The New FedEx Commercial

A man in an office approaches an electric pencil sharpener. Push. Nothing happens. Push push push. Nada. He is nonplussed and keeps trying. Finally, a coworker enters and holds up the electrical plug to show him that the sharpener is unpowered.

Same man in a meeting. Someone lets him get too close to some buttons and he inadvertently hangs up the phone during a global conference call.

At lunch, his meal catches fire in the microwave.

A woman approaches him with a stack of papers. "Can you send this out?" she asks. "I'll use FedEx," he replies. The FedEx guy appears and then must show him how to properly seal the envelope.

I don't know what to make of this commercial. I'm sure the message that the ad agency meant to convey is "FedEx is so great, it will work wonders even for people who always screw up." The message I get is "incompetent people in the workplace are unilaterally tolerated for no apparent reason."

I know, I know. I should not be so intently analyzing a TV ad. But the fact is that there are actual people out there who are comparably as underqualified to hold a job as the man in the FedEx commercial. I know because I've witnessed it with my own eyes. I've seen people who can't tell if a printer is plugged in. I've seen webmasters who couldn't do FTP. Everybody has bad days, I admit, but we all know someone who isn't just an isolated incident. In fact, I bet that you're thinking of someone right this instant who fits the pattern of general incompetence, and you still wonder how he ever holds down his job. Or maybe any job for that matter. Sure, he may be the best basket weaver you've ever seen, but you know damn well he doesn't belong on the same payroll as you. And for some reason, they still haven't canned his sorry butt.

I guess some people are just meant to be basket weavers and they just can't take the hint. The FedEx commercial makes me angry because it takes as its example a guy who should have been fired a long time ago. "Hey," says the commercial. "This guy is a human stain, and if we can still bail him out, imagine what we can do for you." A potent message perhaps, but not one I want to hear.