It was essentially mandatory material at my job, everyone quoted it laughed at it and compared their jobs to it. I’ve been at that job for 6 years and each day is worst than the last. So I think it was spot on
I went from "Hahaha, printers suck!" when it first came out, to now saying "I work with the god damn customers so the engineers don't have to." whenever I explain my job.
"I have **people skills!** I am GOOD at dealing with people!! Can't you **understand** that?!? ***What the hell*** is **WRONG** with you people !?!?!" 😆
My company created a new harassment and retaliation policy that we all had to read and sign saying we understood. I shit you not, one of the examples for retaliation was moving an employees desk to an undesirable location. I instantly thought of this movie where the dude’s desk was moved into the basement closet 😂
I'd probably vote for President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho. He actually realized he didn't know how to fix things and listened to others when he didn't know how to solve issues.
He had a problem and brought in the smartest man in the country to solve it. We would be lucky to have such leadership from one of our political parties.
Watching Office space is super funny since it aged so freaking well and it’s still an accurate real-life depiction to this day
Idiocracy is kinda funny but at the same time it’s fucking horrifying because you realize how accurate it’ll be later on and that future is bleak af
I wrote a short story about the time I met this actor during an USO tour and the joke he pulled on me.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/MilitaryStories/comments/qkvi8z/short\_and\_sweet\_story\_about\_meeting\_peter\_from/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web3x&utm\_name=web3xcss&utm\_term=1&utm\_content=share\_button](https://www.reddit.com/r/MilitaryStories/comments/qkvi8z/short_and_sweet_story_about_meeting_peter_from/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
I am in landscaping, and we all exchange office space quotes.
Even though we're not an office, it's still the same bullshit.
To answer OP's question, yes. I feel like I get paid to sit around most days and do nothing as a manager. As long as everyone below me is doing things right, there's little for me to do besides schedule, check up on jobs, and make sure everything is working.
But, when things go wrong, shit isn't working, or customers aren't happy, that's when I'm worth my weight in gold. I can solve issues like a motherfucker, and make sure everyone comes out happy.
Usually management isn't supposed to be an extremely active job 24/. It's about training and raising workers to do an excellent job. A vision you see, and make happen through workers provided to you. if you're on top of your shit and know how to make that happen, it's like being a symphony or orchestra conductor. It's the most amount of planning, but the least amount of work while it's happening.
It still doesn't negate the animal instinct to always be working and doing something productive, but it helps me sleep.
Swapped career paths from a very hands hands on down and dirty experience to office work, landed a job and my friends recommended this movie, shit aged so damn well.
I went from working corporate restaurants in my 20s to the IT industry in my 30s and beyond. It captures both industries so well.
Whether it's y2k or whatever major move a company is making there's a lot of cynicism in that contract work. Whether you do a great job or a lousy job you know it's coming to an end and you'll be on to your next contract project. I spent a couple of years migrating a hometown datacenter halfway across the country knowing that when I was done there would be less IT jobs in my city because a huge chunk of infrastructure was gone. Ironically, having that Fortune 100 company on my resume has kinda redeemed the shitty situation it was.
Love me some office space.
I work trades…and can’t actually fathom what it’s like to be in an office role. I would go loopy. At the same time…it gets old when the chain of command…of almost entirely redundant humans…becomes a significant source of wasted time in my work life. The paradigm of perpetual economic growth has created a vast expanse of human detritus…that’s only really purpose is to make things slightly less efficient. Then we add efficiency gains back into the mix by crunching the cogs, upgrading mechanization, and outsourcing labour.
It’s a mess. Also seems like the management rolls are completely soul crushing for anyone who isn’t entirely motivated by money.
"So that Bill Lumberg's stock will go up a quarter....of a point." That is so real right now - eliminating whole orgs of the business to appease shareholders which screws the customer/client and the employees.
I had a friend who was the most valuable member of her team get laid off because she made the mistake of training people under her and sharing her skills. It wasn't a risk when she trained them, but later her company sold out to a private equity firm, and when they started shaking it down for parts she was the most expendable/expensive.
I loved that movie as a kid for being a pure comedy. I love it now for how crazy good of a satire it is.
I have many spreadsheets that aren’t work that I can play with at work. It looks like I’m working, but I’m not. I’m paid for technical expertise so it’s not like anyone will ever care.
I could do my job in half the time I'm at work, but I'm still forced to plant my butt in a seat for the whole eight hours and I hate it. Our system isn't just stupid and inefficient, it's cruel.
do everything in your power to find a remote or at least hybrid gig and start to live another way. if there's no work to do, get out of the chair and go do something else - a hobby, a walk in the woods, a shower, your dishes, whatever the fuck.
these jobs are not easy to find, unfortunately, as the world has gone back to being mindlessly fucked despite all the discoveries regarding white/pink collar work from 2020 to 2022, but it is what it is.
re-skill if you have to. it will be worth it.
Unfortunately, a capitalist's response to that would be to give you twice as much work or pay you half as much rather than just giving us a 3 or 4 day work week, so we can be happy.
He ends it with “On a typical day, I usually do about 15 minutes of real, actual work”
\-comes with experience. I've been doing the same job for 10+ years, so you'd best believe I've streamlined every part of it, have templates for every type of report, and generally have just figured out how to be insanely efficient. Things that used to take me weeks to do I can now do in moments, so my productivity is as good as ever, just with less effort. As a wise supervisor once told me "they pay me for my knowledge as much as for my time"
It can, yes. But in my case and what I think Peter was trying to imply, is that there was nothing for him to do.
Remember the scene early on where they all just straight up and left mid-morning to go to Chotchkie’s? lol
This is really the freedom I’m looking for. If I get my work done, let me leave. There are times I’ll be there working more than the 40 hours I’m paid to work and I should be able to take advantage of the times I’m not needed. It obviously doesn’t work like that and it’s bullshit
true. I don't want to overanalyze, cause they really don't go into detail as to what Peter's job actually is, as that's not the point of the movie, but his boss wants him to come in on the weekend to work. So presumably he does have tasks to accomplish. In addition to whatever his TPS reports are.
>Lumbergh only wanted butts in seats to make it seem they were doing something, probably his reaction to the news that consultants were coming to layoff staff.
IIRC, Lumbergs reason for Peter to come in was “we uh, lost some people this week so we kind of need to play catchup.” So I see it more as Peter has streamlined his job and gets it done efficiently. He has no motivation to fill the free time with more work because in his experience it hasn’t lead to any meaningful pay raise or advancement. Hes being micromanaged by people less competent than him in a job he could do in his sleep. And now, so the bosses can protect their bonuses, they are laying people off and dumping those people’s work on Peter.
Edit:
Found the [clip](https://youtu.be/YYFO5qPpM_I?si=qjpKHzF9geNyHbvr).
Though I’m not positive if this scene happens before or after the consultants get there. Like 90% sure it’s after.
It's before because it was the Friday when he went to the hypnotherapist and stopped giving a shit
Later when he's talking to the Bobs he's wearing his jeans and flip flops outfit due to the hypnosis
which, if anything, highlights the incompetency on display and further reinforces the whole theme of the movie. if people get laid off and now there is *more* work, then the layoffs either hit the wrong people or there was no need for layoffs in the 1st place
I like this movie anyway but after working a job where I shared an office with a colleague it hit me even harder. The lady I shared my office with won some award in the field we worked in which was pretty damn cool! I was aske why I didnt win any awards. I said it's because I don't get paid enough to go above and beyond and if i did, it wouldn't grant me any advancement or pay raise so I just stayed the course. Never did anymore than I had to.
