Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Matt Everett: Office Space

Quote:

Dom Portwood: Hi, Peter. What's happening? We need to talk about your TPS reports.
Peter Gibbons: Yeah. The coversheet. I know, I know. Uh, Bill talked to me about it.
Dom Portwood: Yeah. Did you get that memo?
Peter Gibbons: Yeah. I got the memo. And I understand the policy. And the problem is just that I forgot the one time. And I've already taken care of it so it's not even really a problem anymore.
Dom Portwood: Ah! Yeah. It's just we're putting new coversheets on all the TPS reports before they go out now. So if you could go ahead and try to remember to do that from now on, that'd be great. All right!


Stan, Chotchkie's Manager: I noticed your Flare and realized you only has 15 pieces on. 15 is the bare minimum and I thought you wanted to express yourself.”


The fact that Peter has 8 different bosses telling him the same thing really starts to get to him. The TPS reports is what pushes Peter to become unmotivated and not care about his job. As for Joanna, her manager always talks to her about the number of flare that she is wearing. The minimum is 15 so she wears only 15 but her manager gets on her case when she is only wearing 15 pieces. This forces her to become unmotivated which eventually pushes her to the edge and quits her job on the spot. In management, it seems that if they stop being pushy and start thinking about the employee as a person and not part of a machine then their employees would be motivated to succeed at their job and want to work their way up within the company. Both of these quotes really prove the basic assumptions of scientific management. It has a very hierarchical structure of command and thinks of employees as workers while the managers only think.


Q&A:

What can employees do in the future to try and avoid the lack of motivation that occurred at Initech?

I believe the key to this question is communication. If the management team and the employees communicated better and had a chance to voice their opinions on what would be more efficient then everyone would be happier at their jobs. It seemed as if there was such a hierarchical structure at Initech that the management team almost made it impossible for employees to discuss any situations with them. This same concept was discussed in chapter three and is called classical management. This approach to management talks about how it is difficult for employees to talk to their managers about anything that has to do with their workplace and why they are not happy. The hierarchical part to the management is also discussed in chapter three and is called scientific management. Another idea to make Initech or any other company out there a better working environment is to hire a third party (Union) to negotiate terms and conditions between the employees and the employer.

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