Best Friends

My friend, Sgt. Grump, is funny – kinda like Oscar the Grouch… but even more sarcastic.

When our company decided to conduct a survey to check on our morale, our Florida office scored particularly low on one of the questions. So, he circulated the following e-mail. I think I am going to use this as a guide for life.

Due to our low ratings on the “I have a best friend at work” question, we are each going to be assigned a “Best Friend”:

• All our names will be placed into a container, and we will each get to draw our new “Best Friend”.
• Persons drawing their own names must put their name back in the container and select again. If their name is the only name left in the container, they MUST trade for another “Best Friend”. (See below.)
• Selected names may be traded, but each person MUST end up with EXACTLY ONE “Best Friend”. (i.e., No one shall be friendless at any time.)
• Trades involving a “Best Friend to be named later” are forbidden. (This would violate the previous rule.)
• A single trade may involve more than two traders. (e.g. – “A” trades to “B” who trades to “C” who trades to “A”.)
• Cash and/or other considerations may be included in any trade with the agreement of each (trading) person involved.
• Persons ending up with their own names will be fired.
• New Hires will randomly select (i.e. – “draft”) a “Best Friend” from among a pool of everyone based at that corporate office. The person losing their “Best Friend” will receive the New Hire as their new “Best Friend”.
• When a person is terminated, their “Best Friend” is given to whomever has the Terminated Employee as a “Best Friend”. If that results in the person getting their own name, they have until the end of the following business day to make a trade, or else they will be fired.
• Persons unable to attend the drawing shall select a “Designated Drawer” to perform the function of selecting a “Best Friend”.

Optional Rule:

Allowing multiple “Best Friends”…
For instance, we could each place our name into the container THREE times, and draw THREE “Best Friends”. Thus, we could have a “Double-Best Friend” or even “Triple-Best Friend”! And since it is required that we have only ONE “Best Friend”, some people could become collectors! Just imagine the trading sessions!