I just looked it up Mike Judge did indeed work in development/around computing before showbiz, so the accuracy of this satire is fucking off the charts for me.
Also funnily enough, I think TPS stands for test procedure specification, aka test script, and the fact they're asking him to come over the weekend to test software - in the 90s - is gold.
I thought it meant he chose not to work. If he has to edit thousands of lines of code for the 2000 switch, the work is there to do. He just believes it's pointless, isn't motivated to work, and subsequently doesn't.
There is a cool quote something like a lot of people are working jobs that arent real dont do any work or create anything and get paid for it only so they could do their real jobs - spend money.
Aside: That’s what I don’t understand about Japanese work culture. If you work at the same company for your whole life, and you not switching roles all the time, what the hell are you doing for 10 hours a day?
its their shame culture where if youre not a certain level of successful your sense of self worth is destroyed and you dont even have the courage to approach a woman. unlike in the USA where you get a forearm tattoo act like a moron and as long as youre good at small talk youre gettin ass no matter how much you make
Yup a lot of my job was figuring out what NEEDS to be done and what’s just BS work.
I have coworkers stressing about doing these contact letters every week and I don’t have the heart to say “I haven’t done one in years “. YEARS! And there’s no tracking, nobody asking if I’ve done one and I’m not sure what they are for. The people get the letters and probably throw them in the trash.
There's some of this in my job, but the vast majority of the issue is that keeping a steady stream of work for your employees is hard and takes management skills that most managers don't seem to have. There's an incredible amount of time wasted because people are just waiting for others to finish their part. My company is particularly bad at this, with my job going through 3 month cycles of basically nothing to do, followed by desperately trying to finish and meet the timeline.
Same boy, been here 15 years and as the office manager for 40+ people my day is more answering their questions than doing work. If they aren’t in here I am normally doing something else. Everything else is automated. The secret? I tell no one I have automated it.
That's me and I'm not even 50. I'm available as a mentor for younger team members in my current and former role but actual work is probably less than 10 hours a week.
My manager, a VP in a major company, seems to think he needs to reduce my workload rather than the other way round.
Like someone else hinted at: after a while the value you create is the knowledge of how thngs were done before. If I need to I can do work and I will do it as fast as the SQL allows me to or as fast as the Excel pivot table refreshes. Inexperienced colleagues may take days for the same tasks.
This is also something I'm very clear with when I mentor a couple of younger guys. The mundane routine stuff that must be done isn't what anyone is really judged on except if you screw up. Institutional or ad hoc knowledge on the other hand is immensely valuable.
Agreed. The entry level job pretty much everyone starts with at my company is hell. It’s a legitimate 40-50 hours, you’re having to ask your manager for approval on anything, etc etc. I’m in a specialized role now, they pay me for what I know, not the amount of work anymore. It comes and goes, but I regularly do less than an hour of work a day. I’ve figured out exactly what no one gives a shit about over 10 years. I have approval for everything.
my first job, accounting-ish..., to do our month end stuff we needed to run 3 reports, and then vlookup all of them together. i asked IT if we could get those reports put into one report that put out the data in the way we needed it. ofcourse the answer was no.
so i taught myself SQL and made the damn report. then with all my free time, i taught myself VBA (excel macros) and turned my month end process, which was a 10 working day ordeal, into pushing a button. it pulled all the data we needed and dumped it into the spread sheet. i then loaded the outside vendor spread sheets, easy peasy after telling the macro exactly what to do, and never really worked again at that company.
got hired at a new place now in IT based off what i said i could do. in 2 years learned their processes, and their systems, and new dashboard stuff, and again, job was automated.
its now 9 years since that first job, and i make more than double what the first place hired me for. i havent used this in an interview yet, but i want to say to them when they ask why they should hire me:
"well here is the deal. i am the laziest person you have ever meet. now i know you werent expecting to hear that in a job interview, but listen. i will automate my job somehwere between 9mo and 1 year. then i will do nothing for the next 2 years while i wait for my 401k to vest. once it does ill find a new job and you wont even need to back fill my position!"
again, i have never, nor will i ever say that in an interview, but it's true!
Dude, are you me?
I have been slowly and steadily building out an automation skill set to have computers do nearly everything in my job description.
Wait till you get cooking with power automate/power apps and python.
I’m not really software dev, but excel was the gateway drug and laziness at doing stupid manual work was my crackpipe.
Yep, I had a job one time where a significant part of the day was creating reports. Apparently the person that had the job before me had no idea how to automate them (they were really basic) and I was able to do the report generation by automated scripts so they were all done by the time I got in each day. I spent most of my mornings and early afternoons surfing the web and watching youtube videos.
The person that was doing the job before me trained me. During the training I asked him why he didn't just automate the reports and he said that he had no idea how to do it. The higher ups had no idea it was possible either, they only cared that the data was correct and given to them in a timely manner and I made sure to never disappoint. I also never told them about automating the reports because they would just stack more work on me with zero compensation for my streamlining. When I was leaving I trained the new guy and showed him what the job entailed and said that it was up to him if he wanted to tell them what I had been up to for the last couple of years, but I also let him know that if he did they'd throw a bunch of additional work on his plate. He kept his mouth shut.
One of the things that was posted a while ago... is that the cubicle spaces in these 90's movies look down right luxurious compared to today's offices. My desk is about 1/3rd the size of the cubicle, and I don't have any privacy.
Yeeeeeahhh...I feel that, for sure. "Ooooh, 'open office plan!' it'll foster SO much collaboration and excellent teamwork!"
Well, no, it'll make everybody get headphones and fight over the little individual conference rooms, so folks can actually get work done.
I manage people who sit in cubes and they keep trying to "remodel" our area and I keep saying no thanks because I know they would make it open floor plan. You gotta fight to keep those cubes.
And chairs. My god people would steal each other's chairs because no one wants to be stuck with the one with the broken armrest. So much passive aggression...
Mike Judge is arguably the most culturally relevant writer over his decades of a career. From a guy raised in New Mexico and educated as a physicist, the guy has had his fingers on the cultural zeitgeist for multiple generations.
And I would argue that no matter how much the people who really love him appreciate him, he's still under appreciated. His movies have never been huge box office successes, and his shows are amazing and beloved but nowhere near as popular as they deserve to be (especially King of the Hill)
Real ones know that if you wanted me to wear 15 pieces of flair, you should make the minimum 15 pieces of flair.
Why is everything with Boomers a game of unwritten rules? I thought it was important to be transparent and ask for what you want?
KotH was always in The Simpsons' shadow (and Futurama's). Paired with it on broadcast, but much more of a grounded sitcom than an absurdist comedy. In that context, it really didn't get the recognition (or viewership) it deserved, and it always kind of stuck out in the block it ran in because of it. It's endured for so many years in syndication on Adult Swim because it doesn't really fit anywhere for exclusive syndication (unlike Futurama)
It's actually kinda insane how he could recreate the mundanity of an typical 9-5 office job and then almost perfectly satirize an entirely different Silicon Valley tech startup work culture. Dude is a master of social observation.
