RULE 1. The fire drill must never feel useful. It may be a proven way to help save people's lives, to say nothing of being a legal requirement in many work places. But it is important that people experience the exercise only as an in convenience. The drill should take place when people are up against a deadline. It must not be timed to coincide with a long meeting, when it might come as a bit of a relief. Ideally, it should be pouring with rain. The drill can be counted a success only if enough people are rolling their eyes and muttering to themselves. (The sixth rule is essential to achieving this outcome, too.)
规则 1. 消防演习绝不能给人带来实际用处感。它可能是一个经过验证的可以救人性命的方法，更不用说在许多工作场所还是法定要求。但重要的是人们只能体验到这是一种干扰。演习应该在人们面临最后期限时进行。它绝不能安排在长时间会议期间，那样可能会让人感到稍微轻松一些。理想情况下，应该是倾盆大雨时进行。只有足够多的人在翻白眼并自言自语时，才能算是演习成功。（第六条规则也是实现这一结果的关键。）
Rule 2. Remember that the drill is not really a drill but an exercise in begrudging consensus. When the alarm sounds, people must never just get up and leave. They must first satisfy themselves that this is not a mistake. Someone might have pressed the wrong button; that voice might yet drone 'This is a test" and for once people will feel grateful. They must then see other employees getting ready to leave. This stage involves people bobbing up and down at their desks like demented meerkats to see what their colleagues are doing. When it is clear that this is indeed a drill, people must then spend inordinate amounts of time deciding what things to take with them. What's the weather like? Should they take the laptop? Where did they put their reusable coffee flask? Should they pack a suitcase? The one thing they must not have as they leave is any sense of urgency.
规则 2. 记住，演习实际上并不是演习，而是一种勉强的共识练习。当警报响起时，人们绝不能立即起身离开。他们首先必须确认这不是一个错误。有人可能按错了按钮；那个声音可能会再次响起“这只是一个测试”，那么人们可能会首次感到庆幸。他们必须看到其他员工准备离开。这一阶段涉及到像发疯的獴猴一样在办公桌前上蹿下跳，看看同事们在做什么。当确信这确实是一次演习时，人们必须花费大量时间决定带走什么东西。外面天气如何？应该带上笔记本电脑吗？他们把可重复使用的咖啡瓶放在哪里了？是否应该打包一个旅行箱？他们离开时唯一不应有的就是任何紧迫感。
Rule 3. This stage of the drill is when the fire wardens must show themselves. Only the wardens can accelerate the speed of departure from the building. This secretive group is the Opus Dei of the office but with a bit less of the fervour or sense of menace. The fire wardens have often been in the role for years; no one knows how they got the job or how to apply. They hide in plain sight: there may well be sepia photos of their younger selves on the office wall, next to an even more obscure sect known only as the "first-aiders". The wardens reveal themselves during a drill by putting on high visibility jackets, which instantly confer on them a mysterious authority. The cabal is never seen together at other times.
规则 3. 在演习的这个阶段，消防管理员必须出现。只有管理员能加快人们从建筑物中离开的速度。这个秘密组织是办公室中的圣殿骑士团，但没有那么多的狂热或威胁感。消防管理员往往多年担任此职，没有人知道他们是如何得到这份工作或如何申请的。他们在众目睽睽之下藏身：办公室墙上可能有他们年轻时的棕褐色照片，旁边可能还有一个更为神秘的团体，只知道它们叫做“急救员”。在演习中，管理员们通过穿上高能见度的夹克来揭示自己，这立刻赋予了他们一种神秘的权威。这个小团体在其他时候从未被一同看见。
Rule 4. The fire drill will produce a sense of belonging. That is because a drill will suddenly expose you to everyone who works in your building. In the normal course of events, you might briefly share a lift with people from other companies or other departments.You might glimpse their offices as the doors open and close and think how soulless they look. (They will think the same of yours.) But you never realise how outnumbered you are. In a drill, however, strangers surround you. Stairwells fill with people, most of them also weighed down by coats, laptops and reusable coffee flasks. They spiral down below you on the way out and form long queues by the lifts on the way back. You will suddenly feel grateful for the comfort of any recognisable face. You spot someone from legal you think may be called Keith and say hello. You have never given him any thought before; in this moment of grave non-peril he is like family.
规则 4. 消防演习将产生归属感。因为演习会突然让你看到与你在同一建筑工作的所有人。在平常的情况下，你可能会与来自其他公司或部门的人短暂地同乘一部电梯。当电梯门开关时，你可能会瞥见他们的办公室，觉得它们看起来多么无生气。（他们也会这样想你的办公室。）但你从未意识到你是多么地寡不敌众。然而，在演习中，陌生人会围绕你。楼梯间挤满了人，大多数人也背着外套、笔记本电脑和可重复使用的咖啡瓶。他们在你下面螺旋式地走出去，在回去的路上在电梯旁排长队。你会突然感激任何一个可认出的面孔。你认出一个你认为叫做Keith的法务部同事并向他打招呼。在这一严重无危险的时刻之前，你从未对他有过任何思考；在这一刻，他就像家人一样。
Rule 5. The assembly area is not so much a designated spot as a place of people's choosing within a ten-minute walk of your building. Your employer might have specified a place for employees to gather. They may have given it militaristic names like the "primary muster point" or the "tertiary evacuation zone". No one else will have the faintest idea where it is. A clump of people will mill about as close to the site of the notional blaze as possible. Another group will scatter in various directions in search of a coffee or an early lunch. If they walk purposefully enough, other people will assume they know where the assembly area is and follow them. As a result most of the office may accidentally end up at Starbucks.
规则 5. 集合区域不是一个指定的地点，而是人们在你的建筑附近十分钟步行距离内自选的地方。你的雇主可能已经指定了一个员工聚集的地方。他们可能给它起了军事化的名称，如“主要集结点”或“第三疏散区”。没有其他人会清楚地知道它在哪里。一群人会在尽可能靠近假想火灾现场的地方聚集。另一群人则会四散寻找咖啡或提前午餐。如果他们步伐坚定足够，其他人会认为他们知道集合区在哪里并跟随他们。结果，办公室的大部分人可能会意外地结束在星巴克。
Rule 6. Confusingly also known as the first and second rules of fire drill, you must never talk about fire drill. At some point word will spread that the drill is over and people will start to drift back to the office. Once they have returned to their desks, everyone must act as though the whole thing never happened. There must never be any reference to how it went or whether any safety lessons were learned. The fire wardens must fold away their high-viz jackets and settle back into the shadows. The work you were doing must simply be picked up where it was left. You will not speak to Keith from legal again. But you do know not to use the lifts if there is a real emergency.
规则 6. 同时也被称为消防演习的第一和第二规则，你绝不能谈论消防演习。在某个时刻，消息会传开演习结束，人们开始回到办公室。一旦他们回到自己的桌子前，每个人必须表现得好像整件事从未发生过。绝不能有任何关于演习进行得如何或是否学到了任何安全教训的提及。消防管理员必须折叠他们的高能见度夹克，并重新隐入幕后。你之前的工作必须从中断的地方继续。你不会再与法务部的Keith说话。但你确实知道，如果有真正的紧急情况，不要使用电梯。