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Not surprising that large companies would have 'stooge' employees in place for just this sort of thing. I have heard of it happening in at least one major stor

Not surprising that large companies would have 'stooge' employees in place for just this sort of thing. I have heard of it happening in at least one major store chain here many years ago. Kind of reminiscent of one of the first episodes in the series 'Suits' where Louis Litt is interviewing a new junior employee for the firm, and he pulls in another junior mid-interview to dress him down and dismiss him in front of the new employee, just to put the fear of his authority and power into the newbie. The 'fired' employee then just goes back to the bull pen to await being called in for the next new recruit interview so he can walk past and be 'randomly' called in.

whoisjuan 9y ago
I also heard the story of a digital agency that rented a huge space, painted the walls with bright colors and hired a bunch of actors to pose as employees. The idea was to deceive and close a deal with a potential big client that insisted in visiting their offices.
- shubb 9y ago
  As a student I was hired as a temp for a 1 day contract. When I arrived they were just setting up the open plan office. We were asked to bring laptops and given stacks of paper and a phone, and told to work though the files, calling the numbers. It was weird to recieve little training for what seemed to be an investigator type role. Mid way though the day a bunch of suits arrived, toured the office, and went into a meeting. Later they left and we were told to go home. Clearly we were faking something, maybe an inflated company sale or a bid for a contract. The wierd thing was, the stacks of paper were real classified police files, with genuine contents (we were phoning people).
  - zaroth 9y ago
    It's like reddit writing prompts is leaking!
- cyberferret 9y ago
  Uh, a good friend of mine did that a couple of years ago when he started a new design agency. He was going for a large government contract and they insisted on an in-house meeting as part of the pre-tender process. He had a large office space already, in preparation for growth, but only 1 employee at that stage, so he got his high school aged daughter in, as well as some of her friends to sit in the empty desks and pretend to work. A couple of the PC's at the back facing away from the meeting room weren't even plugged in, and were just screens on the desk and keyboards attached to nothing. It worked - he got the contract, and as a result, now has REAL employees at those stations, and in fact has to look at a bigger space to expand into.
  - pimlottc 9y ago
    > pre-tender process If that wasn't intentional, it should have been.
  - chrisweekly 9y ago
    "Fake it till you make it", huh.
- notahacker 9y ago
  Back when his agency was a one man band, a friend pointed out that one advantage of a trendy shared workspace is that nobody ever asked how many of the people they saw in 'his' corner actually worked for him. I've also met people who've earned temp "work" in China being nothing more than white faces in the background to make the company look international to visitors
  - OkGoDoIt 9y ago
    I keep hearing this about Chinese companies but I've never actually met someone who has done this or have any concrete example beyond "oh I've heard that people do that", and I've talked to a lot of white expats in China. You've actually met these people? Did they explain any other details?
    - EliRivers 9y ago
