangers to Google.

As for 6/, today I have discovered the joys of trying to pack six years of your working life into one suitcase. I'm surprised that in this digital age, I still have a suitcase full of paper AND 3.7GB of files to take into the next life. You'd think a modern go-getting designer could just pack up their typefaces and go, but I apparently can't do without the paper samples, the branding guidebooks and of course the finished products, dozens of which got slung into the suitcase with wild abandon (it should be worth noting that I've saved nothing in the way of payslips or appraisal info.) Realistically, I don't know what I'm thinking I'll do with all this stuff. I just know I'm not ready to let it go yet.

So I've handed over my projects. I've taken the comedy decorations off my cubical. I've scrubbed the fonts folder. I've said goodbyes, and now it's just the official business of being made redundant, and then getting pissed in the pub afterward. And then? I go home. Watch the job market. Wait.

Comedy client requests are like buses. You wait for ages and ages, and then three come along at once. Wonderfully, they're all from the same client. The piece is a single A3 poster, featuring a photo of one of our most senior partners, with a line of text promoting one of our high-profile business competitions.  The following requests have been submitted by an assistant director in marketing:

1/ Do we have to have the sponsors' logos on the poster?

2/ This is an internal only poster, so we don't need any contact info or further instructions for people.

3/ Can we change this line of text to read "We have access to the UK's largest company's [sic]"

The answers, were of course, as follows:

1/ Lady, let me explain how the concept of sponsorship works. Sponsors typically pay us money so their logo can get plastered all over our stuff. If the sponsor's logo doesn't get plastered over our stuff, they take away our money and then we can't make any stuff. Basically, the short answer to your query is "YES".

2/ If we take out the text you've requested, the poster will consist of the senior partner's HUGE face and a slogan that essentially says "I like [X]".

Client response: And?

Me: Well, if you're not going to tell people how to find out more, who to contact, or why they should care, you might as well have a big A3 poster of me, with the slogan "I love midget gems!".

Client response: But that would be weird.

Me: Yes. I know.