Boardroom Cricket
Author:
Des Peelo
[Full text] The fact that articled clerks do not enjoy themselves any more poses a grave threat to the future of the Irish accountancy profession. Chartered accountants, never noted for their humour anyway, will lose the little they have unless principals recognise that an integral part of an embryo CA's education is the necessity of enjoying himself. Higher wages, more interested supervision by principals more on-the-job training, stiffer exams, all these and more have eliminated the joy of being an under-privileged articled clerk forced to tailor your social life to the reality of the �£1 per week less stamp.
In the past the foundations of many a successful career in finance were laid on the necessity of making expenditure match income while an impecunious articled clerk.
A knowledge of debt management arose through being in permanent hock to the petty cash. In the writer's office there was one particular operator who, despite enjoying the same income as the rest of us, was never short. Always prepared to make an offer on your watch or pen and dealing in everything from foreign currency to second-hand comics that he used to sell to a little shop off the quays, he is now, needless to say, a merchant banker.
The ability to delegate was fostered by handling the annual intake of new recruits. These were treated as total greenhorns and quickly trained as "go-fors" to fetch fags and cream cakes for the morning tea, make forays to bookies and undertake similar high-level duties.
One particular new recruit who, being a graduate, adjudged himself above this system and rebelled, was quietly dispatched by a contrived message from a partner to collect an alleged pre-ordered tin of tartan paint from Dockrells. The chastening outcome, besides being hilarious, suitably brought him into line with the system. Similarly, rumour had it that the toll collector at the foot of Nelson's Pillar was driven mad by greenhorns sent down to check his takings.
Stock sheets from a supposed stocktaking at Dublin Zoo were also handed to greenhorns with the accompanying admonition to "price and extend that." The unfortunate recruit would spend the introduction to his career asking how much an Indian hippopotamus was worth and would then be closely questioned by another straight-faced accountant as to its weight and age and then given a suggested value. He would learn that snakes were valued by length, depreciation due to age would be explained to him and the fact that yellow parrots were more valuable than green ones would be imparted.
Your general education could always be expanded by a trip to the matinees in the Green cinema where, along with half the mitching school kids in Dublin, you could thrill to the daring exploits in The Revenge of Zorro or Riders of the Purple Sage provided you could put up with university students, popularly known as the Earlsfort Terrace mob, throwing toilet roll streamers around.
Examiners' reports nowadays consistently complain of mis-spellings, poor English and the inability of students to express themselves logically. Clearly, articled clerks nowadays lack the advantages that I had; my spelling was improved enormously over the first two years I spent mastering The Irish Times Simplex crossword and then graduating to the Crossaire. One fellow actually mastered The Observer crossword, regularly, though it usually took him all week to do so.
Our ability to think and express ourselves logically was sharpened by prolonged exposure to 'Battleships' and 'Pushalpenny.' Constructive thinking and an understanding of venture capital was encouraged by poker playing and the buying of drinks for office typists.
Boredom with a sole trader's records written on sugar bags could always be overcome by dialling phone numbers at random and telling the recipient that you were the Post Office engineering branch and a fault had been reported on the line. Not surprisingly with the Irish phone system, almost everyone agreed that their phone was faulty and the ploy then was to get them to sing a song or recite a nursery rhyme so you could 'test' the sound waves on your special monitoring equipment. One person kept the assembled 'engineers' sitting around a boardroom table helpless with mirth for most of the afternoon as he repeatedly recited Jack and Jill and sang Danny Boy.
Other lucky recipients of phone calls were informed that they had been selected to participate in a phone game quiz with prizes ranging from a ton of Cadbury's Lucky Numbers delivered to their doorstep to a lifetime's supply of Daz. Three questions was the standard quiz, with simple questions such as 'Who won the Second World War?' - being followed by more intricate questions like 'What is black and white, lives up a tree and can be dangerous?' - to which one woman's reply of 'a skunk' had to be referred to the adjudication committee as the official answer was a 'magpie with a machine gun.'
You could always ring Arthur Guinness, Son & Co (Dublin) Ltd, and ask 'can Arthur's son come out and play?' whereupon the switchboard girls, used to these antics, would tell you that he was sent to bed for being a bold boy, or else connect you to the company doctor.
Other diversions included the Billiards Hall off Trinity Street, where contests were arranged between the various College Green offices. Cricket in the boardroom was always good for a rainy day when a ball of wet blotting paper wrapped in elastic bands was bowled against a batsman wielding a broken chair leg. Alas our cricket came to an end when one day the office dragon unexpectedly entered the room and literally stopped what was surely a brilliant six from a full sized cricket bat specially brought in for an intended two-day tournament encompassing the staff from an adjoining accountant's office.
Some audits had a status attached to them, reserved for senior articled clerks only; for instance, the audit of a well known department store where there was a large range of pretty girls to be chatted up, hot-buttered toast to eat with the morning coffee and fashion shows to be attended. One particular articled clerk, newly promoted to the job, had the misfortune to bump promptly into a girl he had totally misled the previous Saturday night as to name, rank and occupation.
We discovered 'on-the-job' training long before the Institute thought of it. New recruits were shown how to balance unbalanced trial balances quickly to an accompanying jingle (sung to the tune of
You'll wonder where the
yellow went
When you brush your teeth
with Pepsodent ..
"You'll wonder where the difference went, when you..."
Bank reconciliations always balanced, control accounts always worked out precisely, my gosh, we were efficient! Oh yes the thrill of telling girls at rugby club dances that you were studying medicine in Trinity or were a pilot with Aer Lingus - alas no more: articled clerks nowadays have a different status and are viewed as good if dull prospects.
Accountancy Ireland Vol 35 No 1 February 2003