Tuesday, November 17, 2009

My love affair with knowing your birthday

As submitted to the company newsletter in November 2009

The Water Cooler, huh? To the new hires, I still recall when I first received the Water Cooler. As a recent college grad eager to usher in a new era of freedom from material misstatement to the wild world of financial reporting, I pretended to read the OneVoice and Technically Speaking, but let’s face it, I didn’t get as riled up about consolidating Variable Interest Entities as my senior did.

As a new hire, the Water Cooler was something I could really get into. Pictures, restaurant recommendations, wedding announcements. Over the years, I have come to understand and appreciate the other Deloitte email newsletters and have even gotten excited about updates to the New Audit Methodology.

Over the years, I have also learned what truly makes a great newsletter here at Deloitte.
  1. It helps if you can get a mascot, a face and voice to the newsletter, kinda like Oprah is to O magazine. AERS Weekly has Tommasino; One Voice boasts Jeff Kottkamp as its cover model; we have Ed; and Barry Salzberg is always sending out his own newsletters.
  2. Colors are crucial. It’s Deloitte; the tasteful use of a palette of colors is encouraged, as long as the only colors used are blue and bright green.
  3. Links, tons of links are always encouraged. They make your publication look researched and important. That’s why each month, when we compile the Water Cooler, we insert at least 15 fake links. Just bold a few words and people will think there are tons of data and additional information for whatever you just sent.

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