ID: 2214
At Work
There once was an engineer who had an exceptional gift for fixing all things mechanical. He retired following a happy thirty-year career. Shortly thereafter his company contacted him about a seemingly impossible problem with one of their million-dollar machines.
The engineer reluctantly took the challenge. After spending a day studying the huge machine, he marked a small "X" in chalk on a machine component and proudly stated, "This is where your problem is." The part was replaced and the machine worked perfectly.
The company was astounded to receive a bill for $50,000 from the engineer for his service. They demanded an itemized accounting of his charges.
The engineer responded briefly:
One chalk mark ..............$1
Knowing where to put it .....$49,999
ID: 417
At Work
Prison v. Work
In prison you spend the majority of your time in an 8' by 10' cell. At work you spend most of your time in a 6' by 8' cubicle.
In prison you get three meals a day. At work you only get a break for one meal and you have to pay for that one.
In prison you get time off for good behaviour. At work you get rewarded for good behaviour with more work.
In prison a guard locks and unlocks all the doors for you. At work you must carry around a security card and unlock and open all the doors yourself.
In prison you can watch TV and play games. At work you get fired for watching TV and playing games.
In prison they ball-and-chain you when you go somewhere. At work you are just ball-and-chained.
In prison you get your own loot. At work you have to share.
In prison they allow your family and friends to visit. At work you cannot even speak to your family and friends.
In prison all expenses are paid by taxpayers, with no work required. At work you get to pay all the expenses to go to work and then they deduct taxes from your salary to pay for the prisoners.
In prison you spend most of your life looking through bars from the inside wanting to get out. At work you spend most of your time wanting to get out and inside bars.
In prison you can join many programs which you can leave at any time. At work there are some programs you can never get out of.
In prison there are wardens who are often sadistic.....
At work we have managers.
ID: 7084
At Work
A bright young executive had just been hired as the new CEO of a large high tech firm. The CEO who was stepping down met with him privately and handed him three numbered envelopes.
"Open these if you run up against a problem you don't think you can handle," he said.
Well, things went along pretty smoothly, but six months later, sales took a nosedive and he was really catching a lot of heat from the board. At wit's end, he remembered the envelopes. He went to his drawer and took out the first envelope. The message
read, "Blame your predecessor."
The new CEO called a press conference and tactfully laid the blame at the feet of the previous CEO. Satisfied with his comments, the board, the press, and Wall Street responded positively, sales picked up, stock prices rose and the problem was soon behind him.
About a year later, the company was again experiencing a slight dip in sales, combined with serious problems getting new product to market. Having learned from his previous experience, the CEO wasted no time in opening the second envelope. The message read, "Reorganize." This he did, and again the company quickly rebounded.
After several consecutive profitable quarters, the
company once again fell on difficult times. The CEO went to his office, closed the door and opened the third envelope. The simple message said:
"Prepare three envelopes..."
ID: 13374
At Work
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
Quickly, God was faced with a class action suit for failure to file an environmental impact statement. God was granted a temporary permit for the project, but was stymied with the cease and desist order for the earthly part.
Then God said, "Let there be light!" Immediately, the officials demanded to know how the light would be made. Would there be strip mining? What about thermal pollution? God explained that the light would come from a large ball of fire. God was granted provisional permission to make light, assuming that no smoke would result from the ball of fire, and that he would obtain a building permit and to conserve energy, He would have the light out half the time.
God agreed, and offered to call the light "Day" and the darkness "Night". The officials replied that they were not interested in semantics.
God said, "Let the earth put forth vegetation, plant yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit." The EPA agreed, so long as only native seed was used.
Then God said, "Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth." The officials pointed out that this would require approval from the Department of Game, coordinated with the Heavenly Wildlife Federation and the Audobon Society.
Everything was okay until God said the project would be completed in six days. The officials said it would take at least two hundred days to review the applications and the impact statement. After that there would be a public hearing. Then there would be ten to twelve months before...
At this point God created Hell.
ID: 13002
At Work
During work Mike and John are chatting,
Mike: "I've been taking night courses for five months now, and I have an exam next week."
John: "Oh!"
Mike: "For example, do you know who Graham Bell is?"
John: "No."
Mike: "He is the inventor of the phone in 1876. If you take night courses you would know this."
The next day the same discussiontook place:
Mike: "Do you know who Alexander Dumas is?"
John: "No."