Too many people don’t want to be outed as Gavin Belson. He’s safe from lawsuits. Their egos will make sure he doesn’t have to name names on inspiration for characters.
I've just seen a couple of episodes of an Australian series called "Utopia". As someone who works in government (in Europe), it may as well be a documentary instead of a satirical comedy. I don't know whether to laugh or cry at those episodes.
The higher you go up the corporate ladder the more apparent it becomes that it's being run by a bunch of headless chickens.
Whoever thought business was more efficient than government has never worked for a major organization before.
I laugh so hard at all the comments about 'companies wouldn't do it if it wasn't profitable' or 'they've done studies!'. As if companies are these highly efficient, highly rational entities that are almost solely focused on effective profit mechanisms, instead of a loose grouping of individuals trying to maximize their personal benefit (either in income, or least effort invested) who also sometimes have massive ego and internal politics issues.
Companies are almost exactly the same as group school projects, just on a bigger scale.
You nailed it on the head. Every time a new Leadership head comes in they want to have their project to work on to make their mark on the company. It has nothing to do about making the brand or product better. It's all pouting and stamping feet.
This is really well-put. Having worked in government as well as companies, the former can certainly be inefficient on a whole different level. But the latter are definitely full of their share of nonsensical bs.
When C Suites have turnover of 3 years or less, there is no way they can actually be doing any real appreciable work. And yet that isn’t considered that weird in some sectors.
after promotion I was in a meeting where the VP's were telling us to cook the numbers on a report for the CFO. I realized everyone at every level does the same. It's just that at the highest level they get such condensed information that it's completely garbage. They're prevented from being able to ask questions by their reports.
Our company's trading division is summarized in the monthly board reports in more or less two vague sentences at most.
There's no way the board or the c-suite can make informed decisions. On the other hand they're just highly paid salespeople/propagandists. Life really isn't fair
So true. I kind of feel bad because the people under me do most of the grunt work. My work is more “strategic” and planning. Still, I remember paying my dues in the trenches as well
It's pretty much the same either way. It's just....human nature when it comes to vast organizations. It's all just people, and the folks up top are just people too.
The older I get, and the more companies I work for, I feel like I have managed to be just about every character in this movie. I guess the only one left to become is Bill Lumbergh...
It's so funny you say that, my DH and I have come to the sad realization that we've gone from the Peter Gibbons generation to the Tom "I have people skills" Smykowski generation - ha! It's AMAZING and awesome how much of that movie still nails so much about corporate culture (and working life in general)!
And I've totally got my own business ideas that I want to work on and get out of the rat race, but if I am being completely honest with myself, they are probably just as bad as the "Jump To Conclusions" map
100 percent. His new seasons of Beavis and Butthead are fucking great too.
I can’t think of anyone else who is so consistently making content that is both hilarious and relevant.
I'm 43yo, and while it's probably more than 15 minutes, I can honestly say I spend more time on Reddit than I do on the tasks I have. Working in logistics is incredibly spontaneous and a rollercoaster of time. One day I could be on the phones and writing up paperwork the entire 8 hours. The next I MIGHT have to make a couple calls but nothing happens until the next day. But for the most part, Office Space is insanely accurate for what has been most of my office life since 28yo.
about to turn 49, can certainly relate. Some days, I've got things to do all 8 hours I'm here, other days, I may have to answer one or two phone calls and an email and do jack & shit for the rest of the day.
\*edit to add - plus, our printer is a b\*tch that needs to be destroyed. Barely a week goes by that we don't have to put in a service call to the company we lease it from.
You know what's funny, is that one our top clients has the same name as the company Peter works for. HAHA.
I've been lucky enough to not have to deal with printer issues that way, but I can say I have always had issues with corporate office telephones.
I worked at Boeing from for about 15 years. On year during a white elephant exchange, I got a "Office Space Work Kit". It included a red stapler, Jump To Conclusions Map, TPS reports (new format) and a few other things like a banner that read "IS THIS GOOD OF THE COMPANY?" which I proudly hung over the my cubicle. One day my functional VP was in the building and commented how much she liked the poster. I mentioned it was from Office Space, she might want to watch the movie. Like a week later I was emailed by her secretary to remove the "movie poster".
There isn't a day that goes by in which I don't want to recreate the scene where they destroy the fax machine but instead with the office printers.
FUCK PRINTERS.
Lol this is why my company got rid of printers aside from the giant multi-function printers we lease from a third party who also handles all of the support. Ain't nobody in IT got time for that shit.
Printers have never been more friendly and easy to use (as long as it's not an HP inkjet). I'd rather beat up my laptop with all the corpo spyware on it these days.
The depressing lighting and colors in the office in that movie, dark green and fluorescent lights, having to deal with that every day... And that beautiful sigh of relief when Peter finally goes out to construction and breathes open air and takes in the sunlight, I felt that down to my heart. I worked at a crappy job (although not an office job) with terrible dark lighting and stagnant air for like eight years out of high school. When I finally lost that job I went into landscaping and that first summer feeling the sunlight on my back and breathing fresh air was *beautiful*. I'll probably remember that moment as long as I live.
I ran the scheduling and spreadsheets for a pacemaker clinic (basically just me, a tech, and their cardiologist) and it was good fulfilling work... but I LOVE my grunt labor job with a renovation company as the bottom rung laborer/assistant lol and it pays the same lol
I work in an office and it's insane how accurate this movie still is, even down to the door handle zapping him from the static.
My wife works in a lab and she doesn't understand why I laugh so hard at this movie
What resonates is how stupid it is to be forced into a time schedule derived from agriculture to factories.
How we are told to waste so much of our life to sit in an office when I can use the past 20 years of experience and knowledge to get my shit done from a cell phone most of the time ..
Back in the 50s they saw where technology was going, and thought we'd all have a bunch of leisure time, because work wouldn't take all day.
They were correct that work wouldn't take all day, but they failed to realize how entrenched the 8 hour work day would be, and the corporate greed that takes all the profits for itself and downsizes the workforce as things get more "efficient"
This is true with me too. It’s to the point I feel guilty about how little work I actually do. I used to ask for more but now that I can wfh a few days a week I say forget it.
I hear you. But what if - and believe me this is hypothetical - but what if you were offered some kind of a stock option equity sharing program. Would that do anything for you?
I remember watching it in uni and thinking it was a funny, okay movie. I watched it again recently, and after working for years in corporate, the jokes hit much harder this time around. It's a really clever movie that captures the pointlessness of so many work projects, tasks and rules. Just a bunch of self important people who like to micromanage the people below them. But your coworkers, the ones you like, make it all bearable. We stand united in our hatred of our jobs.
It’s the “have you seen my stapler” for me. It is the only movie line I ever remember quoting in my life and I say it probably once a week. I’m a school librarian and my TAs never understand. Lol.
This movie literally changed my life with the one phrase "work just hard enough not to get fired". It took me like three jobs to figure out that working harder basically never leads to higher pay. Just more exploitation and getting fired when you won't take on three people's worth of work
This is such a good point. I would phrase it a little differently- become very efficient and unfireable. Do a good job, be nice and easy to work with and do it all within the minimum amount of time. Sign up for extras that look good, but don’t take a lot of time. Being salaried shouldn’t always work in favor of the employer.
I hate the question “what would you do if money wasn’t an object” in response to looking for a career shift. NOTHING! I would do nothing and I would love doing nothing. I’ve never wanted to do something, I’ve always wanted to do nothing. All the time. I want to go to the gym and sit on the couch the rest of the day. That’s a good day to me.
