In November of 2001 I was navigating through the maze of low-slung trading desks on the 9th floor of Enron’s new highrise tower, a sheaf of papers in hand: notably a $1.7 million one-year extension to our consulting contract with the energy giant ranked the “Most Innovative Company” by Forbes 7 years running. I was a popular figure amongst many of the traders, having been the lead user-interface designer for four of Enron’s money-making trading systems: Gas trading, Power trading, Bandwidth trading, and just launching this morning - Freight trading. Billions of dollars had been made in terms of revenues and stock price increases based on these systems, and with the launch of bandwidth trading a year prior, Enron’s stock had skyrocketed in a matter of minutes, adding 9 billion dollars of value to the company in just a couple of hours. My teammate Jake Chou and I had posed for a picture with Jeff Skilling and Ken Lay that day during the big reveal of the bandwidth training system’s “pooling points” where you could interconnect, buy, and sell DS3’s, OC3’s up to OC12’s capable of handling massive terabytes of traffic between dozens of USA cities, with the plan for the world to follow.

However, despite all the successes to date, I was full of doubt as I walked the loud corridors full of traders shouting into phones and vigorously typing on their keyboards: despite having the full confidence of our clients Rex Shelby, Dan Reck, and Chris Kravas, the reality was that Enron, the company, was on the verge of collapse. Each day new revelations came out regarding potentially criminal accounting practices, fraud, and “whitewash trades” - fake trades with other energy giants like Dynegy, AES, Reliant, and others booked to create false revenue streams. Enron’s stock had tanked from a high of $90 and was hovering below $1 that morning.

The end came in the form of a tinny announcement from the overhead speakers. “Please stop trading. Please stop trading. Standard and Poor’s has downgraded Enron’s debt - we no longer have collateral to trade. Please stop trading.” The huge floor with hundreds of traders shouting into phones suddenly became deathly quiet. Eyes and chairs swiveled. The news quickly sank in. Traders know how the system works. That announcement was equivalent to the beep of an EKG shifting to the straight tone of a flatline. Enron was dead, there was no resuscitation, no a-fibrillation shock. Every single person in the room was suddenly and completely unemployed. These men and women, by the way, were literally the pick of the litter - the best and brightest cultivated from the top business schools around the world where Enron had enjoyed a top ranking during recruitment events at the top 10 business schools for years - second only to my own employer, Diamond Technology Partners, and just above McKinsey & Co.

Enron’s “work hard, play hard” culture quickly showed itself. About 30 seconds after the announcement and subsequent hush, individuals in the room (mostly young men) began throwing all their paperwork in the air. Confetti rained down from the high-ceilinged room. Moments later AC\DC’s “Back in Black” filled the room from a rather large boom box that had mysteriously appeared. Then things took a bit more aggressive turn: monitors began to be kicked over, crashing to the floor, printers were lofted into the air, and desks were tipped over. It was over, and people found their release in their own way.

Amazingly less than 10 minutes later during the general destruction of the trading floor, a miracle arrived in the form of four men with denim uniforms and embroidered lapels: “Budweiser”. Each man was pushing a pair of kegs into the room along with a huge stack of red solo cups. It was only 10 am but a vast majority of the room lined up and proceeded to drink themselves into a hazy pre-lunch post-collapse oblivion. The spirit in the room was loud and raucous. We, of course, joined in.

By noon the entire floor was drunk and that was when the second, and last announcement came, “Please gather your personal belongings and exit the building. Please take nothing that is not yours, final compensation will be determined at a later date, but this building will be closed by 2pm.”

Everyone began stacking their personal belongings, and probably some of Enron’s, onto their work chairs, and rolling them to the elevators. I walked over to see the exodus - drunk young men and women dropping monitors that were not theirs onto rolling chairs trying to get anything and everything they could find out of the building. As a consultant I was not overly concerned - I knew I would simply be re-assigned. Most of the traders seemed sanguine as well - they would find a new job soon enough.

It was at this point that the brilliant idea first emerged. I *think* it was my idea but I am not 100% sure. Between Brian, Phil, Steve, and I, the drunken notion was aired: “Let’s steal the gold Rubik’s cube!”. Out front of the Enron building was a giant 5’ by 5’ steel emblem of Enron’s logo - famous in the news during those days. However, that was not the target we were discussing. Instead, inside the secure lobby was another emblematic logo of a similar shape, but this time only 5” square - but of solid gold - sitting on a small pedestal not far from the elevators. Always, standing next to it and its Plexiglas case, was a large security guard.

We hatched the plan: Brian and Phil would come down and start a pretend drunken fight near the pedestal. As the fastest of the bunch, I would do the actual theft: once the security guard was distracted and blocked I would knock over the pedestal, grab the solid gold cube and run for the exit where Steve would be waiting in the getaway car.

The four of us piled into the elevator full of nervous laughter and adrenaline. Brian and Phil were pushing chairs full of papers and equipment. They would soon be crashing into each other near the pedestal and creating a fake fist fight and wrestling match. Steve had already headed for his getaway vehicle. I was making a roundabout path to the pedestal and Brian and Phil were taking the direct path. As we exited the hallway from the elevator banks to the lobby, all our great plans were dashed. Lined across the entire foyer were at least 50 security guards and policemen parsing through the property being propelled on chairs and in bags towards the exits. Sadly, there was zero chance of us pulling off the stunt and we returned to the trading floor to enjoy our last minutes before our pending eviction. On the way back I did see an already vandalized framed poster on the wall with a picture of a cocky young man, “Enron - Our Values: Integrity - We are out to prove that good guys do come out ahead.” It had already been vandalized with the second statement of “We will give it to you straight” having an additional Sharpie scrawl “up the butt.” I decided it would be my souvenir and wrested it from the wall. Here’s a rather poor picture of it - it is somewhere in my storage unit.

Why Am I Still Alive? Pt. 8: Enron part 2 - The Meltdown