bears. beets. battlestar gallactica.

I don’t watch a lot of TV for the most part. I usually try to catch “The Hills” on MTV on Monday nights (quality reality television right there) and “The Office” on Thursday nights. I got into The Office in the beginning of this past summer, after I borrowed seasons one and two from a friend and finished them in one and a half days. Needless to say, I was hooked and couldn’t wait for season 4 to begin. (I watched season 3 online through various websites since the DVDs weren’t out yet.) Anyways, the show is absolutely hilarious. It’s very smart and well written, and a few of my friends who are already out in the working world say that it’s very relatable.

The show is about this mid-sized paper distribution company, Dunder Mifflin. The manager of the Scranton, Pennsylvania branch, Michael Scott, is kind of dumb in a funny way and ignorant about many issues. What makes him so great though is how much he cares about the people in his office and his customers. Because Dunder Mifflin is a smaller company, its prices on paper are considerably higher than those of its competitors such as Staples. Michael tries to sell his company on customer experience and customer service, two areas that are harder for the bigger companies to implement on a personal level. In a recent episode, Michael decided to personally deliver gift baskets to all their customers who recently left Dunder Mifflin for a bigger company in order to try to win them back. Also in this episode, a website for the company was about to be launched, which Michael opposed because he – not realizing that people preferred the convenience and speed of ordering online – thought that the website took away from Dunder Mifflin’s approachability and made the company less personal.

Throughout the episode, Michael went to the heads of the companies who left Dunder Mifflin and gave them each a gift basket telling them that there were no hard feelings, but to remember the personal experiences they had with Dunder Mifflin. He was met with pretty much the same response from each executive, which was mostly just a weird look and awkward thank you as they all told him their company would most likely not go back to Dunder Mifflin. This episode, while hilarious, made me kind of sad.

These days, business is being geared more towards customers, doing whatever they need, and making the experience as personal as possible. Everything is done to make the customer experience better. That’s why it’s sad watching Michael Scott trying to connect with all of this clients and then getting rejected time and time again. He is trying to be more personal but at the end of the day, his job is to sell paper. It might not be as important for him to be so friendly with all of his clients, though it is honorable, as much as it is for him to offer the lowest price possible.

Of course, the show doesn’t get too serious, and it’s hard to really feel bad for Michael because he gets so frustrated that none of his clients are returning that he pitches a fit at the last company he goes to and yells for them to return his gift basket and refuses to move from their couch until they do so.

Bottom line is this show is great, and at the same time I’ve learned a few things about business in a sort of off-hand, weird way.


Also, the title of this entry probably makes absolutely no sense unless you watch the office... I actually have no personal interest in bears, beets or battlestar gallactica.