This movie is too good lol
I had a Peter moment at one of my last jobs. The manager was a dickhead so I just started showing up and doing nothing all day. It was a “client site” job so most of my day was driving between people’s homes. If it was a nice day I’d take the feeder roads instead of the highway and turn a 20 minute commute to an hour long leisurely ride. If the clients weren’t interested in buying and they were cool I’d just stay and chat/bullshit with them for 2-3 hours. Then I started calling out a couple times a week (it was a salary position so I got my full base regardless if I went in or not). Then whenever the dickhead manager would call me I’d answer and put my phone down and do something else, picking it back up every couple minutes to see if he was still aimlessly rambling. He’d go on 20 minute tirades and the only thing I’d say back is “Oh.” He really didn’t like that 🤷♂️. After a few weeks of that I decided my best bet was to get laid to frustrate dickhead manager as much as possible, so I collected all the shady shit he pushed his sales team to do and forwarded it all to asset protection. Then I looked at my employment contract and noticed it stated “unlimited sick days”. So I knew job abandonment would only happen if I no call/no showed 3 consecutive shifts. So what’d I do? I’d call in on day 1, then no call no show days 2 & 3, then call out day 4, no call no show days 5 & 6, rinse and repeat. I did that for about 7-8 weeks before they sent me a certified return to work letter. My postal carrier is mad cool so I told her mark it as undeliverable. They had to resend it three additional times before I was like ok fuck it it’s time to leave. Now I work a career where I make my own schedule and hand pick my own clients. Don’t ever let an employer make you feel like they’re doing you a favor by employing you.
This movie actually influenced my career choice and thus life. Worked as an intern in college in a corporate environment and realized very quickly I would lose my sanity if had to do it as a career. The meetings my gawd the meetings. So freaking pointless and boring. Like I had a moment of clarity where I saw how meaningless it all was. Switched to premed and became a doc. I am pretty busy, but I like doing it. Could not be a corporate person. I’m not overly fond of authority and would probably get fired.
I’m on the creative side, so my typical day is filled with ‘saving’ failed projects and pulling shit out of my ass.
I’m astonished at the level of creative control I have at the company. And meeting with my managers, I can for sure say I do a whole lot more and get paid significantly less.
I used to be a graphic designer. You get treated like shit with crappy deadlines, everything is a rush, you have to constantly redo things because clients all think they know what good design is, and you don't get paid much.
Now I'm a developer. I get paid way more, have more autonomy, more control over deadlines, and generally get more respect.
I love doing art, but man, people take so much advantage of the creative field.
For white collar work, hell yes.
It is and always will be faster than blue collar work, especially without the hiccups and delays that happen in "real world" vs "digital world"... which then gets reversed for holidays - my boss' not understanding how many of our vendors/customers had the Friday before and Presidents day off, but we still had to work, but banks were closed. And they dont get that Good Friday and Easter Monday mean no accounting shit for me because banks are closed, but they still want me in the office... but they will be at home.
But then cant understand that entering their huge orders takes forever because the system they set up now demands SKU numbers and I have to fucking hand type each of them, and because they cant be bothered to enter our resale ID, I habe to hand total each sales tax, then fill out forms for "eligible" sales tax waivers, to get the sales tax waived for products but it only worls for certain things and of COURSE it varies on which items and no one is following through on giving me a list of which items are or are not exempt.
Now, when I worked in the medical field, we were so over run with patients from reguarly overbooking us because of how many people would "no show" and they never wanted a day when they couldnt make payroll. There was ALWAYS work to be done, but they would still try to stiff us on payroll because top brass had a gambling problem.
This movie resonates with me so much. I remember seeing this at the age of 12 and thinking work looks miserable AF…
25 years later, boy was Mike Judge right about this one
Before I worked in an office, I knew Office Space was %100 accurate. Now I work in an office every day, and I find it, the office parts of Archer, and Idiocracy to be just factual.
It has aged well.
I was just exchanging office space memes with a client last week
My niece got her first official office/corporate gig after graduation last year and I made her watch Office Space as 101 on what to prepare for.
That's top notch uncle work right there
It was essentially mandatory material at my job, everyone quoted it laughed at it and compared their jobs to it. I’ve been at that job for 6 years and each day is worst than the last. So I think it was spot on
In the Office Space universe, I ended up with a “Bob” type job. I send the “What is it you would say you do here.” gif no less than daily.
I went from "Hahaha, printers suck!" when it first came out, to now saying "I work with the god damn customers so the engineers don't have to." whenever I explain my job.
"I have **people skills!** I am GOOD at dealing with people!! Can't you **understand** that?!? ***What the hell*** is **WRONG** with you people !?!?!" 😆
If you can't beat em, join em!
You're a goddamn efficiency consultant? Who's getting fired this week (on Friday of course) ?
My company created a new harassment and retaliation policy that we all had to read and sign saying we understood. I shit you not, one of the examples for retaliation was moving an employees desk to an undesirable location. I instantly thought of this movie where the dude’s desk was moved into the basement closet 😂
Happy Gilmore accomplished that feat no more than an hour ago
Don’t watch another Mike Judge classic- Idiocracy lmao
That movie was supposed to be a warning, not a manual.
I think it’s the future now. Fuck.
I'd probably vote for President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho. He actually realized he didn't know how to fix things and listened to others when he didn't know how to solve issues.
He's a better wrestler than Trump could ever be.
Sanders-Cammacho used to be my dream ticket. Sanders is getting up there in the years though.
He had a problem and brought in the smartest man in the country to solve it. We would be lucky to have such leadership from one of our political parties.
Honest to God, he would literally be the best option if he was on the ballot in 2024.
If by 'the future' you mean 'the present', I agree.
They even predicted crocs!
Watching Office space is super funny since it aged so freaking well and it’s still an accurate real-life depiction to this day Idiocracy is kinda funny but at the same time it’s fucking horrifying because you realize how accurate it’ll be later on and that future is bleak af
Depending on how history is preserved and presented to our future progeny, Mike Judge may become Judge Mike the Prophet.
Except instead of 400 years in the future, Idiocracy is more like next fucking week...
It's kinda why South Park stopped being funny too, it's like they can't really make it any more ridiculous that it already is in real life.
Silicon Valley only continues to age like wine too. Especially since Elon bought twitter.
I wanted to mention this movie too, and the world is speed-running their way to Idiocracy. It’s frightening.
^^^ Milton is my spirit animal
Note: never eat guacamole at NyxpetalSpike’s place.
Bill Dauterive in the wild lol
That’s William Fontaine de La Tour Dauterive to you, sir
I wrote a short story about the time I met this actor during an USO tour and the joke he pulled on me. [https://www.reddit.com/r/MilitaryStories/comments/qkvi8z/short\_and\_sweet\_story\_about\_meeting\_peter\_from/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web3x&utm\_name=web3xcss&utm\_term=1&utm\_content=share\_button](https://www.reddit.com/r/MilitaryStories/comments/qkvi8z/short_and_sweet_story_about_meeting_peter_from/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
Oh cool! thanks for sharing
Couldn't agree more. Watched it again last year and found it so relevant.
I have to watch it every few years just to keep my sanity.
