XI. We all live in the Matrix… or not?

When you land in Las Vegas airport the very first (almost) thing you see is a slot machines and in a few minutes you realize there are slot machines all around. I didn’t expect to find slots machines on arrival even having in mind it’s Las Vegas. I was even more surprised to see some people gambling right at the airport. I could not find a regular taxi on arrival, there are many black big limousines queuing for the passengers, smaller limousines and some other black cars. The price varies from forty to eighty dollars to get to the hotels on the Strip. Finally I manage to find a shuttle bus with the name “showtime” on the board . “Showtime” takes you to any hotel on the Strip for just $ 7, and if you buy also a return ticket, you can save a dollar. It’s piercingly windy, I’m standing in line for tickets for “showtime” and happy that I’m dressed in a proper winter Russian coat. Tickets, or rather vouchers, are sold at a special box office. A nice Mexican looking woman hands me a voucher and directs me to one of the minibuses off to the side. The driver is putting the suitcase in the back of the trunk. Then he goes to the salon and exchanges vouchers with the full-fledged tickets for those who bought a round trip, and from those who, like me, goes only “one way” he simply takes vouchers. And here we go!

My Wynn hotel is on the farthest end of the Strip and we are getting there following the road parallel to the Strip with the memorable name — Paradise road. Dark night, windy and I can hear the sound of the wind. Along Paradise road there are low, poorly lit houses, some of them look deserted, traffic lights at intersections, lonely gas stations, closed tattoo salons. Empty. After half an hour drive down the Paradise we are finally coming to Wynn hotel from the back side. The driver phlegmatically takes my suitcase out of the trunk and leaves, not reacting to my “thanks a lot”. It’s windy. Dark.

The next moment I’m opening heavy doors and … falling into the matrix. The feeling is similar to the movie “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” when the doors open and from the real world the main hero gets into a cartoon. I’m falling from a dark, windy reality into the true paradise garden. This is a natural garden with trees entwined with luminous garlands of light bulbs, flowering bushes, flowers and an amazing mosaic floor. On the left there is a reception, the check-in procedure takes a few minutes and now I’m going to look for an elevator. To get there you have to pass by the huge casino on the ground floor. Of course I expected to see the casino in Las Vegas, I even imagined something big, but what I saw in reality was so gigantic I could never imagine. Hundreds of machines, tables, people and people. Everything sparkles, makes noise, rumbles, rings. I’m walking down the main aisle, dragging my wheeled suitcase down the bright red carpet. All around, half-naked waitresses are carrying drinks to the players, young people dressed up, girls in short evening dresses and heels. Finally the elevator is found and I’m going up to my sixteenth floor.

I have been here for one day only and I walked the Strip from end to end four times in my attempt to understand it. I gambled, visited the show, talked to the beggars and street musicians. By the end of that day my conclusion was that this is a very professionally built fake unrealistic world, the matrix. Joyful crowd walks around copies of Venice, Paris, Rome. Funny enough to see how this Las Vegas matrix has been replicated all around the world. The Turks used the same concept in Antalya where they built Kremlin palace and Topkapi palace hotels. The South African Montecasino it’s simply a copy of “The Paris Casino”. Bellagio has dancing fountains which are pretty much similar to the Dubai ones. What is somehow special in Vegas is that its matrix works around the clock 24/7. In fact, the entire Strip is one giant round-the-clock casino with shopping centres, shows and food outlets. You can’t just walk down the street, go to a café and sit. You go from one giant casino to another. There are many cafés of course, but all of them are inside the casinos. There are no windows in casinos, they are brightly lit all the time so, when you are inside you do not feel time, you are under an impression that it’s always midday and time stops.

Morning, six o’clock. I got up early, I have a plan. Outside of my window sun is rising, sleepy Vegas and red mountains are far away on the horizon. I’m going down, outside. On the ground floor the Matrix is waking up. Cleaning ladies are cleaning carpets, washing chairs, wiping tables. The tables are almost all empty, only occasionally you can see players sitting up with ashy faces and an absent gaze. It’s fresh outside, the sun’s rays warming up this freshness a bit. Homeless beggars are sleeping on the streets. Starbucks is operational though and after a cup of coffee I’m on my way out of Matrix. My way out is a monorail. Monorail runs behind the Strip at backyard of the hotels like the spinal cord. I thought it will be not an issue to find it, but no, the Matrix doesn’t let you go so easy. Finally I found the rail in 20–40 meters in the air and following the rail found the station. My discovery on the way to the station was that the backyard of the Matrix is its supporting Infrastructure. There are endless parking lots, loading and unloading terminals, and so on and so on. And further out is one-story buildings Vegas. I take the monorail and go the the end station next to the temporary closed Sahara casino. There is the bus stop here. I buy the ticket and go out of the Matrix to the downtown of Vegas, of the Vegas outside of the Matrix.

