Keep and bear arms at the World Cafe

A couple of days ago we posted about an apparently growing business fad in which a group therapy methodology has taken over corporate meetings. [we even had an unfortunately apropos title, as you'll see]. Everyone sits around tables in small groups, gets in touch with their feelings, makes sure not to edit themselves, and expresses their anger at numbers, or whatever, by drawing colors and shapes on liberally distributed white paper. This is being flogged to corporations as the World Cafe method.

Maybe this fad has gotten a little closer to its point of logical absurdity. It took 15 years for the stock option craze to reach the point where everyone could see its underlying Heads I Win, Tails You Lose implementation. As far as we can tell from some web searching, the World Cafe method hit its stride in the late 1990s, but it's already at the point where it was being used as a solution for every corporate problem -- like how to deal with the gun-toting racist on the factory floor who liked to bait black workers into confrontations.

From today's New York Times, we learn that

On Monday, Mr. Williams [Lockheed Martin workplace mass killer], 48, told his father he was ticked off that he would have to attend an ethics and sensitivity training course the next morning, the authorities say. A few minutes after it began, Mr. Williams left the room, returned from his pickup truck armed to the teeth, and began blasting away at close range at people who had known him, and known of his quick temper and simmering hatred, for years.

An earlier Times story had noted the layout of the sensitivity training session in three round tables -- the classic layout of the corporate group therapy session. It's not entirely clear from the Times story, but it sounds like some of the previous victims of the killer's racist stunts were also attending the ethics and sensitivity training session. Because, as some facilitator doubtless told the group, we're not here to attribute blame. And please, make sure to turn off cellphones, and leave rifles and shotguns in your truck before you come in.