>A magazine recently ran a "Dilbert Quotes" contest. They were looking for
>people to submit quotes from their real life Dilbert-type managers. Here are
>the finalists:
>
>1. "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 Corp. in Redmond, WA.)
>
>2. "What I need is a list of specific unknown problems we will encounter."
>(Lykes Lines Shipping)
>
>3. "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)
>
>4. "This project is so important, we can't let things that are more
>important interfere with it." (Advertising/Marketing manager, United Parcel
>Service)
>
>5. "Doing it right is no excuse for not meeting the schedule.
>
>6. "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 and I'll let you
>know when it's time to tell them." (R&D supervisor, Minnesota Mining and
>Manufacturing/3M Corp.)
>
>7. "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 ofDell
>Computers)
>
>8. Quote from the Boss: "Teamwork is a lot of people doing what I say."
>(Marketing executive, Citrix Corporation)
>
>9. My sister passed away and her funeral was scheduled for Monday. When I
>told my Boss, he said she died on purpose 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)
>
>10. "We know that communication is a problem, but the company is not going
>to discuss it with the employees." (Switching supervisor, AT&T Long Lines
>Division)
>
>11. We recently received a memo from senior management saying: "This is to
>inform you that a memo will be issued today regarding the memo mentioned
>above." (Microsoft, Legal Affairs Division)
>
>12. One day my Boss asked me to submit a status report to him concerning a
>project I was working on. I asked him if tomorrow would be soon enough. He
>said, "If I wanted it tomorrow, I would have waited until tomorrow to ask
>for it!" (New business manager, Hallmark Greeting Cards)
>
>13. As director of communications, I was asked to prepare a memo reviewing
>our company's training programs and materials. In the body of the memo in
>one of the sentences I mentioned the "pedagogical approach" used by one of
>the training manuals. The day after I routed the memo to the executive
>committee, I was called into the HR director's office, and told that the
>executive vice president wanted me out of the building by lunch. When I
>asked why, I was told that she wouldn't stand for perverts (pedophiles?)
>working in her company. Finally, he showed me her copy of the memo, with her
>demand that I be fired-and the word "pedagogical" circled in red. The HR
>manager was fairly reasonable, and once he looked the word up in his
>dictionary and made a copy of the definition to send back to her, he told me
>not to worry. He would take care of it. Two days later, a memo to the entire
>staff came out directing us that no words, which could not be found in the
>local Sunday newspaper could be used in company memos. A month later, I
>resigned.
>
>In accordance with company policy, I created my resignation memo by pasting
>words together from the Sunday paper. (Taco Bell Corporation)