The matrix ends immediately as soon as bus starts to move. There are Hispanics and Blacks only on the bus (with the exception of one Russian) going from the night shift in the matrix back home. We are passing by the quarter of one-story houses with inscriptions in Spanish and a lot of graffiti. There is an old steam locomotive and a carriage next to one house. Downtown looks like regular downtown with an impressive multi-storey local police department and central Freemont street with the offices, restaurants, motels, gas stations, cafes and supermarkets. Regular life outside of the Matrix. I left Las Vegas next day early morning for the 5 days car ride to the East with the Louisville (KY) as destination. I’m still not quite sure I left the Matrix…

The idea of Matrix or Bubble came to me step by step. All started probably from this trip to Las Vegas and then trough the States. 2438 miles via Flagstaff, Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Amarillo, Oklahoma City, Fort Smith, Memphis, Nashville. All of them are very different, when you drive passing by place by place, spending just few hours at every city the impression is like you are moving from one reality to another one, from one world to another one, from one “bubble” to another “bubble”, from one matrix to another matrix, then another and so on. Every bubble been built by people, it’s artificial in that sense, people may live in their “constructed small world” all their life in case they have no need to relocate. But even when they go out, very often their Matrix follows them. They bring their world with them to re-create it at a new place.

737 miles. Santa Fe literally means “Holy Faith”, but there is also a full historical name. Here it is: La Villa Real de la Santa Fé de San Francisco de Asís, “The Royal City of the Holy Faith of Saint Francis of Assisi.” At the moment Santa Fe has about 70 thousand inhabitants and half of them are Hispanics. On the site of what is now Santa Fe, there used to be several Pueblo villages that have settled here since the 11th century AD. Well, the city was founded by the Spaniards in 1610. I arrive in Santa Fe after dark. The hotel Luxx is very authentic, with a variety of Mexican gizmos, orange ocher walls, paintings, old furniture, various artefacts. I ask the boy on the reception where to put the car for the night. He says it’s better to go to the garage, takes his key card and we park the car in the two-story garage next door.

I fall asleep and wake up from the chirping of birds. It is already seven o’clock and is starting to brighten. Snow is falling softly. At eight I was planning to leave in the direction of Oklahoma, so taking a quick shower, collecting things and still have some time to walk around. I open the door to the corridor — it is quiet, empty, the reception is closed (it is located in a separate room). I slip out the side door into the alley. Rare passers-by. Parked cars. On the square under the colonnade, there are two Hispanics and rolled blankets neatly lying in a row. The traffic light flashes yellow. I walk along San Francisco street up the hill to the Church of Francis of Assisi.

Cathedral is old made from sandy stones. Around is deserted, cloudy, chilly and windy, fine snow. I open the heavy door and get inside. Inside is another reality. A large hall with high vaults opens in front of me. White walls with green and red Mexican ornaments. Light is pouring through the multicoloured mosaic windows. A lot of people. I hear the sounds of organ. The service in Spanish begins. People are reading and singing. The choir sings to the accompaniment of the piano… A heavy church door slams shut behind me and fresh frosty air rushes into my lungs. A light snow turned into a heavy snowfall. The snow poured out in heavy flakes, so much so that at a distance of ten meters you can no longer see anything. It’s nine in the morning.

I cheerfully return to my hotel, but the reception is still closed. The car is on the parking and the parking lot is closed. It’s empty around and there is only one café Ecco Espresso & Gelato is opened. I’m asking the lady behind the counter when her hotel neighbour will come at work. The Mexican’s eyes take on a brooding philosophical expression.

