Listen to Lucy

Lucy Kellaway laments that management twaddle and gobbledygook haven't faded away with the recession

If your occupation involves making off with money from investors, then it is proper the name Made-off reflects that. There is a fine tradition at work here.

When your job is at risk and your savings are a shadow of their former selves, the search for meaning at work becomes meaningless in itself, says Lucy Kellaway

In the cause of research for a novel, Lucy Kellaway explores the world of internet adultery, and finds that, as the market for banking jobs goes cold, the market for adultery is getting hotter.

Newspaper articles in these tumultuous, fatal, not-seen-since-the-Great-Depression times are so tightly packed with cliche that it is hard to do anything other than join in, says Lucy Kellaway. But she says we must be careful not to overstate things.

If bankers want to understand the global financial crisis, what better way, Lucy Kellaway suggests, than to watch classic film Mary Poppins. They will find a film, she says, that manages to be 'soothing, perspicacious and upbeat all at once.' Time to listen to your inner chimney sweep.

As the global financial crisis deepens, Lucy Kellaway says the glory days of the management bullshit industry are well and truly over. But she admits the return of sense may not be entirely welcome.

What chief executives could learn from reading novels

Should we be sickened at the news of formerly well-paid Lehman bankers jostling with their vending cards for the last Mars Bars? Lucy Kellaway asks just what kind of character is needed to survive the financial meltdown and to find another job.

The global movement to end salary secrecy is flawed, says Lucy Kellaway. It is relative, not actual, pay levels that determine happiness, and sometimes it is better not to know

If you are a business leader your children can screw up as much as they like without harming your career prospects at all, says Lucy Kellaway

Lucy Kellaway goes back to school with a brand new pen lid, which offers a lifetime of pleasure - putting modern gadgets to shame

You don't need to be a lawyer to know that strip club, summer intern and clumsy pass all up to trouble, says Lucy Kellaway.

Thinking about death generally encourages people to come up with dodgy philosophies about life, says Lucy Kellway. The best way of living is not to think of death at all

Mervyn King, governor of the Bank of England, set a 'lousy' example by turning down a pay rise, says Lucy Kellaway. For a capitalist economy to work, we all need to believe that more money is a good thing.