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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
Dilbert 101, 18 Oct 2003
The reason for the remarkable success of Scott Adams' Dilbert cartoon strip is obvious; he has captured the flavor of modern business and held it up to the light of truth, revealing all of its quirks, crazy strategies, and downright insanity for all to see. Dilbert is the working man's hero; while we toil away in our little cubicles, waiting for quitting time and weekends, Dilbert and his pals are fighting back – well, not fighting, but they are doing all kinds of complaining, the same complaining most office workers do, albeit not so forthrightly. The Dilbert Principle is the book that made a cult comic strip a treasury of American humor; taken outside the frames of his heralded daily comic strip, Scott Adams is even funnier and more insightful than even many a Dilbert fan would have thought possible. He's been there, and he knows what he is talking about.In this bestselling book, Adams basically defines corporate culture; telling us many things we already know yet doing so in a fashion that is brilliantly funny. His explanation for the craziness of business today is a simple one: People are idiots, which is something I've been saying that for years. Adams includes himself among the idiot population. We all do stupid things from time to time, and those who do more stupid things than others wind up in corner offices with windows and a secretary while the majority of folks toil away in their sensory deprivation chambers (or cubicles). Adams explains the nature of this beast we call the workplace, illustrating his points with the help of over 400 Dilbert cartoons and reinforcing even the most seemingly inane assumptions he makes with actual case reports of real people who have written to him of their own experiences. The Dilbert Principle covers almost every aspect of the workplace: management, performance reviews, marketing, business plans, budgets, sales, those awful meetings, projects, etc. He shows you how to get ahead at the expense of your co-workers, delineates the lies of management so that you can be on the lookout for them when they come, defines modern terms such as downsizing in the simple, more direct meanings of days gone by. He describes the process by which one becomes a leader, exposes team-building exercises and group projects as the useless vehicles they almost always are, and provides advice on keeping afloat in the business world by means of hoarding information, avoiding doomed projects, and surviving those you can't avoid; from there, he goes on to offer his knowledge on topics such as: how to participate in a meeting based on the things you want to get out of it, and (as if most of us even need a refresher on this) how to avoid actually working while at work. The whole book is just brilliant, hysterical satire built on things millions of us know all too well, and one finds oneself nodding or agreeing with far too many of the silliest notions and business practices Adams rakes over the coals. The book is a fountain of knowledge, with each page containing terrific quotes along the lines of three of my favorites: 1) The best thing about the future is that it isn't here yet, 2) The great thing about the truth is that there are so many ways to avoid it without being a "liar," and 3) The only constructive criticism is the kind you do behind people's backs. If you are a Dilbert-type worker (and odds are pretty good that you are), you will find comedy and a sense of comradeship with Dilbert and his cohorts. If you really want to get ahead and assume the increased lack of intelligence needed to become a manager, though, you should pick this book up for one chapter alone: Machiavellian Methods penned by Dogbert himself.
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