- “Usually at nine, but today is Sunday, who knows, they can come at 9:30, they can at 10:00, probably later they can …”

This is encouraging indeed. I take a cup of latte with a cookie, sitting by the window, watching the snow fall … Museum “The road 66” in Clinton town near Oklahoma closes at five in the evening, and it is exactly seven hours to get there. That’s why I wanted to leave at eight. I finish my coffee and walk around the neighborhood once more time, everything is very beautiful in the snow. I’m back to the hotel, it’s almost ten, but the reception is still empty and closed. But I find out that in the corridor there is a cart with all kinds of household chemicals and towels, with which the cleaning personnel usually works. After short investigation, I found three ladies in the back room. “Is it possible to open the garage somehow?” — I asked. Five minutes later, the car was released and exactly at ten I’m leaving Santa Fe in a hurry. The rest of my way through New Mexico, I am pursued by snow and rain, and only closer to the border with Texas the sky brightens. The terrain treats me all the way with the great views, like on the picture or in the movie. Red cliffs protruding from the plains, amazingly white valleys covered with snow with dark green patches of bushes.

1261 miles. It’s not difficult to find “Motel 6” at all, it is almost on the road. The two-story building is like a motel from one of those American movies. At the front desk, a black woman chewing gum. Idly asks for ID and I show my driving license. Few manipulations with my banking card and I’m holding the key from room N130 in my hand. The girl has ceased to be annoyed and now smiles and apologizes. I drag my things into the room, it’s cold inside so I turn on the air conditioner for heating and study the guidebook that I grabbed from the reception. On the first page is an advertisement for Mickey Mantle’s Steakhouse. I decided that if I had saved on a motel, then I would have fun at dinner and I go for a steak to Oklahoma downtown.

Downtown Oklahoma is divided into two parts — new and old. The new part greeted me with skyscrapers, beautiful lighting, graceful sculptures. Oklahoma is really a cultural centre in the geographic centre of America. There is a science museum for children, a museum of cowboys and the wild west, a philharmonic hall, a zoo and a botanical garden, a hippodrome, a casino, a modern art centre, even orangery and many many different museums, galleries and other smaller institutions of this kind. The city is crossed from east to west by two large streets — Reno Avenue and Sheridan Avenue. I’m driving down Sheridan Avenue, passing a beautiful but empty in the late evening new part of town. On my left I’m passing by the round building of the Philharmonic, a huge orangery illuminated in green and purple. On my right is a violet light of the Devon Tower and blue Renaissance building. The navigator leads me further into a low driveway under a rail-road bridge with a sign above the driveway “welcome to Bricktown!”

Bricktown is the old part of the city, former warehouses that have now been converted into bars, restaurants, music venues. There is even a canal for boating. Mickey Mantle’s Steakhouse — in the heart of Bricktown. Unlike New Town, Bricktown is bustling with life. There are a lot of people in the steakhouse, but there are some tables available. The hostess offers a choice of dining room or lounge and I go to the lounge. The lounge turns out to be a bar. Twilight, wood, TV with news on the ceiling, good selection of drinks in the bar. I sit down at a high bar table and start looking at people.

Eight in the morning, I’m already on the highway, I drive past downtown Oklahoma further east. Downtown in daylight no longer seems so elegant, but more businesslike, shining under the rays of the rising sun. Oklahoma remains in the back, and in front of me, hills, copses, rivers and lakes. Greening crops and herds of cows. The smell of a fire and cows in the window. The signs say that I’m passing by Indian territories. Okahoma means “red people”, the name was given in 1866, and earlier this area was called simply “Indian territories”. Very exotic, unusual, but some familiar names from my childhood books: Caddo, Cherokee, Cheyenne, Chickamauga, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Comanche. The terrain becomes flat, there is a descent into the floodplain, and soon I am driving over the bridge over the Arkansas River.

1452 miles. Fort Smith is washed on three sides by the Arkansas River, and the local Americans pronounce both the name of the river and the name of the State as Aaaarkansaaa. The fort has a rich history. It was founded in 1817 and for a long time it was a border fortress and the last white settlement on the way to the west. The name of the fort was given in honour of General Thomas Smith, who commanded the local army unit back in 1817. Fort Smith was captured for a time by the Confederate army at the start of the Civil War, but was recaptured by the army of the North in 1863. During and immediately after the war, the once tranquil town was flooded with runaway slaves, homeless children, deserters and other victims of hostilities. The most substituted resident of the fort is Judge Isaac Parker, nicknamed “the hanging judge.” Parquet served as a judge at the fort for twenty-one years from 1875 to 1896, which were not the easiest for the border state to comply with the law due to the flow of refugees from the east. During his career as a judge, Parker sentenced 160 people to hang, of which 79 were actually hanged.

