This was awkward. Three weeks ago, it came to our attention that those upstairs had taken it upon themselves to approach the New Year with a vigour not seen since, well, the same time last year, and to optimise productivity through maintaining morale and aiding the development of its staff. It was the usual nonsense.

Everyone gets called in and gets a mild grilling as to what they see as their potential strengths and weaknesses and what the company can do to build up the former and ease out the latter.

As a philosophy this is exactly what a responsible, aware, intelligent company should do.

Develop the potential of your staff, make them happy enough not to want to call in sick every other day and you have the makings of a content, productive and, above all, pro"table workforce.

Of course the problem lies in its implication. I do not work for a responsible, aware, intelligent company. I work for a company that makes the port tunnel look like it was organised, budgeted and built by the Germans. It has taken them the best part of three weeks to get around to me.

Simply asking your staff what they need and doing nothing about it, year after year, is not good policy. To be fair, I don't know whose fault this is. It may be theirs for not implementing any of the ideas that come out of the meeting, or it may be ours for studiously avoiding any attempt at self-improvement.

Ultimately, it's probably a combination of both but it doesn't matter really. What matters is that there's a culture here consisting of a lot of mouth and very little in the way of corresponding trousers.

As a result, I have come to dread these meetings, as I "nd it dif"cult to make up different things to pretend to want to get better at every 12 months. We all have a "le, and written in that "le is what we said last year and for every year of you have worked here. Five years ago I was asked where I'd like to be today and here I am, in almost exactly the same position, being asked the same question.

To the best of my knowledge I said, back in late 2001, that I'd like at least to be a mentor to people in my current position. I said I'd like to have a management position in this company and to be an essential cog in its machinery as it moved forward. That was the only year when I meant what I said.

And now, in 2007, I am perhaps a very temporary mentor to a 16year-old work experience child in his transition year, but I am far from an essential cog and the company, to the best of my (admittedly limited) knowledge, has not moved forward.

I knew, as I sat face to face with the same person who asked me the same question over "ve years ago (who himself, I might add, hasn't moved very far either), that my expected progression had not happened. So what I needed was not only an excuse for my stagnation over the past halfdecade, but a strategy as to how I was going to overcome it in the next.

Less than a fortnight ago (at yet another leaving knees-up), in a weaker moment (although it didn't seem weak at the time - I seem to remember feeling invigorated and forceful) I had told this very same person, in no uncertain terms and without a hint of irony that, in the last 12 months, I had come to rely on (not to hope to or to dream of, but to actually rely on) winning the Lotto to get myself out of my current position. I had, I said, factored it into my plans and if it doesn't come off I may as well throw my hat at it. "And, " I said, to hammer the point home, "I am not joking, " jabbing my index "nger into the soft part of his shoulder for emphasis. I might as well have tattooed it on his forehead.

As I said, this was awkward. In five years the only thing that has changed is that in 2007 I have a clatter of kids to support.

As a question, "where do you see yourself in "ve years?" is the usual guff, so I decided on an answer to complement it. "Moving forward", "optimum", "potential" - I threw in all the buzz words, concentrating more on style than substance. It suits this place down to the ground, to be frank.

My new motto? Honesty. Where do I see myself in "ve years time?

Here, doing this. Where would I like to be? It all depends on the Lotto really.