Boss: Your financial forecast turned out to be wrong. Dilbert: Is that a surprise, given that forecasts are mostly just guessing plus math? Boss: The math is supposed to fix the guessing. Dilbert: I think we've isolated the problem to you.
Boss: A good manager tailors his leadership style to fit each employee. In your case, I think the best approach involves poling you with a sharpened pool cue. To be perfectly honest, a big part of leadership is guessing.
The Boss says, "We're going to use CMMI. It's a model for developing a process to creat a framework." The Boss says, "Or it might be a process for creating a framework to make a model." The Boss says, "There's no budget for training, so we'll be relying on guessing more than usual."
The boss says, "Ted, your new responsibility is to keep the pigeons from defiling our ledges." Ted says, "Are you hoping this awful assignment will cause me to quit?" The boss says, "Not at all." Ted says, "Are you hoping I'll fall out a window?" The boss says, "Maybe you should stop guessing now,"
Dilbert: Here's the financial projection you asked me to do. It's basically just guessing plus math. Obviously, it's useless for making decisions because I can get any result I want by tweaking the assumptions. Boss: Don't say any of that stuff when you present it to the board tomorrow.
alice to the boss: one option is to use the old method that has never once worked, but we think we know how to make it work next time.
alice: the other option is to try something new that we can't be sure will work.
alice: it's almost as if leadership is nothing but guessing.
the boss drinking coffee: let's change the subject.
dilbert: when humans were primitive and dumb, they used their superstitions and biases to make decisions. eventually, science won out, and we evolved to use data and reason to make decisions.
dogbert: how'd that work out?
dilbert: not so good. it turns out that all of our data are unreliable and conflicting. and we don't have the mental capacity to use reason.
dogbert: it's still better than guessing.
dilbert: how do you know that?
dogbert: you are hard to talk to.
Bob the Dinosaur says to Dogbert, "That's all Dilbert left you in his will? A gadget?" Dogbert replies, "I'm just the custodian." Bob says, "Maybe it's some kind of hyper-electronic induction transmutant geoplasmic nodal collectimizer." Dogbert replies, "Maybe . . . But I'm guessing bathroom soap dispenser." Bob picks up the device and asks, "Can I change my guess?"
The garbage man says to Dilbert, "I couldn't help noticing the bugs in the program on this old diskette you threw away." The garbage man continues, "I fixed the bugs and tightened the code from twelve thousand lines to sixteen." Dilbert says, "It took me three months to write that program." The garbage man says, "I took the liberty of updating your resume. I'm guessing you'll need it soon."
Alice and a bloated Dilbert sitting at a table with meals. Dilbert says, "I've been eating like crazy since Dogbert put the fertility drugs in my coffee." Dilbert pats his bloated belly and continues, "I'm guessing I have ten or fifteen babies in there. It's hard to keep them fed." Alice says, "And your only evidence of pregnancy is weight gain?" As Dilbert lifts a sandwich to his mouth, he says, "Here comes another hoagie, kids!"
