If you want to kill any idea in the world, get a committee

Host: The office building loomed like a glass cathedral — all angles and reflections, cold as a boardroom prayer. Inside, the air smelled of coffee, printer ink, and burned ambition. The fluorescent lights hummed — too bright, too sterile — while outside, the city burned with sunset fire, a reminder that real life was still happening somewhere else.

Host: Jack sat at the head of a long mahogany table, sleeves rolled, tie loosened, the weight of exhaustion slumping in his shoulders. Around him, charts, graphs, and PowerPoint slides littered the table like fallen soldiers. Jeeny stood by the window, arms crossed, looking down at the traffic below, the chaos of red and gold lights pulsing like a heartbeat far freer than the one in this room.

Jeeny: “Three hours. And not one decision made.”

Jack: “You say that like it’s new.”

Jeeny: “It shouldn’t be normal.”

Jack: “Welcome to modern collaboration, Jeeny. Everyone’s got a say, and no one’s got courage.”

Host: Jeeny turned, her eyes sharp, her voice low but cutting, like truth slipping through glass.

Jeeny: “You sound like Charles Kettering. ‘If you want to kill any idea in the world, get a committee working on it.’”

Jack: Chuckles dryly. “Smart man. He must’ve sat through one of these meetings.”

Jeeny: “He invented the electric starter. You’d think he believed in teamwork.”

Jack: “He believed in invention, not paralysis. There’s a difference.”

Host: The silence hung — heavy, static, like the air before thunder. The projector screen still glowed faintly with the words ‘Innovation Strategy Proposal.’ No one dared touch it.

Jeeny: “You know, Jack, not everyone wants to lead. Some people just want to belong.”

Jack: “Belonging shouldn’t come at the cost of creation. We start with a spark, and by the time everyone’s ‘aligned,’ the fire’s gone.”

Jeeny: “Maybe it’s not about alignment. Maybe it’s about trust — about believing that a shared idea can survive more than one person’s ego.”

Jack: “Trust doesn’t survive bureaucracy. You put ten people in a room, and they’ll smother brilliance with consensus. Every time.”

Host: Jack leaned back in his chair, exhaling smoke from a hidden vape pen — his rebellion against the building’s “wellness policy.” The cloud drifted upward, catching the light like ghosted thought.

Jack: “You want to see an idea die? Watch what happens when everyone starts protecting their piece of it.”

Jeeny: “You sound like you’ve already buried a few.”

Jack: “Dozens. I once pitched a clean-energy prototype. Revolutionary design. By the time the committee was done, they’d turned it into a recycled logo campaign. All heart, no engine.”

Jeeny: “That’s not the system’s fault, Jack. That’s fear. People are afraid to fail. Committees make failure safe — they dilute it until no one’s responsible.”

Jack: “Exactly. You can’t make art in safety. Or progress. Edison didn’t need twelve sign-offs to fail ninety-nine times.”

Host: Jeeny’s expression softened, her posture loosening. She moved closer, her voice quieter, like an echo of empathy sneaking through the logic.

Jeeny: “But Edison also had people — teams, assistants, dreamers. He didn’t do it alone. Collaboration isn’t the enemy. The fear of conflict is.”

Jack: “You ever tried to argue vision in a boardroom? It’s like whispering poetry to a vending machine.”

Host: A faint smile flickered across Jeeny’s face.

Jeeny: “Maybe that’s because your poetry sounds like war.”

Jack: “Creation is war. Against doubt, time, and mediocrity. And committees? They’re pacifists.”

Jeeny: “Then maybe we need diplomats, not soldiers.”

Host: The rain started outside — soft at first, then steady. The sound of it blended with the faint buzz of lights overhead. The room felt smaller now, their words tightening around it like a noose.

Jack: “You’ve worked in this company long enough to know — nothing bold survives the approval chain. The moment an idea needs permission, it’s dead.”

Jeeny: “Then why stay?”

Jack: “Because somewhere under the weight of all this paperwork, there’s still a pulse. And maybe one day, someone will stop asking for permission and just do it.”

Jeeny: “You could be that someone.”

Jack: “I was. Once. Before they called me ‘unmanageable.’”

Host: The sound of rain filled the silence that followed. It was the kind of silence that didn’t ask for comfort — it just existed, thick and honest.

Jeeny: “You know, I think Kettering didn’t hate committees because they existed. He hated what they represented — the death of courage. But maybe faith in an idea requires patience too. Maybe chaos has its own rhythm before creation.”

Jack: “That’s a lovely metaphor. But this isn’t jazz, Jeeny. This is policy.”

Jeeny: “Even policy can have music, if you listen to the people beneath it.”

Host: Jack turned, the lines around his eyes deepening. He studied her — this woman who somehow still believed in meaning, even after a decade of corporate decay.

Jack: “You really think idealism works here?”

Jeeny: “I think resistance disguised as idealism works better.”

Host: That drew a slow, reluctant smile from Jack — the kind that flickers like a match in rain.

Jack: “You’re dangerous when you talk like that.”

Jeeny: “Only because you’ve forgotten how to be.”

Host: She sat opposite him now, both leaning over the cluttered table — blueprints, memos, ideas half-drowned in bureaucracy. Her fingers traced a phrase on one of the papers — ‘Innovation through Collaboration.’

Jeeny: “Maybe the idea isn’t dead yet, Jack. Maybe it’s just waiting for someone to stop talking and start building.”

Jack: “And what? Get fired?”

Jeeny: “Maybe. But at least it’ll mean something.”

Host: A sudden flash of lightning streaked through the windows, illuminating their faces — his lined with doubt, hers lit with quiet defiance.

Jack: “You’d risk everything for a maybe?”

Jeeny: “Every great thing started with one.”

Host: The thunder rolled, distant but deep. Jack looked back at the whiteboard covered in half-erased sketches — the ghosts of ideas too bold to survive approval.

Jack: “You know, committees don’t kill ideas because they’re bad. They kill them because they’re afraid of what happens if they live.”

Jeeny: “Then let’s give them something to fear.”

Host: Jack paused, then laughed softly — not cynically this time, but like someone remembering the taste of rebellion.

Jack: “You’d make a terrible manager.”

Jeeny: “Good. Managers maintain. Creators disrupt.”

Host: Outside, the rain began to ease. The room, once sterile, felt suddenly alive — the kind of alive that happens just before something changes. Jack reached for a marker, dragging it across the whiteboard in swift, determined strokes.

Jeeny watched as he redrew the design — not perfect, not approved, but pulsing with life.

Jack: “No committees. No drafts. Just action.”

Jeeny: “Finally.”

Host: The clock on the wall ticked, its rhythm matching the slow beat of possibility. The rain stopped. The city outside shimmered under the wet light — unpredictable, alive.

Host: And there, amid the rubble of bureaucracy, something stirred again — the fragile, rebellious heartbeat of a new idea.

Host: Kettering’s words echoed through the quiet, like a challenge answered at last:
That committees may kill ideas,
but courage resurrects them —
one act of defiance,
one person daring to move before the vote.

Host: And as Jack and Jeeny stood in that flickering light, surrounded by failure and faith alike, the idea — at last — began to breathe.