      I ran into an old friend at my brother's wedding who was recently back from Beijing. He studied there and was put onto the rowing team without much active choice on his part. He took occasional jobs for a few hours as the western guy. He'd get picked up and given a briefcase to hold. Sometimes he'd be taken on a tour of a factory. Sometimes it was his job to take something out of the briefcase and give it to someone. At least once his employer was a local police officer. He said that the impression he had was that he was evidence of working with some overseas company.
- hodl 9y ago
  Sounds like Saatchi & Saatchi
- tzs 9y ago
  That reminds me of a 19th century con man I read about in the wonderful book "Bloodletters and Badmen: A Narrative Encyclopedia of American Criminals from the Pilgrims to the Present" [1]. He came to some big city posing as a successful businessman seeking investors for some new enterprise. He would give as a reference the president of a local bank located on the other side of town. When the potential investors went to that bank to check out the reference, they found a busy, well equipped, and well furnished bank, full of well dressed obviously upper class clients conducting business. When they spoke to the President and other officers all they heard was praise for the honesty and business skills of the con man. The marks would then make a large investment. When the con man left town with their money and they realized something was wrong, and then went to the bank to try to find out what was going on, they found an empty building with a "for lease" sign, and many of the people they had seen as customers and employees in the bank were now seen to be beggars, prostitutes, and such from the neighborhood that the con man had hired to play customers and employees. [1] https://www.amazon.com/Bloodletters-Badmen-Narrative-Encyclopedia-Criminals/dp/087131777X https://www.amazon.com/Bloodletters-Badmen-Narrative-Encyclo...
  - chris11 9y ago
    That sounds like something out of Hustle a TV show the BBC produced about a group of contract artists.
    - kthejoker2 9y ago
      It is essentially the plot of 1973's Best Picture The Sting, if you sub a horseracing OTB for the bank.
      - teddyh 9y ago
        It’s a well-known confidence trick called “The Big Store”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_confidence_tricks#Big_Store https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_confidence_tricks#Big_...
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
- DrScump 9y ago
  This is, more or less, the premise of the film "The Sting": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sting
- Maxious 9y ago
  Villain du jour, Cambridge Analytica changed their name and rented a office in Cambridge filled with London based employees to win over the intellectual Steve Bannon https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/17/data-war-whistleblower-christopher-wylie-faceook-nix-bannon-trump https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/17/data-war-whistl...
  - gowld 9y ago
    Is intellectual a euphemism for Anglophile now?
  - markvdb 9y ago
    > the intellectual Steve Bannon Even within this well-educated microclimate, the irony in that statement might not be clear enough to everyone. May I suggest either crystal clear irony ("the most eminent intellectual of our times Steve Bannon") or a more accurate description ("the racist firebrand Steve Bannon")?
divbit 9y ago
I wouldn't be suprised if entire countries raised similar 'scape-goat types as sort of 'bat-man' practice for rich aholes with nothing to do.
louisswiss 9y ago
The 'fired' employee in this case is actually a janitor, IIRC.
gaius 9y ago
I once worked with a guy who would literally “do voices” on the phone to pretend to callers that he managed a whole team of people.
- Jetroid 9y ago
  I knew a guy who ran a business which designed and sold PCBs. He'd make up different names to stamp on PCBs. Designed by Joe Bloggs, Code by Derek Smarts, Layout by Jamie Simple, etc. He wanted the business to seem bigger than it actually was.

