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今天上午一上班，我第一件事就是给Interflora花店打电话，订了两束花，一束送给《金融时报》总编辑安德鲁•高尔斯(Andrew
Gowers), 另一束送给坐在我隔壁的同事黛乐•布莱德肖(Della
Bradshaw)。
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The
first thing I did when I got to work this morning was phone Interflora and
sgroupstwo bunches of flowers. One was for Andrew Gowers, the editor of the
Financial Times, and one for Della Bradshaw, a colleague who sits in the
next cubicle.
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我口述了感谢词，感谢二位的辛勤工作，但是要求花店不留我的名字。我还多给了10英镑，让花店务必在三小时内将鲜花送达。
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I
dictated a message of thanks to each for their hard work, but asked for my
name to be left off the card. I paid an extra ?0 to ensure the flowers
would arrive within three hours.
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在我急切地等待送花之时，我想解释一下我到底是在玩什么花招。这种秘密献花的主意来自新泽西州托托华（Totowa）的一位读者。肯尼•莫尔（Kenny
Moore）是美国能源公司Keyspan的人力资源总监。其个人经历也颇不寻常，他曾在天主教会当过15年的牧师。他告诉我说，他在工作中“负责唤醒公司的喜乐、意义和承诺意识。”
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As
I sit here now anxiously waiting for the delivery, I shall try to explain
what on earth I think I am playing at. The idea for these mystery floral
tributes came from a reader in Totowa, New Jersey. Kenny Moore is director
of human resources at Keyspan, a US energy company, and is a little
unusual. He spent 15 years as a Catholic priest and told me that in his
job he is "responsible for awakening joy, meaning and commitment in
the company".
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我在工作中总能收到不少怪人发来的邮件。肯尼也算一怪，但是他基本上是属于脑筋正常的那种。他说他没有时间拜读诸如汤姆•彼得斯（Tom
Peters）、杰克•韦尔奇（Jack Welch）之类人物的大作，也没有时间去推动制定使命宣言、实施文化变革、提高员工士气之类的企业行动。这话出自一位人力资源总监之口，不可谓不正常啊。
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In
my job I get a lot of e-mails from nutters. Kenny, though odd, struck me
as being basically of sound mind. He said he had no time for Tom Peters,
Jack Welch or for any corporate attempts to issue mission statements,
change culture or raise morale en masse - which coming from a corporate HR
person is very sound indeed.
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相反，他从儿童图书中去找点子，比如《亥奇先生，有人爱你》。这本书中，孤独的亥奇先生收到了一份礼物，上面写着“有人爱你。”亥奇先生开始和陌生人打招呼，希望能遇到他的仰慕者。他的个性从此陡然一变，所有的邻居都开始爱他。最后，他才发现原来礼物是误送给他的，亥奇先生于是想回到自我封闭的生活之中。但是邻居却不答应他这样做了。
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Instead,
he drew inspiration from a children's book called Somebody Loves You, Mr
Hatch. In this book a lonely man gets sent a gift with the label
"somebody loves you". He starts greeting strangers, hoping to
meet the admirer. He undergoes a personality change, and all his
neighbours start to love him. It then turns out that the present was
delivered to him by mistake, and Mr Hatch tries to go backsintoshis shell.
But the neighbours will not let him.
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要是让我看，我一时还看不出这个愉快的故事能给企业什么启发，但是肯尼就看出了门道。他决定在公司里秘密实施亥奇先生试点活动，他做此事是抱着这样一个可贵的原则：做错了请求原谅，总是比申请批准容易。
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The
corporate lessons of this cheery tale are not immediately obvious to me,
but to Kenny they were. He decided to conduct a Mr Hatch pilot in his
company without asking anyone - on the admirable principle that it is
easier to ask forgiveness than permission.
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他送出了两束鲜花，一束送给同一层楼上班的一位妇女，另一束送给主管高级副总。他说，“我本人讨厌当权的人，但是我也注意到，从来没有人对高层主管说‘谢谢’。”这一点我本人也是认同的。
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He
sent out two bunches of flowers, one to a woman on his floor and one to
his senior vice-president. "While I personally hate anyone in
authority, I notice that no one ever says 'thank you' to executives,"
he said. I agreed with that bit, too.
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订完鲜花之后，他却有一种莫名的不安，正如我现在的感觉一样。但是他的担心是多余的。收到鲜花的那位妇女虽然不知究竟，但仍觉得开心，其他的妇女则围到她的桌子边大呼小叫。
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After
he ordered the flowers he felt, as I do now, strangely uncomfortable. Yet
he need not have feared. The woman was delighted, though mystified, and
other women gathered round her desk and oohed and aahed.
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几天后，他到副总那里准备如实交代，但他还没有开口，他的顶头上司就说他从一位感恩的员工处收到了一束鲜花，因此，他准备在退休前几年侧重于满足各位职员的需求。
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A
couple of days later he went to own up to the SVP, but before he could say
anything, his boss said he had just received a bunch of flowers from a
grateful employee, and that as a result he was going to spend his last few
years until retirement concentrating more on the needs of individual
employees.
