MICROMANAGEMENT FILES #002 - “We had a KPI for water.”

I work at a marketing agency. Fast pace, creative brainstorms, campaigns that “change the game.” PowerPoints full of words like growth, disruption, velocity.

And then came the water tank.

Someone, out of pure curiosity, noticed that the gallons of water were emptying “too quickly.” Within a week, it became a topic in a meeting. Within two weeks, it became a metric.

Unofficially, of course.

They started counting how many times each person refilled their glass.
And, by extension, how many times they went to the bathroom.

The reasoning sounded rational: “If people keep getting up, we lose focus.”
No one asked whether we were losing focus because our projects were poorly managed. Water was an easier target.

At first, we laughed.
“This has to be a joke.”

It wasn’t.

One colleague received feedback that he was “circulating around the office too often.”
He was circulating between his desk, the water tank, and the restroom.

Another colleague started bringing her own 1.5-liter bottle from home. She kept it under her desk like she was hiding contraband.

I started planning my fluid intake around meetings. Not for health reasons. For perception.

The most absurd part? At the same time, we were selling clients campaigns about “employee wellbeing” and “healthy work habits.”

In internal meetings, we talked about employer branding.
In practice, we were measuring hydration.

No one ever said, “You’re not allowed to drink water.”
The numbers just circulated. Always in Excel. Always under the guise of optimization.

If creativity depends on how many times someone refills a glass, then water isn’t the problem.

Trust is.

In an agency that lives off ideas, the biggest fear was that someone might spend three minutes too long away from their chair.

That’s not cost control.
That’s the performance of control.

I don’t know how many times I refilled my glass last week.
I just know I started thinking about it.

And the moment you start counting your own sips to appear productive, you know the culture isn’t thirsty for efficiency.

It’s thirsty for surveillance.

— Account Manager, 31