His stay at the pond was in the end longer than planned. Well, if the CEO wanted to take a one-week recreational break, who was to say no? He was reachable through his secretary, if something important happened, that the department heads, team leaders, and senior agents couldn't handle, after all.

  Playing with the Catfish… ehmm… evaluating the Senior Agent’s diligent work was actually refreshing and relaxing. He even visited the fake mill to evaluate the spider's work too. He could have sworn, that a lot of employees from different Zones made their escape just as he was nearing the structure – but that was impossible. Why would employees from different teams visit another group, that wasn't even in their direct line of subordination?!?

  That one of the spiders snatched something like a silken thong in the last second was even more impossible.

  “Boss, the Department Heads are asking for a meeting.” Janine interrupted his fun of laying on the ground and watching a willow grow. “I have stalled them for the last two days, but they are getting impatient. Please go, and have a meeting!”

  If the managers weren't even telling their secretaries to contact his secretary but were calling Janine directly, something was most likely incredibly important.

  “All right. I'm on my way to the Executive Meeting Room. Tell them, they should prepare the presentations!" Of course, Zoli took a detour to his mansion to change into his CEO garb (Hawaii shirt and matching shorts). All in all, it took only two hours to arrive.

  “Morning, folks! What’s the meeting about?”

  “Good morning, honored CEO, sir.” The Executive Team chorused.

  “We have finished the project in evaluating a proper, standardized scale for the model and the figurines.” Raymond started the meeting.

  “Oh, that is good! Please present the outcome!”

  “Yes, honored CEO, sir. After evaluating every possibility, we decided, the most efficient scale would be 1:1200 for the terrain and 1:16 for the figurines.”

  “Outstanding! You assertively administrated adaptive alignments!”

  “Yes, sir, thank you, sir. Furthermore, we fashioned two covalent innovations too. We put a warning on the figurines, see? 'Not to scale!' Also, we integrated these little pins with attached flags into the networks. They are color-coded, with a small representation of the employees. We can pin them to the approximate place, where the employee will work."

  “Also, my guys made these figurines, representing adventurers.”

  “Customers.”

  “Yes, those too. They are the same scale, as the employees, so the honored CEO could review the approximate sizes." Winston started putting a selection of other miniatures on the desk. There were folks in heavy armor, brandishing huge shields, shifty-looking folks with hoods and daggers, other folks with bows, and even a few guys and girls in nightgowns and pointy hats. All in all, there were close to two dozen different miniatures.

  “We took care in representing gender equality." Winston clarified the question, Zoli was just formulating. "See? The one in the chain bikini is a female, and the one in the chain trunks is a male. We made sure, that every possible job is represented both by a female and a male. Also, please note, that miniatures for the same job show the same amount of skin."

  “It was our idea!” Jenette declared proudly “Although we had to scrap most of the figurines, because they were inappropriately clothed, and remake the whole set. Proudly promoting professional partnerships is key”

  Zoli agreed wholeheartedly. If the company was caught being sexist or promoting female exploitation by showing barely clothed specimens, the fallout would be colossal. Advertising was one thing, but internal working materials? It took only one disloyal, evil whistleblower to make different departments pull overtime! On the company’s account, nonetheless!

  “I approve of the progressively matrixed enterprise-wide process improvement. The little pictures are a nice touch. Dedicate a wall to all the employees, including their pictures and organizational places. It will enhance team spirit and relationships!”

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  “Yes, honored CEO, sir.”

  “Remember, there is no 'e' in 'team'! Collaboration and idea sharing are the bases for best practice sharing! Implementing collaborative communities will lead to excellence!" Zoli declared

  “Yes, sure, boss. If you say so." Burke was even more negative than usual. What was his problem? Couldn't he agree with more positivity? This was almost sarcasm!

  “Honored CEO, sir." Colette took over the stage "We have also discussed the challenge of not having exceptional infrastructures in the Zones."

  “Oh, the hiking trails! Please share your findings!”

  “Providing intrinsically networked goal-oriented infrastructural metrics would just decrease the revenue, the customers will provide by negotiating rough grounds."

