Chapter 3: Who Killed the Sparq?

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"In dreams and in love there are no impossibilities."

Janos Arany

Chapter 3
Who Killed the Sparq?

The SUSPECT: Mark

Previous chapters:
Chapter 1: The End
Chapter 2: Ideas Lost

In his ‘den’, the light from a tablet computer playing a film with whites, greens and vivid reds, the only light source in the room, plays on the still features of the man in the armchair. The armchair is old, battered but looks extremely comfortable. Is it this comfort which makes him motionless? He barely seems to be breathing and his eyes, once shiny with energy and wonder, are now only shiny with tears. The next morning, Monday, he would be missed. They would say many things about him. They would say he ‘died’ of worry. He ‘died’ of overwork. He’d watched his fellow employees, people he’d worked with for years, turn from friends into colleagues into adversaries, as wave after wave of redundancies and mergers had broken the soul of the company he’d once been proud to work for, and made concepts like ‘pride in a job well done’ and ‘pride in really providing phenomenal service and products’ sound dated and out of touch. Finally the vicious cost cutting and headcount reduction had got to him – not directly but through the project he’d put so much of his dreams into. In the end it had all seemed pointless, the daily strain of striving to be the ‘last man standing,’ in the modern era’s corporate version of ‘The Weakest link’, keeping your head down to top up your pension, which probably wouldn’t be worth as much as you had hoped.

There had to be more to work than that. More to it than exchanging 10 hours each day of your life for a little bit of money. He would never work for an organisation which lacked a soul ever again.

Some would say Mike had ‘died’ of a broken heart. They would all be wrong. He’d ‘died’ when the spark went out.

This is taken from the manuscript of Prof Eddie Obeng's new book Who Killed the Sparq? We'd love to hear your feedback in the comments below.

Want to read more?

Chapter 4: Mother of Invention
Chapter 5: If You Don't Mind, I'll Have Your Watch Please
Chapter 6: I Wouldn't Have Started from Here
Chapter 7: Weeding Out the Weaklings
Chapter 8: Still Hunting and Gathering