"That's a funny sort of name," said the assistant director of IT, squinting sideways at the résumé. "Got a 'J' in an odd place. I wonder how you are supposed to pronounce it? Hedge-berg? Hoojul-berg?"
"Ah, that'll be a Scandinavian then," said the head of personnel (for it was a rather old-fashioned and reactionary financial institution, and the personnel department was fighting a rearguard action against being turned into mere "human resources"). "Sophie and me had two weeks in Sweden last year," he added, by way of explaining away such an embarrassment of expertise.
The Token Actual Techie, who had been extracted against his will from his PC-filled den and made to sit in as the third member of the hiring tribunal, stirred. The better to address his suited colleagues, he stopped gazing out of the boardroom window over the city of London below and — a great concession this — ceased foraging in his starboard ear with a Palm Pilot stylus. "Wossiz name again?"
The head of personnel told him.
The TAT looked thoughtful. "Think I've heard of him. Isn't he something to do with an uncertainty?"
"No, you're thinking of the atomic cat-in-box man," said the head of personnel. "Anyway, that guy is some sort of boffin, and I think he's dead. I don't see him applying for a programming job at Lost Bearings Bank."
"I don't know," said the assistant director of IT, darkly. "The amount of money you made me offer, I wouldn't be surprised if King Bloody Arthur himself returned from his 1500 year sojourn to apply, claiming expertise in Web security strategies."
"Now come on Dennis," said the head of personnel, "we've been all round this a hundred times. If you want top people — and God knows we need them right now — you have got to pay top dollar."
"It's all very well you saying that, it's not your budget. Yes, yes, all right. Lets get on. I take it he has the usual qualifications? All the Oracle stuff?"
"You mean Shiny Suit Level 2?" muttered the TAT rebelliously. He had resumed the search of his aural ducts and was now wiping his stylus on the sleeve of his XXXL Lara Croft The Movie T-shirt. If the language of clothes was to be believed, his probing had not gone unrewarded, nor had it been the first such investigation since the last washday.
The head of personnel, watching with helpless fascination, swallowed involuntarily and then redirected his attention to the CV. "Well no, according to this he hasn't got any qualifications like that."
"A chancer. We're wasting time. Next, please!" said the assistant director of IT.
"Well hold on a moment, Dennis. He does come very, very highly recommended by the agency. Apparently he wrote a compiler back in the 1980s, using assembly language."
The TAT's interest quickened. "A compiler in assembler eh? Does it say which machine? The BBC B? Or the Commodore 64? I was a pretty dab hand at 6502. I wrote a pretty neat compiler myself for the 64. It was this kind of macro language that let you set up sprites…"
"And he is a great expert in Pascal…" said the head of personnel, inserting a hasty EOF in the reminiscence stream.
The TAT's interest turned to disappointment. "You what? I thought you said he was hard. Next thing you'll be telling me he wears floral underwear. Or that he spent two years programming in Java."
"Actually…" said the head of personnel.
"So where is he working now?" interrupted the assistant director if IT, with the air of a man getting to the bottom of the matter.
The head of personnel explained.
"He's a Microsoftee! You want to employ a Borg?" screamed the TAT.
The assistant director of IT seemed to share his apprehensions. "An ex-Microsoft bloke! Hells bells! No way! Absolutely no way!"
"He'd want to keep switching to the Microsoft API du jour — we'd never get a project finished!' said the TAT, showing an uncharacteristic interest in productivity.
"We could never be at ease with him," added the assistant director of IT. "He'd be wandering around the building in his lunch break, counting how many copies of Word we had running."
The head of personnel looked at the suddenly united representatives of the IT department and sighed. "Very well. It's you gentlemen that would have to work with him. Lets pass on to the next candidate." He dropped the CV on top of the "No" pile and picked up a fresh one.
"Funny name," said the assistant director of IT, twisting round to read it. "Got a "J" in an odd place. How are you supposed to pronounce it? Bee-yarny? Burr-jarn?"
"That'll be another Scandinavian," said the head of personnel.
