EP05 - The Dundies

Sara Chandran:

Welcome to Out of the Office, a podcast exploring the lessons learned from the hit TV show, The US Office. This is an opportunity for us to use the series to understand more about how we can create a more diverse and inclusive workplace. I'm your host, Sara Chandran. I'm the founder of Fresh and Fearless, and I'm going to be delving into the world of Dunder Mifflin to examine the different characters and scenarios presented throughout the series. 

We're going to look at how the show highlights the importance of respecting diversity, fostering inclusivity and how we can create a positive work environment. Whether you're a fan of The Office or just interested in learning more about creating this inclusive workplace, this is the podcast for you. So grab your favourite Dundie Award, and let's tune in. I'm delighted that today we will be looking at season two, episode one, The Dundies. And as a bit of background, this is essentially Michael's, the manager of the Scranton office, his attempt to create an award show, but it's quite embarrassing. It's not that inclusive, and there are some things in there that are probably not great to boost employee morale and spirits, and it takes place in the local Chili's restaurant. He thinks that all his employees love the awards and that they love his comedy act, but actually, a lot of people dread The Dundies. 

So that's a little bit of background, and I'm delighted to have a good friend of mine, Nick, to talk to me about this episode. So Nick, do you want to come up and say hello? Hi, Sara, a pleasure to be here. I'm Nick Warner. I'm a learning and development manager currently working in InsureTech, helping people to unlock their full potential, but still struggling when working on that myself. If only there were a training module for that. 

Sara Chandran:

Love that. So one of the icebreaker questions I have for my guests is, so Michael, infamously in the show, has a mug that says "world's best boss" that he bought himself. So, if you had a "world's best something" mug that you bought yourself, what do you think it would say?

Nick Warner:

Nothing that was progressive, probably "world's best cheekbones", or "world's best skin".

Sara Chandran

Bones and skin, that's true. Very gifted. Any advice on how you get those amazing cheekbones and skin? 

Nick Warner

There's no secret, really. It's just plenty of exercise, a good diet, and the odd bit of acid.

Sara Chandran

Amazing. Okay, so let's dive into the Dundies and the awards. I obviously have watched the series so many times, and I find that the Dundies are really, it's an entertaining episode to watch, and I think there's like a really sweet moment with like Pam and Jim as well, where they have that little kiss, well I think Pam just like plants one on Jim, and he's like "what?"

But in general, like it's just like, it reminds me of when I was at work, and we would often have like awards, and some of them would be silly, and some of them would be more serious, and I feel like Michael maybe struggled here to kind of get the right balance, because I think he kind of sees the Dundie's as an opportunity to like lift employee spirits and morale, and he tries to get Jan over and tries to get some budget to support it to kind of give people drinks and stuff, but I think he really like misses the mark, so whilst he has like those good intentions, I think it hasn't quite achieved what he wanted in terms of the efforts to kind of make people feel great, and I just wonder what your reflections are on that in terms of how Michael has kind of created these Dundie's and why he's kind of missed the mark. 

Nick Warner

For sure, well, it's certainly a process he believes in. He does it year on year, but it's not really something that is well thought out. It doesn't take any opinions or feedback from his staff at all, and the whole event is very disorganized. Although it's an award ceremony with several different categories, none of them are really tailored to the workforce's individual preferences or their opinions on the world and the workplace, so it sets up an opportunity for many things to go wrong, and they do, and the whole thing kind of falls apart around him towards the end. It is interesting how it just quickly, like, falls apart around him, and even like the Chillies restaurant, I feel like it's not really a fitting place for an awards ceremony; I just feel like there are people just random strangers like sat around having the like evening entertainment like of this office awards show, like I think it's yeah it's not really great. 

Nick Warner

Yeah I mean, that's a good example there really to highlight the culture of a workplace and the fact that he's having the event in an American version of a Charlie Chalks, it's going to go no way into reading confidence or any sort of professionalism within the team. People are kind of there against their will. If you look around the faces in the room, everyone's initially, anyway, certainly very bored or actually like they don't want to be there or just outright offended at some of these award categories that are being dished out to them.

Sara Chandran

Yeah, and I think there was one. There are a couple of awards that he gives Kelly, like, oh, I've forgotten what it is like something about curry, which is just completely inappropriate and so offensive to give the only Indian person in the office an award associated with curry and then he obviously gives like Pam the White Sneakers Awards which she seems really delighted by and then he gives like Kevin like smelliest bowel movement and stuff, and they're just like I get that they're funny and like it's kind of his efforts to kind of make people laugh but I think people do look forward to getting like genuine recognition for their kind of their efforts at work.