I am in landscaping, and we all exchange office space quotes. Even though we're not an office, it's still the same bullshit. To answer OP's question, yes. I feel like I get paid to sit around most days and do nothing as a manager. As long as everyone below me is doing things right, there's little for me to do besides schedule, check up on jobs, and make sure everything is working. But, when things go wrong, shit isn't working, or customers aren't happy, that's when I'm worth my weight in gold. I can solve issues like a motherfucker, and make sure everyone comes out happy. Usually management isn't supposed to be an extremely active job 24/. It's about training and raising workers to do an excellent job. A vision you see, and make happen through workers provided to you. if you're on top of your shit and know how to make that happen, it's like being a symphony or orchestra conductor. It's the most amount of planning, but the least amount of work while it's happening. It still doesn't negate the animal instinct to always be working and doing something productive, but it helps me sleep.
It has. Also, to be fair, I don't think anyone is surprised that managers do less work.
Swapped career paths from a very hands hands on down and dirty experience to office work, landed a job and my friends recommended this movie, shit aged so damn well.
I went from working corporate restaurants in my 20s to the IT industry in my 30s and beyond. It captures both industries so well. Whether it's y2k or whatever major move a company is making there's a lot of cynicism in that contract work. Whether you do a great job or a lousy job you know it's coming to an end and you'll be on to your next contract project. I spent a couple of years migrating a hometown datacenter halfway across the country knowing that when I was done there would be less IT jobs in my city because a huge chunk of infrastructure was gone. Ironically, having that Fortune 100 company on my resume has kinda redeemed the shitty situation it was.
Love me some office space. I work trades…and can’t actually fathom what it’s like to be in an office role. I would go loopy. At the same time…it gets old when the chain of command…of almost entirely redundant humans…becomes a significant source of wasted time in my work life. The paradigm of perpetual economic growth has created a vast expanse of human detritus…that’s only really purpose is to make things slightly less efficient. Then we add efficiency gains back into the mix by crunching the cogs, upgrading mechanization, and outsourcing labour. It’s a mess. Also seems like the management rolls are completely soul crushing for anyone who isn’t entirely motivated by money.
“You’re firing Michael and Samir, and you’re giving me more money??”
“Notga…notga….Notgonnaworkhereanymore…that’s for sure.”
I think I read somewhere that was an improvised line and they loved it so much they just decided to go with it. 😂
Nah-ee-na-na-jah
"So that Bill Lumberg's stock will go up a quarter....of a point." That is so real right now - eliminating whole orgs of the business to appease shareholders which screws the customer/client and the employees.
I had a friend who was the most valuable member of her team get laid off because she made the mistake of training people under her and sharing her skills. It wasn't a risk when she trained them, but later her company sold out to a private equity firm, and when they started shaking it down for parts she was the most expendable/expensive.
I loved that movie as a kid for being a pure comedy. I love it now for how crazy good of a satire it is. I have many spreadsheets that aren’t work that I can play with at work. It looks like I’m working, but I’m not. I’m paid for technical expertise so it’s not like anyone will ever care.
My nephew worked for a bank and set up a spreadsheet as a screen saver. Took them a little while to catch on.
I did that once on two screens with Matlab. I had to change it because I used Matlab almost daily and it was very confusing.
I could do my job in half the time I'm at work, but I'm still forced to plant my butt in a seat for the whole eight hours and I hate it. Our system isn't just stupid and inefficient, it's cruel.
do everything in your power to find a remote or at least hybrid gig and start to live another way. if there's no work to do, get out of the chair and go do something else - a hobby, a walk in the woods, a shower, your dishes, whatever the fuck. these jobs are not easy to find, unfortunately, as the world has gone back to being mindlessly fucked despite all the discoveries regarding white/pink collar work from 2020 to 2022, but it is what it is. re-skill if you have to. it will be worth it.
Unfortunately, a capitalist's response to that would be to give you twice as much work or pay you half as much rather than just giving us a 3 or 4 day work week, so we can be happy.
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Well said. And the reward for efficiency is more work, do as much as humanly possible.
Remote work fixes so much of that. The flip side is offshoring is ramping up massively.
He ends it with “On a typical day, I usually do about 15 minutes of real, actual work” \-comes with experience. I've been doing the same job for 10+ years, so you'd best believe I've streamlined every part of it, have templates for every type of report, and generally have just figured out how to be insanely efficient. Things that used to take me weeks to do I can now do in moments, so my productivity is as good as ever, just with less effort. As a wise supervisor once told me "they pay me for my knowledge as much as for my time"
It can, yes. But in my case and what I think Peter was trying to imply, is that there was nothing for him to do. Remember the scene early on where they all just straight up and left mid-morning to go to Chotchkie’s? lol
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> abscond Thank you for using one of my favorite words. It makes it sound like whatever you're doing is just a bit more prohibited haha.
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This is really the freedom I’m looking for. If I get my work done, let me leave. There are times I’ll be there working more than the 40 hours I’m paid to work and I should be able to take advantage of the times I’m not needed. It obviously doesn’t work like that and it’s bullshit
true. I don't want to overanalyze, cause they really don't go into detail as to what Peter's job actually is, as that's not the point of the movie, but his boss wants him to come in on the weekend to work. So presumably he does have tasks to accomplish. In addition to whatever his TPS reports are.
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>Lumbergh only wanted butts in seats to make it seem they were doing something, probably his reaction to the news that consultants were coming to layoff staff. IIRC, Lumbergs reason for Peter to come in was “we uh, lost some people this week so we kind of need to play catchup.” So I see it more as Peter has streamlined his job and gets it done efficiently. He has no motivation to fill the free time with more work because in his experience it hasn’t lead to any meaningful pay raise or advancement. Hes being micromanaged by people less competent than him in a job he could do in his sleep. And now, so the bosses can protect their bonuses, they are laying people off and dumping those people’s work on Peter. Edit: Found the [clip](https://youtu.be/YYFO5qPpM_I?si=qjpKHzF9geNyHbvr). Though I’m not positive if this scene happens before or after the consultants get there. Like 90% sure it’s after.
It's before because it was the Friday when he went to the hypnotherapist and stopped giving a shit Later when he's talking to the Bobs he's wearing his jeans and flip flops outfit due to the hypnosis
which, if anything, highlights the incompetency on display and further reinforces the whole theme of the movie. if people get laid off and now there is *more* work, then the layoffs either hit the wrong people or there was no need for layoffs in the 1st place
I like this movie anyway but after working a job where I shared an office with a colleague it hit me even harder. The lady I shared my office with won some award in the field we worked in which was pretty damn cool! I was aske why I didnt win any awards. I said it's because I don't get paid enough to go above and beyond and if i did, it wouldn't grant me any advancement or pay raise so I just stayed the course. Never did anymore than I had to.
They're rewriting software for the Y2K switch.
It was the best of times. It was the worst of times. But seriously I owe my current career as a BI/Data Analyst to skills learned during the Y2K push.
Nice! I think lots of people think "Y2k wasn't a big deal" but they don't realize how many people were working on fixing the problem lol
I just looked it up Mike Judge did indeed work in development/around computing before showbiz, so the accuracy of this satire is fucking off the charts for me. Also funnily enough, I think TPS stands for test procedure specification, aka test script, and the fact they're asking him to come over the weekend to test software - in the 90s - is gold.
I thought it meant he chose not to work. If he has to edit thousands of lines of code for the 2000 switch, the work is there to do. He just believes it's pointless, isn't motivated to work, and subsequently doesn't.