Mike: "He is the author of "The 3 Musketeers". If you took night courses you would know this."
The next day, once again:
Mike: "And do you know who Jean Jacques Rousseau is?"
John: "No."
Mike: "He's the author of "Confessions", if you took night courses you would know this."
Now this time John got irritated and said, "And do you know who Steven Turner is?"
Mike: "No."
John: "He is the guy sleeping with your wife! If you stopped night duties you would know this!"
ID: 248
At Work
A man walks into an insurance office and asks for a job.
"Sorry, we don't need anyone..." they replied.
"You can't afford not to hire me. I can sell anyone anything any time!"
"Well, we have two prospects that no one has been able to sell. If you can sell just one, then you have a job."
He was gone about two hours and returned and handed them two checks, one for $25,000 and another for $50,000.
"How in the world did you do that?" they asked.
"I told you I'm the world's best salesman, I can sell anyone anything, any time!"
"Did you get a urine sample?" they asked him.
"What's that?" he asked.
"Well, if you sell a policy over $20,000 the company requires a urine sample. Now take these two bottles and go back and get urine samples."
He was gone about 8 hours and the office was about to close, when in he walks in with two five gallon buckets, one in each hand. He sets the buckets down and reaches in his shirt pocket and produces two bottles of urine and sets them on the desk and says, "Here's Mr. Jones' and this one is Mrs. Johnson's."
"That's good," they said, "but what's in those two buckets?"
"Well, I passed by the school house and they were having a state teachers convention - so I stopped and sold them a group policy!"
ID: 3903
At Work
1.Outside a muffler shop: "No appointment necessary, we hear you coming."
2.Outside a hotel: "Help! We need inn-experienced people."
3.On a desk in a reception room: "We shoot every 3rd salesman, and the 2nd one just left."
4.In a veterinarian's waiting room: "Be back in 5 minutes, Sit! Stay!"
5.At the electric company: "We would be de-lighted if you send in your bill. However, if you don't you will be."
6.On the door of a computer store: "Out for a quick byte."
7.In a restaurant window: "Don't stand there and be hungry, come on in and get fed up."
8.Inside a bowling alley: "Please be quiet, we need to hear a pin drop."
9.In the front yard of a funeral home: "Drive carefully, we'll wait."
10.In a counselor's office: "Growing old is mandatory, growing wise is optional."
ID: 14888
At Work
A salesman, tired of his job, gave it up to become a policeman.
Several months later, a friend asked him how he liked his new role.
"Well," he replied, "the pay is good and the hours aren't bad, but what I like best is that the customer is always wrong."
ID: 1278
At Work
The first 90% of a project takes 10% of the time, the last 10% takes the other 90% of the time.
If at first you don't succeed, try again. Then quit. No use being a damn fool about it.
The more crap you put up with, the more crap you are going to get.
Keep your boss's boss off your boss's back.
If you can't get your work done in the first 24 hours, work nights.
A pat on the back is only a few centimeters from a kick in the butt.
Don't be irreplaceable, if you can't be replaced, you can't be promoted.
It doesn't matter what you do, it only matters what you say you've done and what you're going to do.
After any salary raise, you will have less money at the end of the month than you did before.
You can go anywhere you want if you look serious and carry a clipboard.
Eat one live toad the first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.
When the bosses talk about improving productivity, they are never talking about themselves.
There will always be beer cans rolling on the floor of your car when the boss asks for a ride home from the office.
Everything can be filed under "Miscellaneous."
Never delay the ending of a meeting or the beginning of a cocktail hour.
To err is human, to forgive is not our policy.
Anyone can do any amount of work provided it isn't the work he/she is supposed to be doing.
Important letters that contain no errors will develop errors in the mail.
If you are good, you will be assigned all the work. If you are really good, you will get out of it.
You are always doing something marginal when the boss drops by your desk.
People who go to conferences are the ones who shouldn't.
If it wasn't for the last minute, nothing would get done.
At work, the authority of a person is inversely proportional to the number of pens that person is carrying.
When you don't know what to do, walk fast and look worried.
Following the rules will not get the job done.
Getting the job done is no excuse for not following the rules.
When confronted by a difficult problem you can solve it more easily by reducing it to the question, "How would the Lone Ranger handle this?"
No matter how much you do, you never do enough.
The last person that quit or was fired will be held responsible for everything that goes wrong.