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And the Winner Is...

Here’s the problem I have with Best Of issues. I never make the list. Apparently, I’m not one of the best CEOs. Apparently, my company isn’t one of the best companies. Apparently, this isn’t one of the best columns. Every Best Of list ends up being published without me. This annoys me.

Granted, there are some obstacles to my being included on any of these lists. One is that you generally have to apply for inclusion, and I don’t feel like applying, so I never do. The other is that, once you’re chosen, you have to tell the publication all kinds of interesting information about you, and the only information about me is boring.

Finally, to be chosen, you actually have to be one of the best at something, and I’m quite sure I’m not. This isn’t for lack of talent. It’s simply for lack of interest. You’ve worked extremely hard to be recognized as one of the area’s best tax accountants. Why would I want to do that? I’d have to go to tax accountant school, join professional associations, keep up on trade publications and otherwise work hard at something I find boring.

I don’t want to.

Then again, sometimes a person makes the Best Of list just by marketing himself or herself extremely well. See Colton! Colton has the area’s hottest software development firm! He operates it out of a 900-square-foot cardboard box, has his employees move around the office on skateboards and blasts Lisa Loeb on the boombox all throughout the work day. Edgy! Different! Innovative!

The magazine photographer came down to the cardboard box and took shots for several hours while Colton and his hip young team designed software and played World of Warcraft.

I could market myself in the same way. You could come to my office and watch me sit here, wondering if maybe I should start learning a thing or two about how to actually be a CEO, then just deciding the whole thing would probably bore me and making out a grocery list instead.

So you see my conundrum. On the one hand, it bugs me that I never make the list. On the other hand, it would bug me more to have to do the things necessary to make the list. I’m just destined to be annoyed, and there’s not a thing you or I can do about it.

So here’s the solution I’ve come up with. Tell me what you think: I’m going to pretend I made the list. I’m going to tell people I run into how interesting and self-conscious I felt when I saw my name there. I’m going to tell people how I wish I’d taken a better picture. I’m going to tell people how the questions they asked me seemed kind of silly, but how I was a good sport and played along because it seemed like the thing to do.

I’ll casually work this into conversations.

“Oh, hey, Bob, it’s been awhile. Are you calling because you saw that profile of me in the Best Of issue? You know, I would love to have done that photo shoot over!”

Now, you probably think you’ve detected a flaw in my plan. You think it’s obvious. People will look through the issue and not find me there, and they’ll quickly realize I’m lying. I’ll be busted faster than Tim Geithner’s tenure as Treasury Secretary will be over.

Not a chance.

I’ll never be busted for one simple reason: No one ever, and I mean ever, looks through one of these issues in its entirety. Oh they look through it all right, looking for themselves or for their competitors. Once they’re pretty sure that particular search has been concluded, they turn to the gossip column at the back and then put down the issue.

No one will examine the issue thoroughly enough to be sure I’m not in there. They may wonder, “Hmm, why can’t I find D.F.?” but they’ll give up looking long before they’re sure I’m not included. They don’t really care if I’m in there or not.

That, of course, raises an interesting question: If the people I know don’t really care if I’m on the list, and I know they don’t care, why do I care? Because!

No one should be publishing a Best Of list of anything and not including me on it. It just isn’t right. So here’s what I want: You need to start including me on your Best Of lists, in spite of the fact that I have no intention of making any effort whatsoever to qualify for the list, get your attention or otherwise deserve inclusion. I want my picture taken. I want my bio listed. I want to be somewhere in one of those hundreds of tiny photos you’re probably going to put on the front page.

If you’re going to do that thing where you make a trophy out of 150 different CEOs’ faces, I want to be on the handle. I have no idea why. I really don’t think this is too much to ask—random, ego-feeding recognition as a reward for nothing in particular.

And if it doesn’t happen, well, I’ll just have to figure out a way to show up in the upcoming Celebrity Chefs issue. And that could be a real mess.