When is Wayne going to let up on this idea? Sure, a whale watching pavilion sounds good in theory, but as part of a commercial development? I’m not convinced. What has whale watching got to do with financial apps, which are our primary product?
I mean, I get it. Wayne’s stuck on this thing about a whale representing ‘the big guy’, and having one’s eyes on the horizon and so on. It’s a pretty obvious constellation of metaphors, if you ask me. Of course, Wayne didn’t ask me – he just told me it was happening, and now I’m supposed to execute it as part of the office redevelopment. It just feels irresponsible to our shareholders, you know?
I realise that, when it comes to design for office interiors, Melbourne is reasonably open-minded, but that’s not really the point. My concern is more of the budgetary persuasion. A whale watching pavilion is not only extravagant and excessive, but also a weird distraction from what we actually do here. It’s something that’s sure to get lots of attention from niche commercial design magazines and so on, but which will ultimately confuse our message unnecessarily.
What is our message? It’s that we develop apps that are secure and robust enough for use in financial applications. A whale watching pavilion, by contrast, says that we are throwing around money on what is essentially bling. In my view, that’s something to be avoided in commercial office space fitouts. Melbourne might be in favour of loud statements and shiny things on the whole, but there’s still a time and place.
How do I break this to Wayne? Maybe I could lie and say that the board rejected it – make them the bad guys. I could tell him that the budget wouldn’t stretch to it, or that there’s some kind of council restriction standing in the way of such a build. Or I could just suck him up and tell him I don’t like it.