Now about 100 thousand people live in Fort Smith and the fort itself, from which one building has survived, has been turned into a museum. Deep blue spring sky, American flag waving in the wind, Civil War cannon, dark red brick buildings. There is not a soul around, but in the museum I found three employees who happily jumped on me and explained what’s what and where. I go up to the first floor. Here is a full-size model of a prison — one of the first in the United States with yellow floors, bars, etc. Many stands are dedicated to Indian discrimination, the fight against crime and the civil war, the history of the fort. The room in which Judge Parker performed his judgement is completely intact. On the left side there are jury chairs. In the middle there are seats for the prosecutor and the accused with a lawyer. In the back is the judge’s table with two massive table lamps. Lots of shelves with volumes of books. American flag is on the wall. On the ground floor, the building where the very first prison of the fort was located, it’s called “hell on the border”. Low ceilings, stone floors, bags on which prisoners slept.

My next stop is the Tram Museum right there three hundred meters away. A large hangar, a sign informing everyone: 1. That the museum is open and 2. That for $ 2 you can take a tram ride. The tram on the tracks is right next to it — old, vintage, wooden. And again there are not a single souls around. I open the heavy door and find myself in the twilight of the hangar. The smell of motor oil, metal, rubber hits the nose. Inside is the workshop. Two tram frames are clearly in the process of restoration, the third — finished, yellow, wooden stands right there. “Will be ready soon, probably in few weeks” — I hear a voice nearby. Rather, it sounds like “wiillrrbereaaadyyirsooonnn” due to the heavy “southern acent” which is not familiar to me. The voice belongs to a skinny, grey-haired gentleman. His name is David. David shows and tells me everything about the restored tram. Where the passengers were coming from, how the conductor worked, where the driver stood, what materials they used during the restoration. On the plate with the speed control knob, there are inscriptions of the patents that the tram received. A total of 12 patents dated from 1888 to 1904. Right in the middle of the tram is a huge Siamese grey cat. It doesn’t sleep, but sits on the seat relaxing and looks lazily.

1738 miles. Graceland’s address is very simple — Elvis Presley Boulevard 3734 and I decided I could get there following the paper map without navigator. I drive through the Beale Street — the street fell asleep until evening. Skyscrapers give way to low buildings, I’m passing under the railway bridge, then quarters of one-story, shabby houses begin with garbage bins on the streets. I get out on Elvis Presley Boulevard, but it doesn’t look like a pop music icon place. Maybe I got lost and missed it? After I finally turned on my navigator I see that I’m still five kilometers away from my destination. I keep driving. On both sides of the road there are shops selling all sorts of things — cars, parts, food, furniture. Gas stations, car washes. Suddenly, the houses parted and on the right side I see a semblance of a one-story shopping center and the Graceland Parking $ 25 sign. I give to the parking clerk my dollars and park in an imposing-looking parking lot nearly two-thirds full of big American cars.

The Elvis’ house is rather small. Not indeed small, but smaller than I imagined. I was preparing myself for Graceland and searched Wikipedia. Elvis was born near Memphis in the town of Tupelo on January 8, 1935. There is a niche in a big house, and in a niche there is a model of the house where he was born. This house is perhaps the only thing that somehow catching me (apart from Teddy bear), it is kind of lonely and as if it was not from here. It all started in 1956 when Elvis recorded his Heartbreak Hotel, which immediately sold over a million copies. And in 1958 Elvis joined the army. In one of the rooms there are many pictures of him in the army, where he is so young, in uniform, sometimes he picks up a box, then he stands by the tank. He served in West Germany, where he met fourteen-year-old Priscilla at a party and apparently fell in love. And by 1963 by the age of twenty-seven or eight, Elvis already has everything a boy from Tupelo can dream of — money, fame, Graceland. But his mother died … In 1967 Elvis and Priscilla got married, then their daughter Lisa-Maria was born … It seems that for the next fourteen years Elvis just wants to forget himself in work — records, films, tours. Some unrealistic number of awards — there is a separate house for them. Parties in Graceland — the whole basement is allocated for them — everything is in mirrors, sofas, a fireplace, billiards. Teddy bear, a big Teddy bear, sits in an armchair with a guitar in a “wooden” room. Everything in the room is made of wood and carpets are everywhere. Tourists pass by — 600 thousand people a year, and he sits and looks at everyone with his glass eyes. Lonely, his friend left him long time ago.

