If you were thrust into a Christian school like I was (or aren’t living under a rock) you may have once or twice heard the story about Mary and Joseph who couldn’t rub two pennies together (but needed a place to sprout their special sprog) so some dude let them hang out in his barn. Back then, barns didn’t have cribs like they do today, so after Jesus was born and the midwife, the doula, the doctor and his team of nurses delivered the baby, smacked his bum, cut his umbilical cord, cleaned him up and gave the new parents a copy of The Healthy Baby Meal Planner, they placed him into a manger – like in the pictures below. Pretty awesome for an introduction to a life of farming (one wonders why carpentry was the chosen profession for the wee baby, perhaps the barn wasn’t built well and he thought he’d have none of that should he need a baby-birthing-barn at some point, but that’s neither here nor there).

A little research (thanks to Wikipedia) shows a manger, or trough, is a structure used to hold food to feed animals. The word manger originally referred to a feed-trough, but it may also be used to refer to a water-trough when this is not being used possibly because it is similar to an abreuvoir.

In other words, mangers look more like these things:

So it seems that people are confused as to what mangers actually look like. That’s okay. We’re a far way away from Jerusalem and wise men, so I’ll forgive us for this one. What’s really exciting, though, is that no matter what we’ve perceived mangers to be in the past, their future is bright, and they’ve come a long way since the days of only feeding cows or housing babies.

No more are they pure vessels to hold feed or water for livestock. No, my friends, they’ve progressed to ends you wouldn’t believe. How? Well, they now have jobs. Real jobs! And thanks to the wonderful world of LinkedIn, these previously disengaged, unconnected mangers now have a voice. A real voice. And they’re sharing their experiences and work titles  proudly online, because goddammit, that’s their right after all, isn’t it!? There are Account Mangers, Product Mangers, Change & Configuration Mangers, heck, even just a simple but proud, solitary Manger. It’s just… so… inspiring!

In a show of solidarity with my friends the mangers (who I someday want to be), here are just a few of thousands that I’ve found on LinkedIn, trying to make a difference for mangers across the world. This is only a handful, a drop in the bucket of the brave manger-folk who decided to step out of the barn, away from the stables, and make something of themselves. My eyes are welling up as I type this, it’s just too beautiful. Out of respect, and for fear of all you readers bombarding them with emails of affection and courageous “You can do it!” motivationals, I’ve decided to keep their identities hidden, but their Manger titles left intact in all their rewarding and heart-warming glory, as they should be.

God bless the Manger…