  “Yes, boss. If we don’t have prepared trails, the adventurers will need to search for interesting places with loot. Besides, making the trails would cost us.”

  “So, if we forget the hiking trails, it would generate revenue, while at the same time it would decrease investments?”

  “That is correct, honored CEO, sir.”

  “All right, forget the hiking trails!”

  “We have also assessed the viability of relocating the entry point to company property." This time it was James from Corporate Security, who reported. "Optimizing metrics and promoting functionalized solutions, we have narrowed the new location to three points." James pulled up Zone 1's map "Here, in the extreme North of the Zone is our least viable point. The customers could reach Zones 4 and 5 without much effort, basically bypassing the whole of Zone 1. However, the location provides an excellent overview of Zone 1 and hints at the exceptional geography of the other Zones. Even Zone 2 and 3 can be seen from there, and the Zones on the hills. That would be Zones 6 to 12."

  “But the location is maintaining the current location’s challenge of flexibly negotiating Zone 1 without providing revenue by utilizing our customer service.”

  “Yes, sir, that is correct. The second proposed point would be at the confluence of the two streams in the extreme South of the Zone. It isn’t much better, but at least it is close to Ground Zero. If anything, we propose to choose the first possibility.”

  “Hmmm… And the third?”

  “That is the favorite of most of the departments. It is located here, about a quarter up from the hill's Southern end. Zone 2's Eastern hill can be clearly seen from there, and also the very edge of Zone 5, but the steep side of Zone 1's hill dominates the view."

  “Dramatically delivering distinctive perspectives!” Jenette exclaimed.

  “Have you conducted market research?" Zoli tended to choose possibility three, but without proper research and investigation, picking a solution was like inviting disaster.

  “No, but we made this poster, boss," Burke said and showed a nicely done advertising poster. It featured the view from the proposed point, with quite a clever application of perspective and a snarling Fox at the center. On top 'The Grandest Dungeon of all the Multiverses!' was written, and on the bottom 'We will kill your ass dead!'. "Marketing gave her okay for the design."

  “An objectively harnessed extensible product!” Zoli congratulated the managers. If nothing else, a perfectly done motivational or advertising poster could make the difference between excellence and mediocrity. “Relocate the entry point to this place!”

  “Yes, honored CEO, sir. A wise choice!”

  “Also, make a few such posters, and hang them in the office space. Oh, and brainstorm motivational posters for the cubicles. The employees should feel motivated to work even more diligently! Do you think, distributing motivational posters to the Zones would help the employees in the field gain excellence?”

  “No, sir, I don’t think so.” Dana deliberated “We would need to place walls or signs up, and I doubt the employees in the Zones can read in the first place. Being literate wasn’t in the job description.”

  “All right, but make the posters in the offices happen! This is a priority! You could also instruct the teams to come up with designs and slogans on their own.” Outsourcing such creativity to the wage slaves was done at least once a year in Zoli’s previous company. The employees always felt appreciated and thought, the company gave a damn about their existence. Some of the posters were even useable. Not the ‘Please, let me work! Don’t wanna do this shit!’ ones, though. The moron, who submitted that poster was fired anyway. “Keep up the good work! See you next time!”

  “Honored CEO, sir!" Ellen cut in, just before Zoli could have left the meeting. All the other heads were also nodding like it was planned "Now, that the challenge with the different scales for the model and the figurines is resolved, can we seamlessly transit to frictionless growth?"

  “Yeah, boss, we should discuss Zone 5. The devs have some funny ideas there.”

  Zoli just groaned. They already discussed two wildly different topics – and he could tell from experience, that expediting the elastic expertizes for a new Zone would take time. With Burke at the meeting and all the ideas his underlings had, Zoli would need to do hours of hard work!

  There is no 'e' in 'team'!

  Zoli is actually right here. An 'e' is pronounced in most of Europe as an [e], while 'team' is pronounced as [ti:m]. An 'I' would be pronounced as [aj]. So, there is really no [e] in [ti:m]!