Ten Steps to Oblivion from the Desk of Solstice McEwan

‘Some are born to lead. Others are simply too slow to step back.’
—Memo from the frontline of team-building exercises

 

My name is Solstice McEwan—named, according to my mother, for ‘a celestial moment of balance, rebirth, and radiant light’. I now manage the rota for recycling bins and once cried during a fire drill.

Leadership, in my case, wasn’t so much seized as quietly abandoned by everyone else until I looked like the only adult left standing. Which is ironic, really, as I’ve been emotionally winded by passive-aggressive Post-its and once lost a week to a printer jam labelled ‘user error’—a phrase I took personally.

So when I found myself ‘volunteered’ to sort out a minor scheduling tangle—just a few diary clashes, a deadline, and the vague sense that something somewhere needed aligning—I thought: this is my moment. My birthright, at last. Not the radiant light part, obviously. Just the balance. And maybe a touch of Excel wizardry.

Solstice Wisdom #1:

• Never hesitate. That’s how you end up in charge of things no one wants to do.

The first thing I did was set up a group chat. I called it ‘Team Comms’, which in hindsight was like naming a lifeboat Titanic 2 and inviting everyone aboard with sparklers. I added everyone I could think of. And I mean everyone. Including someone who was on parental leave, someone who was leaving the company, and Ben—who replies exclusively in raccoon GIFs and once asked if ‘Q4’ was a Star Wars reference.

Within moments, the chat had burst into glorious dysfunction. Sarah suggested a poll. Mark asked if we could ‘just vibe this one’. Someone posted a photo of their cat on a keyboard and wrote, ‘Working hard or hardly working?!’. My original question—regarding availability—was now buried under digital confetti and the sound of my soul gently exhaling.

Solstice Wisdom #2:

• A shared problem is just gossip with formatting.

Undeterred, I did what any desperate man with too much access to Google Sheets would do: I made a spreadsheet. It was clean. It was logical. It had colour-coding, drop-down menus, and a note field for ‘personal blockers’. I even included conditional formatting that would flash red when deadlines overlapped. I spent my Saturday on it. I cancelled dinner. No one opened it.

Solstice Wisdom #3:

• ‘Teamwork’ is conformity in casual dress code.

Instead, Sarah told me it was a bit ‘spreadsheety’. Ben responded with a raccoon dancing on a pie chart. Mark suggested we ‘hold space for less structured input’. And someone else—whose name I still don’t know—uploaded a PDF titled Meeting Flow as Energy, which I can only describe as a hand-drawn mandala with time slots.

Still, I persisted. Because in my head, I was the last grown-up left. The one sane man at a circus of whimsy and trauma dumping. I believed, earnestly and without irony, that if I just explained the logic clearly enough, they’d all fall in line. Spoiler: they did not. They formed a sub-group to discuss ‘unhelpful hierarchies of information’.

Solstice Wisdom #4:

• Vision isn’t shared—it’s diluted.

It came to a head during what was described—without apparent humour—as a ‘collaboration clinic’. There were beanbags. There was pan flute music. There was, at one point, a woman with a ukulele singing about empathy. I was asked to draw how I felt using crayons. I sketched a spreadsheet. Then I drew flames. Then I doodled myself on fire, waving a Post-it.

We broke into small groups to ‘co-create meeting values’. Mine proposed punctuality and purpose. I was outvoted by a motion titled ‘mood flexibility’. One person said we shouldn’t ‘fetishise outcomes’. Another said ‘eye contact’ was colonial.

Solstice Wisdom #5:

• ‘Unity’ is just loneliness in group chat form.

Then came the trust exercise. A backwards fall into waiting arms. I fell. No one caught me. They said they thought I was joking. I wasn’t. Later, in the car park, I was led blindfolded on a ‘sensing walk’. I walked into a recycling bin and apologised to it. Old instincts die hard.

Solstice Wisdom #6:

• Being in the same boat means you all drown politely together.