The embankment of Mississippi river is wide, deserted, probably due to thirty-five Fahrenheit, the yellow grass is in anticipation of warmth and spring. A gigantic cargo boat of dirty orange colour is slowly creeping across Mississippi. The passenger steam boats are standing at the pier motionless. The steamers are decent — white, with pipes, decks, wheels — exactly as I imagined before coming here. I’m looking for a long time at the barge, at the river, the bridge with passing cars, at the steamers, at an elderly gentleman walking a dog of an unknown breed, at two athletic women running. It’s time to go further.

You see, travelling through such a different places is like travelling from one planet to another one. So, what’s the point of those nice stories I just told you? This is my analogy. The whole world around us is very fragmented and we all live in our “bubbles”. Some people “travel” and “jump” between the bubbles, or may belong to few bubbles even, but some spend the whole life been attributed to one-two cells of this gigantic matrix. There are 300 miles or so between fort Smith and the Teddy bear of Elvis. Two world 300 miles apart. But sometime you do not have to be 300 miles away to be apart…

From Cape Town to Stellenbosch is around 30 minutes drive (if no traffic of course). The mountains you already can see from Cape Town, and when you go to Stellenbosch they approach gradually and gradually more and more details become visible. The vineyards begin. Long ago the Dutch and French came here and planted grapes and learned how to grow them in local conditions and make excellent wine. The soil is red and the combination of green and red colours is eye-catching. Then a picture from a fairy tale emerges. The sky is high without a single cloud, the turquoise blue. Far away are high rocky mountains, sheer, spurs look like the bastions of a fortress. Clouds sit on the mountains and slide down between the spurs a little. Mountains are in cloud caps. You can see every small detail of the breathtaking picture. The mountains are rocky, overgrown with dark green forest. At the foot of the mountains, here and there are estates — small farms, in France they would say “château” and vineyards. Everywhere. Small artificial lakes. Groves. Vineyards. Air. Jacaranda was brought from Australia and has few leaves and many small purple flowers. Large bright purple trees. Red earth, greenery, purple trees as if woven from cobwebs. Air. Sky. Full feeling that I got home, back to my childhood. And the smell of freshly baked buns from somewhere. In the middle of this fairy tail is the Stellenbosch and the Stellenbosch University. Wide streets. The crowns of trees are closed at the top. Many simply beautiful buildings. Biological Faculty, Geological Faculty. Church. Conservatory. Tiled roofs. All inscriptions are in Afrikaans. I see the sky through the tree crowns. Quiet. Summer holidays. The sky, the caps of clouds on the mountains, groves, wine grapes, a glass of redm ruby ​​red wine. Stellenbosch.

From Cape Town to Stellenbosch is around 30 minutes drive (if no traffic of course). The mountains you already can see from Cape Town, but to get there you need to pass by three townships surrounding the city: Langa, Gugulethu, Khayelitsha in the order of appearance. All three townships have very catchy romantic names. In Xhosa Langa means “sun”, Gugulethu — “our pride”, Khayelitsha — “new home”. Prior to the 2010 FIFA World Cup township were surrounded by the nice coloured fences, so passing by N2 road you may not even notice them. But if out of curiosity you dare to get in you will discover the whole new world. Nothing prevents me from going inside the township. The moment I leave N2 the picture changes. I still see the Table Mountain but I’m not longer surrounded by the picturesque hills and vineyards. I’m surrounded by thousands tin houses with walls and the roofs all made from tin. One of those houses from my right hand side has a sign “Mambhele Cash Store” with the Coca Cola logo on it. It’s famous South African Spaza shop. There is no visible door, just a window with the thick metal bars, so you can give your cash and get some food or drinks in return. The Spaza is coloured in blue with the visuals of packs of mielie-meal, sugar, oil and other basic products. I’m getting off my car and approaching “Mambhele”, looking behind the bars. Inside is dark, I see shelves, not many products — flour, oil, fridge with the chicken parts, coke, mielie-meal, soap bars… that’s it. The owner — slim guy, looks scared. He has a strong accent which I don’t recognise. I buy a bottle of Coke and we start chatting. His name is Aaden, his came from Somalie some time ago. The family stays in another tin house nearby, there are 7 people on 10 square meters — him, his brother, their wives and the kids. Brothers are working in the shop, but it’s tough. Locals do not accept them, there were robbed already few times and last year somebody attempted to burn their Spaza. I’m driving down to the street. Dusty. Boys are playing football. Women are going somewhere with the big bales on their heads. Two guys are sitting next to Shebeen with the beer and repairing red bicycles. I turn around and go out of there back to N2.

