Turn tartle at your next corporate do

It’s that time of the year again when even as a boyish billionaire who has successfully stood out by not stepping out to socialise, you’ll be meeting’n’greeting your moneyed fellowmen and women till the year runs out. Just be prepared to tartle. That useful Scottish word describes the act of hesitating when introducing someone because you’ve forgotten their name. Tartling, with its delicate mix of awkwardness and mental gymnastics, is an art form you’ll get to perfect over time in the busy labyrinth of the corporate world, where name tags and introductions are as fleeting as the average attention span during a quarterly review. You’re at a high-stakes meeting, feeling like a corporate ninja, when you’re suddenly called upon to introduce your brilliant colleague… whose name you can’t recall. Behold, the tartle. Your brain goes on overdrive, and you produce a masterful series of ‘umms’ and ‘uhs’ worthy of an old Otis Redding classic.

With open offices and endless Zoom calls, tartling is an epidemic. A miracle usually doesn’t save you. But smart thinking – ‘So, how do you like to be introduced to people these days?’ or ‘I just call him ‘The Man!” – can do wonders in a directors’ Christmas Eve get-together, where tartling turns into a party game. So, embrace it. Master it. Turn tartle with a vengeance, ideally wearing a stylish tartleneck.