Nick Warner

Sure, I mean, you hit the nail on the head there when he was trying to bring an element of humour to the occasion, but it was his humour, and it wasn't finely balanced at all when mixing that in with professionalism. This is a corporate event at the end of the day despite being in chillies. Michael failed to understand that the team's humour or preferences change from person to person. He clearly did not set clear boundaries when leading that team, and it's not encouraging an inclusive work environment. You couldn't make the errors like he did with the categories if he had done so. So sometimes humour can enhance camaraderie amongst colleagues. Still, not a single thought was given to that when creating the event in the first place, and the absolutely lead balloon across the floor when people were going on to accept these awards just absolutely ratified that totally. 

Sara Chandran

I feel like he could have been yeah as you say a bit more thoughtful and put some idea behind those awards and you know for example every year he gives Pam the same award and recognition of like the longest engagement award goes to Pam and obviously that actually really hurts Pam's feelings because she's obviously quite sensitive about it for for very clear on obvious reasons and I feel like you know if he knew his employees and had like a bit of awareness about those small behaviors and like picking up those cues that people aren't having fun people aren't laughing people clearly don't want to be there so he's not you know created that environment for them to kind of want to to be in that space and I think it's really lovely when like Jim kind of goes into the office to Michael and says hey you know I think it would be great if you kind of change that category like you know and Michael's like oh but it's so funny because we do that every year and I feel like that's maybe sometimes what people in workplaces need to do is they can you know you're in it right and managers aren't always see things and I feel like as an employee you have the insight to the culture that you can then say to the manager hey I'm not sure if you know this but maybe this award isn't the right one or maybe this is what's happening with your colleagues and and just supporting each other that way I feel like there's like an element of you know advocating for each other at work in that way like Jim did. 

Nick Warner

Sure, Jim's comment was direct feedback, and Michael failed to take that on board. He's not even acknowledged it. He's not got a culture to improve that element of his workspace. He doesn't really acknowledge or learn from his errors ever, which is kind of the premise of the show working so well. Still, for an office environment, it is extremely toxic, with no open space to discuss ideas with the team and the offensive awards that occur year on year.  

Any feedback that comes from the shop floor is not taken into consideration at all, and if I were working in that environment, I would think my boss, the leader, does not value any kind of progress. There's no sort of way forward. In that sense, it's very lucky actually that anyone bothered to attend at all. 

Sara Chandran 

I think he managed to rope people in because it's like you can bring your partners and family, and so people are like, okay, cool and then it turns out there's no budget, and they have to buy their own drinks and food, and it's just like oh really like you can't even do the basic thing right.

Nick Warner

Sure, and you know, it comes across as completely unprofessional on his part because, at the end of it, it was only people's pity for him and a lot of alcohol that sort of saved and won the day, but if that were to play out in a more realistic setting, he would need to invest in some serious professional development after that night. 

Sara Chandran

Yeah, what kind of things do you think Michael could do with personal development? What kind of courses and modules would you put that man on?

Nick Warner

Well, the art of public speaking, perhaps because I don't think he was particularly nuanced when delivering his message to the room.

Clear communication, so improved communication by setting expectations within the team.

You could argue that he did do that, but it was a culture of anything kind of goes almost and certainly no boundaries when it comes to sense of humour and what may or may not be offensive.

Regular updates, regular feedback, as well as providing that channel for employees to feedback to the manager praise or grumble that can either be an anonymous feedback form or could have daily sort of stand-up meetings just to keep the temperature check on the attitudes amongst his team and ensuring that everyone understands their roles. You said people like to receive recognition for, you know, legitimate things that they've actually done in the day-to-day. He was, you know, giving awards out for smelliest bowel movement, etc., So it doesn't really kind of allow everyone to fully embrace and understand their roles because none of the awards that were dished out or very few anyway were actually relevant at all to the whole reason they're in that environment every day going to work and taking a wage.

