All we 9-6 regular people are familiar with Dilbert, aren’t we? He is the personification of our own self, the ordinary office goers, who can do nothing more but grimace about the work, or rather the way we work. We are all Dilbies in our own capacities at our workplaces, going through those daily mundane routines, putting up with morons for bosses, bearing stupid colleagues, breaking heads over incomprehensible procedures, making sense out of nonsensical drafts/memos/e-mails, tolerating cheeky clients/ customers and so on. And all that with so much practiced ease and mouthshut (pun not necessarily intended) so firmly, that you may as well be product-endorsing Fevicol.
Scott Adams, the cartoonist of Dilbert, brings out these very facts in a thoroughly hilarious fashion in his work ’The Dilbert Principle.’ The tone is highly satirical and you never stop laughing throughout the book. But you don’t miss his point either. He outrightly ridicules almost the entire system, yet you nod affirmative to what he has to say. The book per se is nothing but collection of various cartoon strips, fan e-mails, funny real-time day to day situations and exemplary jibes thrown at anyone and everyone in an office system starting from the senior most level of management to the inconspicuous office boy... and most of it is purely Adams’ insinuations and hyper imaginations! However, there is no single point in the book with which you disagree. He touches upon various issues like Consultancy, Marketing hypocrisies, Budget and bungling, Employee dilemma, Faking quality and so on with fine rib ticklings. Exaggeration or extrapolation, call what you may, but it all seems so true to the hilt.
So what exactly is Dilbert Principle?
According to Adams, its promoting idiots up the order of management so that they can be your bosses and cause least damage to the company! Now, isn’t that how we all felt about our managers? I firmly believe that even to call them ’total idiots’ would still be a compliment. Isn’t it a familiar feeling always that boss hardly knows what he/she is talking about? And this is exactly what Adams elaborates in a highly entertaining fashion. I won’t quote much from the book, but will try to drive home the points with some real-time examples that are provided as comical interludes. Here is a sample conversation of RJbert (RJ) and her boss Moron, the Dumb (MD).
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Teleconversation,
RJ: Sir, I need your approval for purchasing that switch I’d discussed earlier, could you please sign that requisition form I sent you.
MD: Oh yeah, its on my table alright. Suno, while you are at it, order a replacement for the switch of my table lamp as well, loose connection lagtha hein.
RJ: But sir, this is the 12-port switch for our LAN..
MD: Kya? Portable bhi hein? Better order two for me.. (click)
Who wants to switch places with me please?
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Office politics and rumours are part and parcel of your work life and can affect you in variety of ways. Adams lampooning is even more evident when he talks about various kind of people associated with different aspects of the office, their interpersonal management and passing the buck nature when it comes to actual work.
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During a certain monthly meeting:
Nitwit1: So how about that long pending annual family day in Nainital? Would this weekend be alright?
Nitwit2: Er.. Sorry, but I’ve an emergency this Saturday.. I need to take my wife to the dentist ... Let’s keep it for a later date.
And after several such meetings and excuses later,
Nitwit1: So is Nainital on for this month end?
RJbert: By the looks of that trip being postponed, I may as well have reached an age for pilgrimage. So why not make it to Haridwar or Rishikesh instead?
Utter silence for a split second and then uncontrollable laughs, giggles, pandemonium.
Nitwit1 (wiping tears): Ha ha, come on RJbert, kabhi tho serious hua karo..
But I could not have been more serious if I were taking marriage vows, you dumbhead!
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Not that you are any better yourself. When was the last time when you went out on a proper weekend date? Does the word ’Social Life’ convey any meaning to you? And what techno zombie of a person you have become, can you really count 2 + 2 without using a calculator or a ’C’ code? The turn on factor for you is not that blonde bombshell but the new CDMA mobile handset she is carrying? Remember your predicament on a Sunday to either watch ’’Matrix - Reloaded’’ or take your boss’s mother-in-law to the temple? Catch Dilbert and ratbert strips very aptly conveying your present situation.
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MD calls RJ,
MD: RJbert, get that World Bank report ready urgently. I would like to present it in the Board of Directors meeting Monday afternoon to impress upon them.
RJ: Well sir, it needs much more work done.. at least 2 days to be completed
MD: Never mind, go to office on Saturday and finish it off
RJ: But today is Saturday and I am already in the office
MD: Oh I see.. doesn’t matter.. then come on Sunday and get it ready..
RJ: Not Sunday.. its my laundry day..
MD: Keep that for next week..
RJ: But that’s what you said last week as well
MD: That report is more important than your laundry.. just get it ready RJbert..
And I am looking for what rags to wear for Monday’s meeting.
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That’s not all. There are plenty of advices and tips from Adams for the yet to be morons, if you want to be there that is. He gives a lesson or two in
Talking like a Manager (A manager never says, ’’I used my fork to eat a potato, ’’ instead ’’I utilized a multitined tool to process a starch resource’’)
How to get your way (Swearing as key to success and such strategies)
Tips on describing your accomplishments (Performance appraisal and other stories)
Pretending to work (by becoming a consultant)
Fashion and appearance (For an engineer, if no genitalia or mammary glands are swinging around in plain view, then the objective of clothing has been met. Anything else is a waste)
and plenty such interesting topics.
It’s almost impossible to really review this book. There are no story lines, no characters, no lecturing, no speeches or boring philosophies on which you can keep harping about. But take my word for it and go get your copy now. I promise you won’t repent a single moment that you’ve spent over it. The book has been more than worth the Rs.50 that I paid to my raddiwala and I wonder which nincompoop could throw away such a prized possession. But whoever it was, I am safely willing to take a bet that he must be a CEO or MD of some big company!
And now, in fervent anticipation of commendable remarks by observations managers of orifice fastened! [Is that flowery enough language to get promoted as a Manager?;)]