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刚写到肯尼的试点活动取得令人振奋的收效，就听到黛乐接听电话，是要她去前台领鲜花的电话。她拿鲜花回来的时候，我一直在看着。她脸上带着笑，但表情却是迷惑的。在读附卡的时候，她把头稍稍低下去，嘴里说道：“上面是说：‘感谢你的辛勤劳动’，但是没有署名。真是要人命啊。”
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As
I write about the heartening results of Kenny's pilot, Della has just
taken the call telling her there are flowers waiting for her in reception.
I watch as she returns carrying them; she's smiling but her expression is
puzzled. Her face falls slightly as she reads the message. "It says:
'Thanks for your hard work', but it's not signed. This makes me feel
really paranoid," she says.
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“这可是不妙啊！”邻座的一个人叫道。另外一个人说：“老天，有人在跟踪你呢。”
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"That's
really sinister!" exclaims the person who sits next to her.
"Christ, you've got a stalker," says someone else.
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但黛乐不愧是记者。她立刻拿起话筒，给花店拨打电话。此时，我真想一头钻进电脑键盘里去。幸运的是，花店的人说不能透露送花者的姓名。
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Like
a true journalist, she snatches up the phone to call the florist. I try to
bury my whole bodysintosmy computer keyboard. Mercifully the florist says
she cannot reveal the name of the sender.
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“总编辑也收到了一束，”黛乐说。“真是奇怪。”
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"The
editor has got one too," Della says. "It's so weird."
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最后，大家一致同意，这是个愚蠢的公关噱头，大家于是都对此事失去了兴趣。没有人去想，或许真是有人诚心诚意地感谢她确实付出的辛勤劳动。她说，“我想不通，他们这究竟为什么要这样做？”
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The
consensus is that this is some daft PR stunt and everyone loses interest.
It does not occur to anyone that some genuine well-wisher would really be
thanking her for her genuine hard work. "I mean, why would they do
that?" she says.
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我下楼去看秘密献花在总编辑那里有何反应。他刚乘夜间航班从华盛顿回来，在赶写采访美国总统的文章。我从他门上的玻璃孔中看过去。看不见鲜花在或不在。突然间，我意识到他不会对此事感兴趣。这些鲜花绝对不会促使他决定在我们身上花更多时间（这并不说明我会赞同此举）。
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I
go downstairs to see if I can find out how my floral tribute is playing
with the editor. He has just stepped off an overnight flight from
Washington and is writing up an interview with the president of the US. I
peep though the glass hole in his door. I can't see if the flowers are in
there or not. Suddenly I know they are not going to interest him at all.
They are certainly not going to make him decide he wants to spend more
time with us individually (not that I would necessarily advocate such a
course of action).
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肯尼的试验成功之后，他开始每周秘密送花。他说，他并没有成功地改变企业文化。但是他这个小点子能让他开开心心地开始一周的工作。负责供货的花店自然也很开心。总之，他每周能让两个人感到开心，而且还能引起一些愉快的困惑。
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After
the success of his pilot, Kenny has been secretly sending flowers out
every week. He says he has not succeeded in changing corporate culture.
But his little scheme makes him happy on Mondays. It also makes the guy
from the shop who supplies the flowers happy, makes two people feel good
each week and causes a good deal of pleasant bemusement.
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而我的试验失败之后，我是不会再去尝试了。这一做法不能奏效。我在想，在接受感谢的时候，我们只有在认识感谢者（并且重视他们）时，他们的感谢才会让我们觉得舒心。如果肯尼知道了这一点，他应该不会感到吃惊或不高兴。他说得对，这些小点子是不能模仿的。在一个地方适用，换到另外一个地方，其魅力就可能消失殆尽。总之，大家都应该想出自己的主意。
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After
the failure of my pilot, I shall not be extending it. It did not work. I
suspect this is because it is only nice to be thanked if you know (and
value) the person who is thanking you. I don't think Kenny would be
surprised or hurt to learn this. He says, and here he is right, that
small-scale initiatives cannot be copied. They may work in one place but,
if you translate them, the magic may be lost. People should think up their
own things, anyway.
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或许这正是我失误的地方。我试验的失败还有一层原因。上文中我只说我送了两“束”花。事实上我送的是两支天可怜见的金鱼草，再平凡不过了。更要命的是，它们看起来如同男性阴茎。这也是有原因的。我把我的试验活动算入了业务开销，我会要求报销的，理由如下：1)我是合理合法用此举来寻找写作启发；2)我认为肯尼买花是报销的。我的点子并不好。但是，至少没让《金融时报》花多少钱。
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So
that was partlyswheresI went wrong. There is a second reason why my
experiment was a flop. I said earlier that I sent two "bunches".
In truth I sent two pathetic, bottom-of-the-range single antirrhinums that
had an unfortunately phallic appearance. There was a reason for this, too.
I was treating my pilot as a business expense, which I shall be claiming
on the grounds that a) they were legit research for an article; and b) I
think Kenny claims his. It wasn't a great idea. But at least I did not
cost the FT too much money.
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作者电子邮件：lucy.kellaway@ft.com
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lucy.kellaway@ft.com
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译者/柏林
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