Date Received: Fri, 10 Jul 1998
A magazine recently ran a "Dilbert quotes" contest. They were
looking for people to submit quotes from their real life Dilbert-type managers.
- As of tomorrow, employees will only be able to access the building
using individual security cards. Pictures will be taken next Wednesday and
employees will receive their cards in two weeks. (This was the winning quote
from Fred Dales at Microsoft Corporation)
- What I need is a list of specific unknown problems we will encounter.
(Lykes Lines Shipping)
- How long is this Beta guy going to keep testing our stuff?
(Programming intern, Microsoft IIS development team)
- E-mail is not to be used to pass on information or data. It should be
used only for company business. (Accounting Manager, Electric Boat
Company)
- This project is so important, we can't let things that are more
important interfere with it. (Advertising/Marketing Manager, United Parcel
Service)
- Doing it right is no excuse for not meeting the schedule. No one will
believe you solved this problem in one day! We've been working on it for
months. Now, go act busy for a few weeks. I'll let you know when it's time to
tell them. (R&D supervisor, 3M)
- My Boss spent the entire weekend retyping a 25-page proposal that
only needed corrections. She claims the disk I gave her was damaged and she
couldn't edit it. The disk I gave her was write-protected. (CIO of Dell
Computers)
- Quote from the Boss: "Teamwork is a lot of people doing what I say."
(Marketing executive, Citrix Corp)
- My sister passed away and her funeral was scheduled for Monday. When
I told my Boss, he said she died so that I would have to miss work on the
busiest day of the year. He then asked if we could change her burial to Friday.
He said, "That would be better for me." (Shipping executive, FTD
Florists)
- "We know that communication is a problem, but the company is not
going to discuss it with the employees." (Switching Supervisor, AT&T Lone Lines
Division)
- We recently received a memo from senior management saying: "This is
to inform you that a memo will be issued today regarding the subject mentioned
above." (Microsoft, Legal Affairs Division)
- This gem is the closing paragraph of a nationally- circulated memo
from a large communications company: "(Company name) is endeavorily determined
to promote constant attention on current procedures of transacting business
focusing emphasis on innovative ways to better, if not supersede, the
expectations of quality!" (Lucent Technologies)