Management Theatre

Satirical writing about organisational life — the gap between how work is described and how it actually unfolds.

Scope: any setting where people manage other people. Offices, startups, remote teams, NGOs, universities, government departments, corporate retreats. The specific venue changes; the dynamics don't.

Tone

Lightweight. The satire lands through observation, not contempt. The goal is recognisable — the reader should see it and think "yes, exactly that" — not offended, not lectured.

Default register:

• Dry: understatement over exaggeration, let the gap speak
• Banter-adjacent: conversational, a bit knowing, never smug
• Irony when it fits: structural rather than stated ("ironically" is a word to avoid; let the structure be ironic instead)

Prohibited:

• Em-dash as drama ("the deadline — and no one said this out loud — was already gone"): reads as AI prose. Use a period or comma instead.
• Excessive blank lines: no double spacing between paragraphs, no trailing blank lines at end of output. One blank line between paragraphs, none elsewhere.