I am Allesandra Mayforth with Deer and Dove Magazine. Today, I am at the home of Maximilian Macpowers, the CEO of GravenStone INC.
Mr. Macpowers, thank you for meeting with me in your lovely Swiss Alps home.
The pleasure is all yours, Miss Mayforth.
Your reign at Gravenstone has been quite tumultuous since the cartel agreement between your company and three other manufacturers of mood-sensing chocolate.
First, the rest of the management and I are very sorry that somebody found out, but in our defence, we did it because we wanted to make a lot of money.
It sounds like you don’t feel any remorse at all.
Miss Mayforth, a company’s sole purpose is to make money. We do not care about our employees; they are there to make money for us. I can assure you that the minute we can replace them with robots or monkeys, they are out of a job.
I must say you are very honest. Has there been a discussion of an apology in some form out of respect for your customers and to show a tiny glimmer of regret?
Miss Mayforth, you insult me; of course there has been a discussion of an apology.
To your customers?
Not at all, no, the real victims here are our shareholders, rich men and women, the backbone of this country. I get emotional just thinking about it. One of our largest shareholders called me the other day in tears because he had to lay off a lot of his staff in order to buy another yacht.
You would think if laying off people affected him so much, maybe then he would have forgo of buying a yacht.
No, you see, the reason he was in tears is that firing people is a lot of work, but don’t worry, he is happy again. We pledge to give the shareholders a larger percentage of our proceeds, and we stand united as a company. Our staff have unhappily agreed to take a pay cut so we do not default on our pledge. I know all this sounds fantastic and to further improve our image the company website now has a tip button so when a customer makes a purchase he or she can press the TIP button to leave a tip to the staff.
Let’s say a customer leaves a 5-dollar tip; how is it distributed among your employees?
And how many employees do you have?
We have 10,000 employees, and the way it is shared is that all the tips get compiled into an account, and twice a year, the money goes to me and the rest of the management. But do not fret—we also have a pizza party where the staff buy pizza for themselves so they can eat outside of work.
I am afraid to ask if there are no employee benefits.
Sure, they get paid almost on time and get to work for an amazing company.
There are chairs to sit in. Furthermore, we have a road-to-recovery program where if an employee feels stressed, he or she is fired immediately because then he or she would not feel stressed anymore, well, at least not about this particular job.
I’m sorry, Miss Mayforth. I have a tee time in an hour, and we must part ways. I am sure this has been a wonderful experience for you.
I do want to thank you for your time and the nightmares.