Maria continues to develop her poor reputation for team management capability and leadership amongst her team.

Today, Friday she has given them all some work collating some statistics. The work will take hours to complete and will delay some people leaving the office to start the weekend. But Maria has indicated that delivery is urgent and required by the CEO for an early meeting on Monday.

Maria has told everyone that she has an important meeting during Friday afternoon, unfortunately her husband has phoned in soon after she left to say that “He may be a few minutes late meeting her for some early Christmas shopping”.

With the financial downturn, loss of bank confidence and recall of loans it’s inevitable that well known brands will disappear from the high street.

Marks & Spencer, Curry’s and other brands are recording falling income. More concerning is the amount of investment owned by the banks in Iceland.

However, there is one glimmer of hope, and that it if the shopper should decide that an “enjoyable Christmas” to put all these miseries behind us is necessary and, as in the past, spends in the high street to blow away the blues.

If not then it won’t be just banks such as HSBOS, lloyds TSB and HSBC won’t be the only businesses shedding staff this year. Unemployment in the UK will increase sharply and perhaps we will be talking “depression” instead of downturn.