The Trojan Horse Procurement Dispute

The horse arrived without a purchase order, warranty, or declared interior volume. It was nevertheless placed on the agenda as a quick win. The procurement chair noted that the price was zero. I noted that so was the documented benefit. This was received as negativity.

Security recommended drilling a small inspection hole. Cultural Affairs objected that this might damage an important diplomatic artifact. Facilities asked where it would be stored. The mayor’s office asked whether it could be brought inside before sunset for better photographs. I suggested waiting until morning, which was rejected as insufficiently celebratory.

The emergency steering committee

I presented three options: reject the horse, inspect the horse, or accept the horse while pretending the risk had not been raised. The committee selected a fourth option—accept immediately and create an inspection subcommittee. The subcommittee’s first meeting was scheduled for the following week.

“If there were anything dangerous inside, would the workmanship really be this good?”

Senior stakeholder, name withheld for reasons now obvious

The gate team requested written authorization. No executive wished to sign, so authorization was provided orally, in a group, with several people speaking at once. This created distributed accountability, an ancient governance practice in which responsibility becomes too finely divided to observe.

The subsequent incident is outside the scope of this file, although the closeout report uses the phrase ‘significant unplanned occupancy.’ Procurement later amended its policy: all free gifts over the size of a goat required inspection, named ownership, and a written answer to the question ‘Is anyone hiding inside?’ It remains one of the clearest control improvements in the archive.