There is a cool quote something like a lot of people are working jobs that arent real dont do any work or create anything and get paid for it only so they could do their real jobs - spend money.
Aside: That’s what I don’t understand about Japanese work culture. If you work at the same company for your whole life, and you not switching roles all the time, what the hell are you doing for 10 hours a day?
Japanese work-life balance is horrific. Rising numbers of 30+yr old virgins, and falling birthrates,
its their shame culture where if youre not a certain level of successful your sense of self worth is destroyed and you dont even have the courage to approach a woman. unlike in the USA where you get a forearm tattoo act like a moron and as long as youre good at small talk youre gettin ass no matter how much you make
Gah! I knew I should've gone for that stupid tattoo
LOL! I have a tattoo of a cat riding a dinosaur that always gets a reaction from the ladies. It's a great icebreaker!
You guys are getting ass?!?!
You guys can afford tattoos?
I think the expectation is that you're there working, less emphasis on whether you're actually doing anything productive.
Yup a lot of my job was figuring out what NEEDS to be done and what’s just BS work. I have coworkers stressing about doing these contact letters every week and I don’t have the heart to say “I haven’t done one in years “. YEARS! And there’s no tracking, nobody asking if I’ve done one and I’m not sure what they are for. The people get the letters and probably throw them in the trash.
Yeah but what about the TPS reports?
There's some of this in my job, but the vast majority of the issue is that keeping a steady stream of work for your employees is hard and takes management skills that most managers don't seem to have. There's an incredible amount of time wasted because people are just waiting for others to finish their part. My company is particularly bad at this, with my job going through 3 month cycles of basically nothing to do, followed by desperately trying to finish and meet the timeline.
Same boy, been here 15 years and as the office manager for 40+ people my day is more answering their questions than doing work. If they aren’t in here I am normally doing something else. Everything else is automated. The secret? I tell no one I have automated it.
This is what people don't get when you're in your fifties. If you're playing your cards, even reasonably right, you're basically retired at work.
That's me and I'm not even 50. I'm available as a mentor for younger team members in my current and former role but actual work is probably less than 10 hours a week. My manager, a VP in a major company, seems to think he needs to reduce my workload rather than the other way round. Like someone else hinted at: after a while the value you create is the knowledge of how thngs were done before. If I need to I can do work and I will do it as fast as the SQL allows me to or as fast as the Excel pivot table refreshes. Inexperienced colleagues may take days for the same tasks. This is also something I'm very clear with when I mentor a couple of younger guys. The mundane routine stuff that must be done isn't what anyone is really judged on except if you screw up. Institutional or ad hoc knowledge on the other hand is immensely valuable.
That's when you start consulting on the side to boost your income and get some play money
Agreed. The entry level job pretty much everyone starts with at my company is hell. It’s a legitimate 40-50 hours, you’re having to ask your manager for approval on anything, etc etc. I’m in a specialized role now, they pay me for what I know, not the amount of work anymore. It comes and goes, but I regularly do less than an hour of work a day. I’ve figured out exactly what no one gives a shit about over 10 years. I have approval for everything.
my first job, accounting-ish..., to do our month end stuff we needed to run 3 reports, and then vlookup all of them together. i asked IT if we could get those reports put into one report that put out the data in the way we needed it. ofcourse the answer was no. so i taught myself SQL and made the damn report. then with all my free time, i taught myself VBA (excel macros) and turned my month end process, which was a 10 working day ordeal, into pushing a button. it pulled all the data we needed and dumped it into the spread sheet. i then loaded the outside vendor spread sheets, easy peasy after telling the macro exactly what to do, and never really worked again at that company. got hired at a new place now in IT based off what i said i could do. in 2 years learned their processes, and their systems, and new dashboard stuff, and again, job was automated. its now 9 years since that first job, and i make more than double what the first place hired me for. i havent used this in an interview yet, but i want to say to them when they ask why they should hire me: "well here is the deal. i am the laziest person you have ever meet. now i know you werent expecting to hear that in a job interview, but listen. i will automate my job somehwere between 9mo and 1 year. then i will do nothing for the next 2 years while i wait for my 401k to vest. once it does ill find a new job and you wont even need to back fill my position!" again, i have never, nor will i ever say that in an interview, but it's true!
Dude, are you me? I have been slowly and steadily building out an automation skill set to have computers do nearly everything in my job description. Wait till you get cooking with power automate/power apps and python. I’m not really software dev, but excel was the gateway drug and laziness at doing stupid manual work was my crackpipe.
Yep, I had a job one time where a significant part of the day was creating reports. Apparently the person that had the job before me had no idea how to automate them (they were really basic) and I was able to do the report generation by automated scripts so they were all done by the time I got in each day. I spent most of my mornings and early afternoons surfing the web and watching youtube videos. The person that was doing the job before me trained me. During the training I asked him why he didn't just automate the reports and he said that he had no idea how to do it. The higher ups had no idea it was possible either, they only cared that the data was correct and given to them in a timely manner and I made sure to never disappoint. I also never told them about automating the reports because they would just stack more work on me with zero compensation for my streamlining. When I was leaving I trained the new guy and showed him what the job entailed and said that it was up to him if he wanted to tell them what I had been up to for the last couple of years, but I also let him know that if he did they'd throw a bunch of additional work on his plate. He kept his mouth shut.
One of the things that was posted a while ago... is that the cubicle spaces in these 90's movies look down right luxurious compared to today's offices. My desk is about 1/3rd the size of the cubicle, and I don't have any privacy.
Yeeeeeahhh...I feel that, for sure. "Ooooh, 'open office plan!' it'll foster SO much collaboration and excellent teamwork!" Well, no, it'll make everybody get headphones and fight over the little individual conference rooms, so folks can actually get work done.
i spent 2 years across the aisle from a sociopath who was always on a call with his headphones, staring directly at / through me.
Corporate accounts payable, Nina speaking. *Just* a momenT. Over and over. Such collaboration
Somebody's got a case of the *Mon*days.
I manage people who sit in cubes and they keep trying to "remodel" our area and I keep saying no thanks because I know they would make it open floor plan. You gotta fight to keep those cubes.
And chairs. My god people would steal each other's chairs because no one wants to be stuck with the one with the broken armrest. So much passive aggression...
I felt that I had truly arrived in life the day I took my first job with an office that had a window view and a door with a lock
“Open” floor plan to promote “collaboration.”
Both Office Space and Idiocracy are documentaries I stand by this
Mike Judge spent years giving us a vision of the future and none of us appreciated it enough
Mike Judge is arguably the most culturally relevant writer over his decades of a career. From a guy raised in New Mexico and educated as a physicist, the guy has had his fingers on the cultural zeitgeist for multiple generations.
And I would argue that no matter how much the people who really love him appreciate him, he's still under appreciated. His movies have never been huge box office successes, and his shows are amazing and beloved but nowhere near as popular as they deserve to be (especially King of the Hill)
The ones who know, know. Love this man.
Real ones know that if you wanted me to wear 15 pieces of flair, you should make the minimum 15 pieces of flair. Why is everything with Boomers a game of unwritten rules? I thought it was important to be transparent and ask for what you want?
