How to alienate your workmates

If you work in an office environment, you may want to alienate most of your workmates. This is a serious task and you’ll not want to take any chances. Plan your alienation.

A good start is to take a watching brief. Watch the people who are widely considered ‘massive tools’ and make note of what they do to achieve this reputation. If a person regularly walks into your room and insults one of your colleagues and then attempts to get everyone else to join in with them in some group bullying, try that. A person like this thinks that everyone is on their side. They think that everyone’s against their chosen target.

But they’re not.

How to get promoted

You’ve been working in your junior administrative position for 26 years now. You’ve not vomited on the desk in eight years and you’ve not stabbed anyone for three. Chances are you’re close to promotion. How do you ensure this happens?

First of all, promotion is NOT about the quality of your work, your attitude or the number of years since the last knife-related fatality. Ignore these elements. You’re kidding yourself and it will only cause you frustration.

Promotion is actually about golf. Take up the sport of golf and try and play against your immediate superior and preferably someone from another department as well. If you can create a situation where someone says to your boss that you’re good at golf, you are guaranteed to climb the corporate ladder.

A good telephone manner

Having a good telephone manner is all about acting. Chances are, you will instantly despise at least 90 per cent of the people who phone up. The remainder will earn your hatred with their attitude. The trick is to act like you don’t wish they had some sort of inflammation of the pancreas.

First of all, you should always pick the phone up. No-one wants to pick the phone up, because there is almost always someone on the other end of it, but pick it up you must. Having done so, utter a greeting. Don’t just sigh at length, like a deflating air bed.

Addressing the boss

Communication skills are key in the workplace. Knowing how to address different people will go a long way towards keeping you in that junior administrative position for the rest of your life.

When addressing the boss, never so much as allude to the fact that the menial, repetitive tasks that you have to carry out corrode your soul. Soul corrosion is an occupational hazard in the modern workplace and to complain about it would make you seem like a whinger.

Also, never go overboard and refer to the boss as being an emperor or king. While they might act like this is the case, they won’t believe that you feel the same way.

Dressing for your junior administrative position

Once you’ve landed that junior administrative position of which you’d always dreamt, there’s still much to be done. As well as not smashing things, you also have to dress appropriately. The following dress is considered inappropriate:

• Full pirate regalia – piracy in all its forms is frowned upon in most workplaces
• A Spider-man outfit – it is difficult for people to know whether they are dreaming or not if you’re wandering around dressed as Spider-man. Many people consider the appearance of Spider-man to be a sure sign that they are asleep
• Filing cabinet camouflage – you want people to be able to find you at work and you don’t want people stuffing stuff in you