Namibia is home to about one and a half million people in an area comparable to that of England. In the north, closer to the border with Angola, there is Etosha park with the large lake and a lot of all kinds of animals. On the coast in the north — completely untouched places, the northern part of the “coast of skeletons”, there still tribes live naturally in hut houses. In the very south, there is the stunning Fish River Canyon. Farther south, in South Africa, the Namaqualand region which is a desert indeed, but in the spring in September it blooms amazingly. In the centre of the country is the capital Windhoek and half of the population lives here. While driving through the desert it’s hot, forty degrees Celcium. The landscape is flat. The sky is absolutely clear. Hot. On the horizon, due to the hot air, mirages appear — it seems that there is water on the road, you drive up — the mirage disappears. Far away are mountains. And again another mirage. It seems that there are lakes far away and “upside-down” mountains are visible, their reflection in the “lakes”. In around 50 kilometres from the coast something incomprehensible appears on the horizon. As I drive closer I understand that these are clouds. They stretch like a ruler along the horizon. I drive even closer and understand that this is fog, not clouds and it “sits” on the coastal strip. Finally I enter a dense fog and the temperature immediately drops to fifteen degrees. Here a cold Bengal current approaches the shore, so it is always cool on the sea side.

Swakopmund used to be belonged to Germans, so I feel myself in Germany. German alike architecture, German sausages with beer. The ocean meets me with huge waves. Waves crash with the noise on the pier, and rocks on the shore, leaving fountains of spray. Swakopmund was the German answer to the English port town of Walvis Bay, 30 kilometers to the south. Walvis Bay still has a relatively large port, there the bay is very convenient. But in Swakopmund there is no good bay, there is no any bay at all and the Germans tried to solve this issue with the technology, they built an endless pier going into the ocean. Pier is still here and goes far into the ocean. But the ocean brought sand (the current is very strong) and covered everything with the sand, so the pier became useless for the boats and ships to dock. In the end, nothing came out of this idea and now Swakopmund is just a tourist town. It is always foggy and mysteriously romantic.

Walvis Bay is different, being English colony it has complete different architecture and the port (the next port to the north is only in Angola in 1000 km from here). I’m sitting on the shore at the edge of the ocean in a hotel café, drinking coffee. It’s seven in the evening, it’s getting dark, foggy, it’s always foggy, humid, even chilly, it’s always like that. The coast is flat, flat to the horizon where are dunes, next to me crowd of pink flamingos and some other small birds with bent beaks walk along the coast, and seagulls. The fog merges with the dunes so I can’t recognise where dunes stops and fog starts. It’s empty, no one is there. My passion is oysters. They are farmed in Walvis Bay, I sailed on a boat, saw plantations of oysters, dolphins, again seals, flamingos… Swakopmund and Walvis Bay — two different worlds, too bubbles in 30 km from each other. Different destiny. Port and useless pier. Oysters farms and German sausages. Both immersed in fog.

This chapter is full of travel stories and you may think I decided to disconnect from the business. Not really. Turning to the business practices it’s quite clear that “bubbles” in any company starts with the functional matrix. Every function whatever it is — finance, IT, marketing, manufacturing, sales, all tend to build a cozy, closed, silos type of bubble. The reason behind is very simple — people in every function typically have similar professional background, feeling of belongings to something exceptional, corporate ethic, professional language, targets and measure of success. After all you just read about different bubbles around us, you may agree that this view is equally applicable to the functional corporate matrix. Sometime people may live in their functional silos for the whole life, some people though actively travels between the functions. Very often you may see one functional silos denying another one, denying it’s significance. We may see different success measure applying to different functions which often leads to the “cold war” between the functions.

The are few clichés in the corporate world regarding the relationships between different silos or department. You may remember many stories of confrontation between sales, finance and marketing. But in my experience the biggest chasm lies between blue and white collars, between the “office” and the “plant”. I just counted 18 manufacturing sites of complete different industries I’ve visited during my working life in US, Europe, Turkey, Middles East, Africa, China, Russia. I love going to the plant and observe production cycle for as long as I can. What is special about all those plants? Of course I may tell you a lot about the specific professional language, “6 sigma” culture, culture of savings and efficiency. Yes, it’s all very true, but one phenomenon always strikes me. It may be too generous statement, but in the production hall I feel the energy and the passion of people creating “material things”. Even the packing workers from the packing line are concentrated and focused on the result and you feel that they are proud of themselves completing the shift. And if you talk to the managers, R&D people, quality — everybody who touches the production you feel this proud and passion.