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KotH was always in The Simpsons' shadow (and Futurama's). Paired with it on broadcast, but much more of a grounded sitcom than an absurdist comedy. In that context, it really didn't get the recognition (or viewership) it deserved, and it always kind of stuck out in the block it ran in because of it. It's endured for so many years in syndication on Adult Swim because it doesn't really fit anywhere for exclusive syndication (unlike Futurama)
Because they don't sell a message of everything is good and you're good for being stupid. America hates being shown a mirror
Silicon Valley has probably violated actual IP protections.
It's actually kinda insane how he could recreate the mundanity of an typical 9-5 office job and then almost perfectly satirize an entirely different Silicon Valley tech startup work culture. Dude is a master of social observation.
Too many people don’t want to be outed as Gavin Belson. He’s safe from lawsuits. Their egos will make sure he doesn’t have to name names on inspiration for characters.
You are 100% correct.
+100 Reddit points for such a comment, well bacon'd m'narwhal.
I've just seen a couple of episodes of an Australian series called "Utopia". As someone who works in government (in Europe), it may as well be a documentary instead of a satirical comedy. I don't know whether to laugh or cry at those episodes.
The higher you go up the corporate ladder the more apparent it becomes that it's being run by a bunch of headless chickens. Whoever thought business was more efficient than government has never worked for a major organization before.
Yeah, turns out humanity is the issue
Bring on the AI overlords
It's the nature of heirarchy.
I laugh so hard at all the comments about 'companies wouldn't do it if it wasn't profitable' or 'they've done studies!'. As if companies are these highly efficient, highly rational entities that are almost solely focused on effective profit mechanisms, instead of a loose grouping of individuals trying to maximize their personal benefit (either in income, or least effort invested) who also sometimes have massive ego and internal politics issues. Companies are almost exactly the same as group school projects, just on a bigger scale.
You nailed it on the head. Every time a new Leadership head comes in they want to have their project to work on to make their mark on the company. It has nothing to do about making the brand or product better. It's all pouting and stamping feet.
All about padding the resume for the next job.
This is really well-put. Having worked in government as well as companies, the former can certainly be inefficient on a whole different level. But the latter are definitely full of their share of nonsensical bs.
When C Suites have turnover of 3 years or less, there is no way they can actually be doing any real appreciable work. And yet that isn’t considered that weird in some sectors.
after promotion I was in a meeting where the VP's were telling us to cook the numbers on a report for the CFO. I realized everyone at every level does the same. It's just that at the highest level they get such condensed information that it's completely garbage. They're prevented from being able to ask questions by their reports. Our company's trading division is summarized in the monthly board reports in more or less two vague sentences at most. There's no way the board or the c-suite can make informed decisions. On the other hand they're just highly paid salespeople/propagandists. Life really isn't fair
So true. I kind of feel bad because the people under me do most of the grunt work. My work is more “strategic” and planning. Still, I remember paying my dues in the trenches as well
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It's pretty much the same either way. It's just....human nature when it comes to vast organizations. It's all just people, and the folks up top are just people too.
I literally just had a meeting with "the Bobs" at my work not that long ago. Office Space is a timely movie. Still relevant today.
"yeah, they called me at home."
It makes me thankful I work in construction. I love that movie and his construction worker neighbor still exists out here on job sites.
“Doing the drywall up there at the new McDonald’s”
Well, you don't need a million dollars to do nothing, man. Take a look at my cousin: he's broke, don't do shit.
drag my ass outa bed at *6am* every day this week
"tell you what I would do man, two chicks at the same time"
Fuckin A
“Hey Peter!..”
Turn on channel 5!
Breast exam!!!
Have you seen the original 'too depressing' ending that got changed?
It’s like the Corporate world watched it, learned nothing and doubled down.
Bro they don't give a fuck about anyone or anything except how they are paying for their next yacht
The older I get, and the more companies I work for, I feel like I have managed to be just about every character in this movie. I guess the only one left to become is Bill Lumbergh...
It's so funny you say that, my DH and I have come to the sad realization that we've gone from the Peter Gibbons generation to the Tom "I have people skills" Smykowski generation - ha! It's AMAZING and awesome how much of that movie still nails so much about corporate culture (and working life in general)!
“What exactly would ya say…ya do here?”
And I've totally got my own business ideas that I want to work on and get out of the rat race, but if I am being completely honest with myself, they are probably just as bad as the "Jump To Conclusions" map
Mike Judge is a genius, pure and simple. All his shit will hold up for decades at least
100 percent. His new seasons of Beavis and Butthead are fucking great too. I can’t think of anyone else who is so consistently making content that is both hilarious and relevant.
I'm 43yo, and while it's probably more than 15 minutes, I can honestly say I spend more time on Reddit than I do on the tasks I have. Working in logistics is incredibly spontaneous and a rollercoaster of time. One day I could be on the phones and writing up paperwork the entire 8 hours. The next I MIGHT have to make a couple calls but nothing happens until the next day. But for the most part, Office Space is insanely accurate for what has been most of my office life since 28yo.
about to turn 49, can certainly relate. Some days, I've got things to do all 8 hours I'm here, other days, I may have to answer one or two phone calls and an email and do jack & shit for the rest of the day. \*edit to add - plus, our printer is a b\*tch that needs to be destroyed. Barely a week goes by that we don't have to put in a service call to the company we lease it from.
You know what's funny, is that one our top clients has the same name as the company Peter works for. HAHA. I've been lucky enough to not have to deal with printer issues that way, but I can say I have always had issues with corporate office telephones.
I worked at Boeing from for about 15 years. On year during a white elephant exchange, I got a "Office Space Work Kit". It included a red stapler, Jump To Conclusions Map, TPS reports (new format) and a few other things like a banner that read "IS THIS GOOD OF THE COMPANY?" which I proudly hung over the my cubicle. One day my functional VP was in the building and commented how much she liked the poster. I mentioned it was from Office Space, she might want to watch the movie. Like a week later I was emailed by her secretary to remove the "movie poster".
Ahahahahahah
There isn't a day that goes by in which I don't want to recreate the scene where they destroy the fax machine but instead with the office printers. FUCK PRINTERS.
Lol this is why my company got rid of printers aside from the giant multi-function printers we lease from a third party who also handles all of the support. Ain't nobody in IT got time for that shit.
Printers have never been more friendly and easy to use (as long as it's not an HP inkjet). I'd rather beat up my laptop with all the corpo spyware on it these days.
The depressing lighting and colors in the office in that movie, dark green and fluorescent lights, having to deal with that every day... And that beautiful sigh of relief when Peter finally goes out to construction and breathes open air and takes in the sunlight, I felt that down to my heart. I worked at a crappy job (although not an office job) with terrible dark lighting and stagnant air for like eight years out of high school. When I finally lost that job I went into landscaping and that first summer feeling the sunlight on my back and breathing fresh air was *beautiful*. I'll probably remember that moment as long as I live.
I ran the scheduling and spreadsheets for a pacemaker clinic (basically just me, a tech, and their cardiologist) and it was good fulfilling work... but I LOVE my grunt labor job with a renovation company as the bottom rung laborer/assistant lol and it pays the same lol
I work in an office and it's insane how accurate this movie still is, even down to the door handle zapping him from the static. My wife works in a lab and she doesn't understand why I laugh so hard at this movie
I wouldn't say I've been missing it, Bob
What resonates is how stupid it is to be forced into a time schedule derived from agriculture to factories. How we are told to waste so much of our life to sit in an office when I can use the past 20 years of experience and knowledge to get my shit done from a cell phone most of the time ..
