- Two of the VPs at the company were named Jim Collinsworth and Peter Sachs (not their real names).
- For reasons I can't remember, I was able to send emails through the company's Windows email server under any name that I wanted.
- So, I merged the two VP names and I sent an email blast to the entire company from "Peter Collinsworth" (just swapping first and last names).
- "Peter" Collinsworth's email said something to the effect of "In honor of the 765th anniversary of the establishment of the Exchequer and the signing of the Magna Carta, <biotech-startup-x> is declaring April as 'English Unit' Celebration Month. All laboratory generated results will be reported using the following units: Instead of mg/kg/day, we will use pounds/stone/fortnight ...." etc. etc. etc.
- Well, Jim Collinsworth (real VP) saw the email and even he thought that the email had been sent under his own name.
- So, Jim fired off an email blast saying, "I did NOT send this. I don't know what this is about."
- Everyone soon realized it was an April Fool's joke.
- Jim eventually made his way to my office to say ... "That was really funny. Don't EVER do it again."