It very difficult to single out one person, but one of the most passionate professionals I ever met was Conrad from Woodford. Woodford Reserve Whiskey Distillery was established in 1812. The life of the distillery wasn’t easy. At the beginning, Dr. James Crow was engaged in the production. In 1879, two businessmen, Graham and Labrot, acquired the entire business, renaming it Labrot & Graham. The historic letters L&G are still visible on the old chimney above the production area — part of the history. Then Brown-Forman bought the distillery, then sold it, and then bought it back again. Modern manufacturing was finally opened in 1995. The equipment was completely changed. They bought and brought three distillation stills from Scotland and the whole process was adjusted according to the technologies of the 19th century.

I’m meeting production Director of Woodford Conor right in front of those Scottish stills which looks like 19th century artefacts. He is telling me his story. Conrad is Scotsman, came to US a long time ago, married here with kids. And then the passion starts as he starts to explain the PROCESS. First we go to watch a mixture of corn, rye and barley flour ferment in few large oak barrels. Special yeast is specially grown. The smell is warm, bready, yeasty. A very gentle smell. Then we go to the cubes — few giant bottles with tubes — caps on top. It’s hot here, the process is going on and the copper stills are so well heated that it is better not to touch it. The whole process is controlled manually. Conor shows how the “head” and “tail” of whiskey are cut off, how the alcohol content in a liquid is measured with a hydrometer. Then we go to the warehouse and walk for a long time among the barrels and there a smell of oak and whiskey envelopes me. Woodford is aged for six to seven years and then bottled. In front of us, one of the barrels was rolled in and opened. Conor solemnly takes a special pipe, scoops up the whiskey straight from the barrel, pours it into a glass and gives it to me to try. Very soft, woody, charcoal, “tasty” taste… You may see nothing special in this story, but at every moment of time Conor was so passionate and explained me all the small detailed with such high level of dedication, that it stayed with me forever.

Let’s move now from the production site to the office environment. Of course there are many passionate and dedicated people among white collars too. The difference probably is in unity. At manufacturing, at least from what I observed personally, in general everybody understands what everybody is doing and what value this or that person brings. Thus, following the same common goal (Net Output, Safety Measures, Level of scrap, etc.) the manufacturing team seems to be more united in it’s mission and thus passion and dedication. White collars are more disperse (again, my personal observation), so very often two people in the office (especially if office is large) may not really understand what value the neighbour is bringing and what exactly she/he is doing. But of course the level of passion and dedication is a complex matter depending on many criteria.

What drives the “wall” between blue and white is not just the difference in the passion. It’s rather the lack of the “bridge”, different language, success measures and background. So the manufacturing very often is a “black box” for, for example, sales people and vice versa. Let’s spend few last minutes of this reading trying to understand is it all possible to break the “bubbles” and make corporate matrix more flexible, agile and lighter.

There is no any magic here and the only recipe I learn is called “multifunctional teams”. If in your commercial team apart from the sales people you have marketing person dedicated to the problems of the team and at the same time connected via dual reporting to the corporate marketing team; if next to the marketing you have supply chain manager doing demand forecast; product manager responsible for innovations and the product and so on and so on, than you have those “bridges” to the other functions. “Bridges” “translate” the commercial needs from sales language into the language of of particular function. I can give you tons of examples of cross functional miscommunication. Once my sales team claimed we have a quality issue but the quality department didn’t accept the obvious (as sales people saw it) fact and the issue was ping-ponged from one department to another for quite a while. When I stepped in I understood that the essence of “quality issue” was that cardboard outer cases were broken while being delivered to the customer. But what sales people called “quality issue” wasn’t that for quality department, because they were dealing just with the quality on the plant. This specific issue belonged to supply chain transportation issue. This incident may be seen as a minor insignificant detail, but believe me those small things may derail a lot of energy from the team and finally affect your performance big time.

What may be the conclusion of this chapter? Yes, to some extend we live in the matrix from “bubbles”. Some of us travels freely between the bubbles, some of us prefer to spend time been anchored in one or few comfortable bubbles. Matrix at work is inevitable and may be even dangerous for the business and mental health of the people, yet it’s still possible to adapt it and make it flexible, simple and efficient.