whoisjuan 9y ago

I also heard the story of a digital agency that rented a huge space, painted the walls with bright colors and hired a bunch of actors to pose as employees. The idea was to deceive and close a deal with a potential big client that insisted in visiting their offices.

shubb 9y ago
As a student I was hired as a temp for a 1 day contract. When I arrived they were just setting up the open plan office. We were asked to bring laptops and given stacks of paper and a phone, and told to work though the files, calling the numbers. It was weird to recieve little training for what seemed to be an investigator type role. Mid way though the day a bunch of suits arrived, toured the office, and went into a meeting. Later they left and we were told to go home. Clearly we were faking something, maybe an inflated company sale or a bid for a contract. The wierd thing was, the stacks of paper were real classified police files, with genuine contents (we were phoning people).
- zaroth 9y ago
  It's like reddit writing prompts is leaking!
cyberferret 9y ago
Uh, a good friend of mine did that a couple of years ago when he started a new design agency. He was going for a large government contract and they insisted on an in-house meeting as part of the pre-tender process. He had a large office space already, in preparation for growth, but only 1 employee at that stage, so he got his high school aged daughter in, as well as some of her friends to sit in the empty desks and pretend to work. A couple of the PC's at the back facing away from the meeting room weren't even plugged in, and were just screens on the desk and keyboards attached to nothing. It worked - he got the contract, and as a result, now has REAL employees at those stations, and in fact has to look at a bigger space to expand into.
- pimlottc 9y ago
  > pre-tender process If that wasn't intentional, it should have been.
- chrisweekly 9y ago
  "Fake it till you make it", huh.
notahacker 9y ago
Back when his agency was a one man band, a friend pointed out that one advantage of a trendy shared workspace is that nobody ever asked how many of the people they saw in 'his' corner actually worked for him. I've also met people who've earned temp "work" in China being nothing more than white faces in the background to make the company look international to visitors
- OkGoDoIt 9y ago
  I keep hearing this about Chinese companies but I've never actually met someone who has done this or have any concrete example beyond "oh I've heard that people do that", and I've talked to a lot of white expats in China. You've actually met these people? Did they explain any other details?
  - EliRivers 9y ago
    I ran into an old friend at my brother's wedding who was recently back from Beijing. He studied there and was put onto the rowing team without much active choice on his part. He took occasional jobs for a few hours as the western guy. He'd get picked up and given a briefcase to hold. Sometimes he'd be taken on a tour of a factory. Sometimes it was his job to take something out of the briefcase and give it to someone. At least once his employer was a local police officer. He said that the impression he had was that he was evidence of working with some overseas company.
hodl 9y ago
Sounds like Saatchi & Saatchi
tzs 9y ago
That reminds me of a 19th century con man I read about in the wonderful book "Bloodletters and Badmen: A Narrative Encyclopedia of American Criminals from the Pilgrims to the Present" [1]. He came to some big city posing as a successful businessman seeking investors for some new enterprise. He would give as a reference the president of a local bank located on the other side of town. When the potential investors went to that bank to check out the reference, they found a busy, well equipped, and well furnished bank, full of well dressed obviously upper class clients conducting business. When they spoke to the President and other officers all they heard was praise for the honesty and business skills of the con man. The marks would then make a large investment. When the con man left town with their money and they realized something was wrong, and then went to the bank to try to find out what was going on, they found an empty building with a "for lease" sign, and many of the people they had seen as customers and employees in the bank were now seen to be beggars, prostitutes, and such from the neighborhood that the con man had hired to play customers and employees. [1] https://www.amazon.com/Bloodletters-Badmen-Narrative-Encyclopedia-Criminals/dp/087131777X https://www.amazon.com/Bloodletters-Badmen-Narrative-Encyclo...
- chris11 9y ago
  That sounds like something out of Hustle a TV show the BBC produced about a group of contract artists.
  - kthejoker2 9y ago
    It is essentially the plot of 1973's Best Picture The Sting, if you sub a horseracing OTB for the bank.
    - teddyh 9y ago
      It’s a well-known confidence trick called “The Big Store”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_confidence_tricks#Big_Store https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_confidence_tricks#Big_...
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
DrScump 9y ago
This is, more or less, the premise of the film "The Sting": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sting
Maxious 9y ago
Villain du jour, Cambridge Analytica changed their name and rented a office in Cambridge filled with London based employees to win over the intellectual Steve Bannon https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/17/data-war-whistleblower-christopher-wylie-faceook-nix-bannon-trump https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/17/data-war-whistl...
- gowld 9y ago
  Is intellectual a euphemism for Anglophile now?
- markvdb 9y ago
  > the intellectual Steve Bannon Even within this well-educated microclimate, the irony in that statement might not be clear enough to everyone. May I suggest either crystal clear irony ("the most eminent intellectual of our times Steve Bannon") or a more accurate description ("the racist firebrand Steve Bannon")?

divbit 9y ago

I wouldn't be suprised if entire countries raised similar 'scape-goat types as sort of 'bat-man' practice for rich aholes with nothing to do.

louisswiss 9y ago

The 'fired' employee in this case is actually a janitor, IIRC.

gaius 9y ago

I once worked with a guy who would literally “do voices” on the phone to pretend to callers that he managed a whole team of people.

Jetroid 9y ago
I knew a guy who ran a business which designed and sold PCBs. He'd make up different names to stamp on PCBs. Designed by Joe Bloggs, Code by Derek Smarts, Layout by Jamie Simple, etc. He wanted the business to seem bigger than it actually was.