Inside Knowledge of the Game

     Did you ever see the 1992 film, "Glengarry Glen Ross?"
It has a superb cast: Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, Alec Baldwin, Alan Arkin, Kevin Spacey, Ed Harris.

     It's an examination of office politics and "manipulating people", as a metaphor of the American Dream.  As part of my college's Organizational Behavior class, we watched their typical roles of "office politics" and identified what was going on.  However, I was the only student in the class that "caught" the ending… which greatly pleased my professor.  

     Despite all the manipulation, bribery, salesmanship, cheerleading, and threats between all the powerful characters, the finality of the movie is that nobody can win... if they obey the guidelines.

     Why?  Because Kevin Spacey's character (the office manager) was giving all the brokers a list of names that would never actually produce enough sales.  In fact, Spacey knew that some of the names were truly worthless.  Which harkens to his fraudulent "cheerleading" and "coaching" when he brings in a supposedly "top-selling" realtor (Alec Baldwin) to woo and lure his own salesmen to work harder for him.  Baldwin's character--with a custom suit, new sports car, and the apparent trappings of success--tells them that all they have to do to become as rich as him is to "work from the list of clients".  If they just keep "putting their nose to the grindstone" and continue working hard at their stressful underpaid jobs, then they'll eventually reach the top.  And they blindly believe him.

Thus, the company pushes them into a contest: first prize is a Cadillac (that is so "American"), second prize is a set of steak knives, and third prize is getting fired.  Great company, huh?

     Al Pacino's character seems to get the closest to reaching the top of their company's contest.  But, at the last minute, he fails because his too-quickly-created deals collapse.  Jack Lemmon's character is the most desperate and worn-out from his constant failures to succeed.  None of them figure out why they're not advancing.  That's when Spacey's character casually informs the audience that the client list he has everyone working from will never produce results.  The "company-issued tools" are deliberately faulty.  That 30-second moment is probably the most important Life Lesson in the entire film!

     Somehow, nobody else in my class noticed it.  That it was a "rigged game"--a "rat race" that none of them would ever win because it was set up that way on purpose.  Baldwin's character succeeded by "going outside the box" (which isn't revealed in the film), yet he was helping to lie to the lower salesmen to keep them toiling away.  The American Dream is only a dream: a mirage to lure gullible people to overwork themselves within preset guidelines (paths) that are futile.  Just like the American Dream, the characters in the film are told to blame themselves if they fail.  They never realize that they exist in a rigged scam.

Open your eyes.  Know when to "hold" and when to "fold".