It occurred to me when the computer was down, the phone ringing off the hook, and I was trying to send a FAX that wouldn’t go through, that there must unseen forces governing offices and creating laws of probability to make us crazy. We don’t know how these rules work exactly, but they seem to reoccur in such a regular pattern that it is hard to believe that it is not more than mere coincidence.

• If your day is going well, don’t check your email.
• The better you do your work, the more work you will be given to do.
• Nothing can ever be done in the amount of time allotted to do it.
• Time management is another of the tasks that you don’t have time to complete.
• The more you need a supply item, the greater the probability it was discontinued.
• The closer the deadline gets, the more complicated the project becomes.
• If you suggest a good idea, you will be put in charge of implementing it.
• Your report is never so good that it can’t be improved.
• Computers will only calculate the information you give them.
• A four-day week with a holiday is longer than a five-day week.
• If you take a day off, the work will multiply until you get back.
• The right decision and the wrong decision are both better than indecision.
• There is nothing more satisfying than a job well done – except one assigned to someone else.
• If you make a coffee ring on a document, it will always be an essential reference item.
• Meetings are a waste of time – but an approved and essential waste of time.
• When everyone understands policy, it’s time to change it.
• If you want to get a task done, you have to do it instead of talking about how to get it done.
• The more details in directions, the greater the likelihood they will not be understood.
• If someone sends email to keep from calling, they will call to see if the email was received.
• An error is never noticed until after the email is sent.
• Technology will create as many problems as it solves.
• A stapler always jams and runs out of staples at the same time.
• When everyone understand the new computer software, it will be upgraded.
• Any organized chronological filing system can be fouled up with two word – alphabetize it.
• Nothing gets done as fast as it does on the day before going on vacation.
• The telephone will ring most when you are totally absorbed with something else.
• The primary function of office workers is to ensure that paperwork is never completed.
• The easy jobs always end up taking more time than the difficult ones.
• After everything is done, we will still worry about whether we’ve done everything.
• The computers worked better before they were upgraded.
• Never say anything in an email that you do not want forwarded all over the office.
• The more important a fax, the greater the probability that it will not go through.
• No matter how busy someone is, they always have time for lunch and smoke breaks.
• Problems always develop at the end of the day, never at the beginning.
• The day you have a lunch appointment will always be the day you can’t get away.
• Projects are never cancelled until they are nearly completed.
• If you misplace it, you will need it; if you find it, you will forget what you needed it for.
• If it’s been a great week, something important didn’t get done.
• When all else fails, remember you can fix any machine by turning it off.
• If you wait until the last minute to run copies, the copy machine will always jam.
• Your pen will quit writing when you are taking down an important phone number.
• Documents always make more sense before being revised than afterwards.
• You will only find an easy solution after spending all day doing it the hard way.

©2004

Did I miss anything?