The other day, my company made a tiny but completely avoidable mistake with a client after forcing corporate BS into the situation.

Here's what happened. And it involved four people: myself, Colleague, Colleague's Boss, and Client.

For extra clarity, Colleague, Colleague's Boss and I work together, but we're parallel. So I'm not directly in the same chain of command, so to speak.

Anyway, Client got in touch with Colleague's Boss, who told Colleague to tell me to create a product for Client.

I created a product for Client and that point, the logical thing to do would've been for me to send Client the finished product for approval.

But no. I was required to send it to Colleague, who would then have to send it to Colleague's Boss, who'd then send it to Client.

It's important to point out that these extra steps were unnecessary.

Once the product was finished, it was up to Client to say yes or no, Colleague and Colleague's Boss had no say in the matter, and couldn't create product - only I could - so they were just messengers.

To cut a very long short, Colleague sent product to Colleague's Boss, who then failed (forgot?) to send product to Client, which means Client eventually got in touch with me directly.

What I wanted to say: "No idea why you didn't receive it. Not my fault because I did my job. Maybe *they* forgot to send it over".

What I had to say: "apologies, I thought it had already reached you, here you go."

This felt really stupid. We made an avoidable mistake - in this case it was a simple delay - for absolutely no reason.

In the olden days, when my parents' generation were looking for jobs and finding them, the hierarchy was clearer.

Role, seniority, and pay generally coincided and reflected one another. And the role was clearer.

Today, you've got people who are technically below you that are making more than you. And viceversa.

You've got mindless job titles that mean nothing. You've got roles that intersect in all kinds of confusing ways. Different people doing different versions of the same job.

And of course the inevitable rise of ridiculous LinkedIn posts and comments.

It all looks pretty stupid to me.

But who knows, maybe I'm getting it all wrong. Maybe this is the right way to do it.

Yeah, right.