This one’s for fans of The Office. We all know that Steve Carell’s character of Michael Scott is the bumbling, incompetent manager based on Ricky Gervais’s character of David Brent in the original British version. Having watched both, I think the writers have better served Michael than David with a touch of character depth that explains why Dunder-Mifflin kept him around long enough to get a promotion to manager: he’s an amazing salesman. In the few episodes where he’s needed to make a pitch to a major client, his means may have always exasperated Jan, but the story usually ends with him nonchalantly mentioning that, oh, by the by, he landed the account. In one episode, he even gets a chance to shine when he roundly condemns Ryan’s criticisms when Ryan hasn’t made a single sale and expands upon his philosophy of sales being based around people. Via the Peter Principle, he simply got promoted to his level of incompetence and nobody ever demoted him back to his level of competence. It’s like if Admiral kirk never got demoted back to captain. I think, whenever The Office goes off the air, the perfect happy ending would have Michael Scott go back into sales.
That’s my two cents.
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Categories: TV, Movies & Entertainment
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May 24th, 2007 at 12:18:54 pm
It helps that the US Office airs more episodes in one season than the UK office aired in its entire run.
It’s like if Admiral kirk never got demoted back to captain.
Spoiler!
May 24th, 2007 at 3:49:47 pm
Indeed. I just hope Michael Scott doesn’t have the same ending as David Brent.
Though special guest star Ricky Gervais as motivational speaker David Brent at Dunder-Mifflin would be awesome…
May 24th, 2007 at 4:06:46 pm
Your idea was good… Jan’s was bigger.
May 24th, 2007 at 9:01:41 pm
I actually had a discussion about the Peter Principle with several of my 20-something colleagues a few weeks back. NONE had ever heard of it.
I believe the Peter Principle should be one of the first things taught in general business classes. The fact is you will work with, or for, someone who is where he or she is because of the Peter Principle.
The Office makes the problem funny. In real life, it sucks. And, in some cases, it can be deadly.
May 30th, 2007 at 11:11:00 pm
[…] to this principle on blogs. Here it is applied to internal innovation in the enterprise. An example can be seen in Michael Scott’s character from The Office, in a real-life example here, and even […]