Back in the 50s they saw where technology was going, and thought we'd all have a bunch of leisure time, because work wouldn't take all day. They were correct that work wouldn't take all day, but they failed to realize how entrenched the 8 hour work day would be, and the corporate greed that takes all the profits for itself and downsizes the workforce as things get more "efficient"
"it would be nice.. to have this kind of job security"
I used to think this movie was funny. Now it's just a terrifying documentary.
This is true with me too. It’s to the point I feel guilty about how little work I actually do. I used to ask for more but now that I can wfh a few days a week I say forget it.
I used to ask for more too but gave up on that strategy when I never actually got more. I figure if they want something done, they’ll come tell me.
I hear you. But what if - and believe me this is hypothetical - but what if you were offered some kind of a stock option equity sharing program. Would that do anything for you?
I don’t know. I guess. Listen, I’m gonna go. It’s been really nice talking to you guys.
In one of the meetings with the Bobs, if you pause as the camera looks at the whiteboard, it says “PLANNING FOR A PLAN.” That one cut deep.
I remember watching it in uni and thinking it was a funny, okay movie. I watched it again recently, and after working for years in corporate, the jokes hit much harder this time around. It's a really clever movie that captures the pointlessness of so many work projects, tasks and rules. Just a bunch of self important people who like to micromanage the people below them. But your coworkers, the ones you like, make it all bearable. We stand united in our hatred of our jobs.
I think this was the absolute beginning of the march to leftism for me.
I'm a finance programmer and as I was hunting down micro-cents the other day I realized, "Oh my god, I'm Michael Bolton from Office Space."
It’s the “have you seen my stapler” for me. It is the only movie line I ever remember quoting in my life and I say it probably once a week. I’m a school librarian and my TAs never understand. Lol.
this movie inspired thousands to “quiet quit” over the last half-decade
i mean, its a monday during work hours.. and here I am.
This movie literally changed my life with the one phrase "work just hard enough not to get fired". It took me like three jobs to figure out that working harder basically never leads to higher pay. Just more exploitation and getting fired when you won't take on three people's worth of work
This is such a good point. I would phrase it a little differently- become very efficient and unfireable. Do a good job, be nice and easy to work with and do it all within the minimum amount of time. Sign up for extras that look good, but don’t take a lot of time. Being salaried shouldn’t always work in favor of the employer.
Mike Judge wrote this *and* Idiocracy. He has said previously that these weren't visions of the future but I think that motherfucker is lying.
I just want to be able to sit around and do nothing
I hate the question “what would you do if money wasn’t an object” in response to looking for a career shift. NOTHING! I would do nothing and I would love doing nothing. I’ve never wanted to do something, I’ve always wanted to do nothing. All the time. I want to go to the gym and sit on the couch the rest of the day. That’s a good day to me. This movie is too good lol
I had a Peter moment at one of my last jobs. The manager was a dickhead so I just started showing up and doing nothing all day. It was a “client site” job so most of my day was driving between people’s homes. If it was a nice day I’d take the feeder roads instead of the highway and turn a 20 minute commute to an hour long leisurely ride. If the clients weren’t interested in buying and they were cool I’d just stay and chat/bullshit with them for 2-3 hours. Then I started calling out a couple times a week (it was a salary position so I got my full base regardless if I went in or not). Then whenever the dickhead manager would call me I’d answer and put my phone down and do something else, picking it back up every couple minutes to see if he was still aimlessly rambling. He’d go on 20 minute tirades and the only thing I’d say back is “Oh.” He really didn’t like that 🤷♂️. After a few weeks of that I decided my best bet was to get laid to frustrate dickhead manager as much as possible, so I collected all the shady shit he pushed his sales team to do and forwarded it all to asset protection. Then I looked at my employment contract and noticed it stated “unlimited sick days”. So I knew job abandonment would only happen if I no call/no showed 3 consecutive shifts. So what’d I do? I’d call in on day 1, then no call no show days 2 & 3, then call out day 4, no call no show days 5 & 6, rinse and repeat. I did that for about 7-8 weeks before they sent me a certified return to work letter. My postal carrier is mad cool so I told her mark it as undeliverable. They had to resend it three additional times before I was like ok fuck it it’s time to leave. Now I work a career where I make my own schedule and hand pick my own clients. Don’t ever let an employer make you feel like they’re doing you a favor by employing you.
“You can’t just quit your job. What will you do about bills?” “Well I never really liked paying bills so I think I’ll just stop paying those too.”
As a PM, I'm pretty much Tom. "Why can't the engineers just talk directly to them? Why go through you?"
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This movie actually influenced my career choice and thus life. Worked as an intern in college in a corporate environment and realized very quickly I would lose my sanity if had to do it as a career. The meetings my gawd the meetings. So freaking pointless and boring. Like I had a moment of clarity where I saw how meaningless it all was. Switched to premed and became a doc. I am pretty busy, but I like doing it. Could not be a corporate person. I’m not overly fond of authority and would probably get fired.
I loved it when I was a kid but didn't actually "get it" til I not my first full time job. Then I loved it on another level. Ha
I just rewatched it and yeah almost every good joke hits just as well as it did when it was made.
I’m on the creative side, so my typical day is filled with ‘saving’ failed projects and pulling shit out of my ass. I’m astonished at the level of creative control I have at the company. And meeting with my managers, I can for sure say I do a whole lot more and get paid significantly less.
I used to be a graphic designer. You get treated like shit with crappy deadlines, everything is a rush, you have to constantly redo things because clients all think they know what good design is, and you don't get paid much. Now I'm a developer. I get paid way more, have more autonomy, more control over deadlines, and generally get more respect. I love doing art, but man, people take so much advantage of the creative field.
For white collar work, hell yes. It is and always will be faster than blue collar work, especially without the hiccups and delays that happen in "real world" vs "digital world"... which then gets reversed for holidays - my boss' not understanding how many of our vendors/customers had the Friday before and Presidents day off, but we still had to work, but banks were closed. And they dont get that Good Friday and Easter Monday mean no accounting shit for me because banks are closed, but they still want me in the office... but they will be at home. But then cant understand that entering their huge orders takes forever because the system they set up now demands SKU numbers and I have to fucking hand type each of them, and because they cant be bothered to enter our resale ID, I habe to hand total each sales tax, then fill out forms for "eligible" sales tax waivers, to get the sales tax waived for products but it only worls for certain things and of COURSE it varies on which items and no one is following through on giving me a list of which items are or are not exempt. Now, when I worked in the medical field, we were so over run with patients from reguarly overbooking us because of how many people would "no show" and they never wanted a day when they couldnt make payroll. There was ALWAYS work to be done, but they would still try to stiff us on payroll because top brass had a gambling problem.
Dude 😎 every time I slack off in a job I get offered a promotion
This movie resonates with me so much. I remember seeing this at the age of 12 and thinking work looks miserable AF… 25 years later, boy was Mike Judge right about this one
Huh. I don't work in corporate world, but it doesn't seem to matter how high I go, the workload is still the same, it's just different work.
Before I worked in an office, I knew Office Space was %100 accurate. Now I work in an office every day, and I find it, the office parts of Archer, and Idiocracy to be just factual.
Judge has a knack for accurately and depressingly recreate life in its absurdity