Howard was a stinker in every sense of the word.
It wasn’t enough that he had become a consulting chemical engineer for a firm that charged fees for surreptitiously dumping industrial chemicals for companies whose legal permits were expired or couldn’t find sites, but two chemical accidents that Howard had sustained with the self-same compounds prior to becoming a consultant had permanently changed his metabolism. As a curious side effect of the damages to his impaired liver, he had begun exuding a penetrating sour reek after the second accident. Howard soon found it impossible to keep his full time job with the honest recycling company with whom he had been employed and was forced to become a part-time consultant for one of the dirtiest companies in the business. Most people were willing to endure his malodorous presence for a half an hour or so, but suffering him more than thirty minutes was more than the average human could bear. After all, it wasn’t as if his coworkers were married to him. His lined, weather-beaten look frightened lesser souls and his gruff, unvarnished social skills could not help counterbalance the social effects of his stench. Howard’s difficult personality did nothing to endear him to his coworkers; they were happy to see him go. If he had been able to display some element of suprahumanity, some knowledge or skill beyond the ordinary ken of mortals, his obvious faults would have been temporarily forgotten and they would have flocked to his side despite the rank smell he exuded. Unhappily for Howard’s social life, aside from his odor, he was a disgustingly normal male of the human species: He was self-absorbed, vain about his dress and as difficult personally as he was knowledgeable in the chemistry of modern disposal techniques. Howard was an absolute expert in his chosen field. As a consequence, no one had the slightest intention of having anything to do with him aside from the absolute minimum necessary contact to conduct business. His lack of character along with his troublesome personality damned him. His odoriferous condition merely sealed his fate.
A short mid-level managerial conference was secretly held and a plan of action was developed to deal with Howard’s problem. Given the laws for medically disadvantaged and handicapped employees, it was felt that simply firing him was out of the question. If they terminated him for any medical reasons other than a demonstrated inability to perform his job professionally, they exposed the company to a potential discrimination suit. If they weren’t careful in choosing the means of his termination, Howard could sue the company for both real and punitive damages. They needed a more elegant solution.
Even though they were managers and unused to logical thought, they were able to come up with a workable solution; if they couldn’t fire Howard, then they could eliminate his job. They could always ask Human Resources to recreate the position later. No one could castigate them for trying to save the company money by downsizing excess personnel. Each department involved, barring Human Resources, would independently contribute “spontaneous” documentation over a period of a month stating that the engineering support they received from Howard’s department was redundant. Since the meeting officially never occurred, it wasn’t necessary to order a statistical cost/benefit analysis of the effect of removing a senior engineer’s position as it would have been had the departments been operating in concert after mutual consultation. For its contribution to the effort, Howard’s department sent a preliminary report stating that Howard seemed to be having difficulties getting along with his colleagues and asked if Human Resources would be willing to fund a course of socialization training for Howard with a psychological resources and development company. They acknowledged that the training would be expensive, but they stated categorically that Howard would have to improve his “people” skills in order to effectively deal with other personnel at the company as well as customers. The noted that although Howard was a recognized expert in disposal, his attitude seemed to have a negative effect on potential clients.