Rahul Verma: My Petty Bits

Disclaimer: Uber/Ola have nothing to do with this plot device and don’t, in any manner, endorse the contents. Their names are used for demonstration purpose only. No cabs were damaged in the writing of this article.

You want to write a great post or article on LinkedIn and you wonder how to get started with it. That’s when plot devices come handy. In movies, we see mechanisms like ‘Unreliable Narrator’, ‘MacGuffin’ etc used for great movies. So, what are those devices that can help you write a fictional story as fiction or a fictional story as a pseudo-genuine personal story that happened yesterday?

Welcome to The Uber/Ola Cab Plot Device.

It’s a great device to do shameless marketing completely wrapped and passed on as an appealing, genuine-looking story. It also gives you a subtle, plausible deniability.

The Foundations

In your imagination get into a cab and place your story characters appropriately. Once they sit in the cab, they start a conversation among themselves or you can have an imaginative conversation with them. Typically to show your courage you might want to have an imaginative confrontation with them and make sure that you had the last word, the last punch line. Your final words should have perfectly crafted sentences without ‘err..’, ‘uh…’, ‘hmmm…’. You can also add a random motivational quote by some recognisable big shot which you suddenly remembered at the time, word for word.

Some Examples

If it is a business post, they could be freshers talking about the bad policies of their organisation. It suddenly reminds you of the great policies you have and how fortunate your employees should feel. An image of a recent outing or a selfie with funny faces adds spice to it.

If it’s an HR post, they could be communicating about the problems they face at work or the leave plans that get rejected for them. It suddenly reminds you of a random interview in which you heroically broke the norms of organisation or society and made the hiring decision for a trodden-down weakling.

If you are completely on the edge of the axis of narcissism, they could very well be talking about a product that you or your organisation has developed and how great that is. In such a story, just smile so that you are positioned as a humble organism, working relentless towards perfection.

In short, choose a conversation that can help you deviously pass on the message that you care about in the garb of a personal story.

Relation of Cab Time and Length of Story

Choose the time of boarding the cab carefully. Plan upfront on what is the duration of time over which your fake story unfolds. Relate it to the spot and traffic at the time. 

Further Tips

Make it emotional. Make it controversial, but conclude with a positive note based on your concluding words. Everybody un-boards the cab ‘happily ever after.’ I was tempted to use the phrase ‘happy ending’, but then I am told that it could mean a lot of other things which could change the age-appropriateness of this plot device.

Don’t forget that the cab driver is a character as well. S/he could just smile at you in the back view mirror in the story when you throw in the final punch line. As an alternative, s/he can be the supporting cast as a secondary protagonist or antagonist.

Variants

You can change the cab with the waiting room/place at an airport, a long queue at any place where a long queue is possible etc. In short, it can be any place, where the conversation can take place but you can safely forget to ask anybody’s names and other details.

Steal and Make it Your Own

The stories written using this plot device are so vague that you can also steal the post from anybody else without due credit and pass it on as your own.

You can interchange the cab provider name. Very simple.

You can also make it your own by replacing the original location with another location variant.

If you are worried about someone pointing out stolen goods, don’t worry, nobody listens to them – they are seen as the mood spoilers.

PS: For the innocent souls reading this post, there is a word called satire.