Eventually, the project concluded itself. Like a dog running off during a walk and eventually returning with a limp and a strange smell. There was no deadline met, no milestone celebrated. Just an email that said ‘think we’re good?’ and a link to a Google Doc titled Final Maybe Real One v6.

I was not included in the sign-off. Ben got a shout-out. Sarah got a plant. I got an invitation to a retrospective I wasn’t invited to.

And yet—I persisted. I turned up anyway. Sat quietly in the back, clutching my notepad like a man expecting a hostage negotiation. I nodded. I scribbled. I tried to look like someone who mattered. No one noticed. Until Eliza Marris walked in.

Dr Eliza Marris: Head of Strategy. My muse. My intellectual crush. My weekly reminder that I am a man who once tripped over his own shoelaces during a Zoom call. She smiled at me. The kind of smile you give a dog in a jumper—amused, affectionate, and certain that it’s not your problem. She said,

‘Solstice, you’re still here. I admire the loyalty. Or is it inertia?’

I laughed. Possibly too loudly. Then stood up, knocking over my chair and accidentally activating my digital recorder. She helped me pick it up. She asked, eyebrow raised:

‘You’re recording this?’

I said,

‘For accuracy’

Then added,

‘And for posterity. In case someone needs to do a podcast one day about… governance.’

She patted my arm.

‘You’re a rare breed.’

I wanted to say something smooth. Something clever. Instead, I said,

‘You smell like a pine forest’

Solstice Wisdom #7:

• Speak your truth. You’ll wither. But eventually, you stop noticing.

Later, during the ‘Reflections Circle’, we were encouraged to share our lessons learned. I said,

‘Don’t trust hyperlinks in WhatsApp’

No one laughed. Ben clapped ironically. Then, of course, came Tristan Vale.

Tristan never appears. He arrives—with hair like ambition and a jaw that looks like it was sculpted by performance metrics. He said nothing for the first twenty minutes. Just nodded at people. One woman blushed. Someone handed him a coffee he hadn’t asked for. Then the facilitator said:

‘Tristan, anything to add?’

He looked thoughtful and said:

‘Sometimes, clarity isn’t about data—it’s about direction.’

They applauded. I dropped my pen. It bounced, hit my foot, and rolled under Eliza’s chair. I reached for it and headbutted the table.

Solstice Wisdom #8:

• The best communicators say absolutely nothing—just beautifully.

At lunch, I tried to join Eliza and Tristan at their table. They were discussing stakeholder paradigms. I attempted a casual lean. The table was foldable. I went down like a Victorian fainting goat—legs tangled, hummus airborne and one breadstick lodged behind my ear. Tristan helped me up with the smooth efficiency of someone trained in mountain rescue. Eliza handed me a napkin and said:

‘You make these events feel… cinematic’

I dabbed hummus from my temple and said, ‘Thank you. I try to add texture.’

Solstice Wisdom #9:

• People don’t fear isolation. They fear being wrong in public.

Back in the office, I sent one final update to the group chat. It was ignored, naturally. Tristan posted a photo of a whiteboard covered in handwriting and added the words ‘Great session’. People responded with fire emojis and heart eyes. I added a link to the cleaned-up task tracker. No response. Then someone posted a raccoon in a rocket ship.

Solstice Wisdom #10:

• Yes, ‘communication’ builds bridges. But it also carries explosives.

And yet… I still make spreadsheets. Not for them. For me. For the small sense of control. I colour-code my regrets. I use conditional formatting to track where I should have said nothing at all. Occasionally, I open the Team Comms thread just to feel something. Usually nausea. Then it happened. Someone forwarded my spreadsheet to the entire department. The subject line? ‘Useful format?’

I printed it. Framed it. Took a photo of myself standing next to it. Then emailed that photo to the group chat. I waited. No one replied. Then someone removed me from the group. I stared at my screen for a long time. Long enough for it to fall asleep out of embarrassment.

And in a way… that feels like legacy.

Solstice McEwan
Celestial namesake.
(The man who once accidentally kissed the back of Tristan Vale’s neck while reaching for a sandwich).