Sara Chandran

Yeah, I think Michael could do with a lot of development. Every time I do these episodes, it's so funny because obviously, the whole premise, as you say of the show, is, you know, Michael's inability to take feedback due to his lack of self-awareness. It's what makes for such entertaining work, right? But I feel like, yes, he's an inflated version of what kind of managers can be. Still, there are managers out there that are like that that that can't seem to take feedback like they do take it so personally or they don't even give the space to, you know, receive that feedback, so having those stand-ups having that transparency to be like here's an opportunity to you know to fill in a feedback form anonymously right because I think people aren't always comfortable with sharing feedback so directly where they're associated with it because they worry about I guess the impact it will have on their own personal kind of journey.

Nick Warner

I mean, he's got a lot of potential there. I think the blueprints in place for someone that does celebrate diversity and inclusion, there is a vast array of awards handed out and recognition given. There's just no personal touch to it, no sensitivity, so it absolutely touches on D&I and the importance of it perhaps, but totally given the event that took place, no consideration was kind of given to how people were going to react to it on you know person by person basis and he crossed many boundaries there's a lot of discomfort amongst all of the employees and just to you know to go back to professionalism as a leader he didn't maintain any level of that at all. 

It wasn't even a friendly, supportive environment in the early days of that in the early moments of that ceremony. It was an absolute cringe-fest. 

Sara Chandran

Yeah honestly it's the amount of cringing that goes on when you watch this show it's ridiculous you're just like oh god is he really going to do this is he really going to say that and there's like there's a bit there where he does something really offensive he's like mimicking South Asian, Southeast Asian people and you can see there's like guests in this chili restaurant just eating their meal and they're just looking at him like what the hell is this like can you imagine if someone did that today in a restaurant like the company would be in turmoil, rightfully so but Michael just seems to get away with it and like you know Dunder Mifflin gets away you know with no no repercussions for Michael's behavior.

Nick Warner

Yeah totally I mean he does need to or if this were a real-life scenario that there would be a serious emergency need for turning those mistakes into a learning opportunity and self-reflection because there are several errors made well, there's several errors made in every single episode but that one in particular he would need to kind of own up to the fact that he's perhaps closed-minded and a lot of the categories that he dished out were perhaps acceptable in old money but certainly not in today's day and age. Apologies you know that can go a long way to fixing any grievance someone may have with you just acknowledging it in the first place and then implement that change afterwards any feedback given use it to make meaningful adjustments and create better recognition strategies and as a trainer you know invest in those training managers that can influence office culture improve communication and yeah again recognition but legitimate recognition for the task that's been at hand not for the world's longest engagement whatever it might be. 

Sara Chandran

Yeah it's not not great and I love what you said about apologies because you know sometimes we feel like you know oh it's all gone wrong and and you know you hear this in the kind of DEI space of someone makes a mistake and it becomes this that whole song and dance about it but I really think sometimes a simple apology and just holding your hands up and saying you know I messed up here I said something I shouldn't have is completely inappropriate and I apologize and I'll you know work to do better next time and I feel like you know we kind of over complicate the process because people start tripping up on themselves and you know getting like those knee-jerk reactions and becoming self-defense like becoming really defensive about it which Michael has a tendency to do. 

Nick Warner

Totally, yeah I mean, there's this frequent conflict in the episodes, and if you know, from a manager's perspective, you wouldn't want that to fester, of course within the, within the office environment, needs to be addressed quickly and in kind of an impartial way as well you can sort of tell Michael has got his favourites in a work capacity if not in a personal capacity and to construct and maintain a healthy work environment you would have to sort of deal with any conflict in a lot more swift manner than he did when you know Dwight found that was it graffiti in the toilet and in the ladies room 

Sara Chandran

and then Dwight's reaction is like uh this is the ladies room so you need to have some class and then basically prevent the women from being able to use the bathroom and I'm just like Dwight I love Dwight honestly I think he's one of my favorite characters because he's just he is just so ridiculous he just takes things so literally well.

Nick Warner

Yeah yeah it doesn't balance any personal professional boundary despite you know it's ironic really is uh is that sort of end goal is it's totally odd with how he goes about, completing the task. 

Sara Chandran

Yeah and I think the thing I always see and recognize with Dwight is everything that he does is to gain the recognition of Michael you know he is he just does everything that he can to be noticed and to get that praise so it's like this weird father-son dynamic with them even though they're like the same age but I think that's like  quite a lot of people we kind of you know in the workplace we might look to somebody as like okay they are someone to you know I would really value their recognition and their praise more so than anybody else and then yeah did not quite get so I think you know as a manager or as a colleague just picking up on those things because those those moments where you can just say like good work good job can really change and transform that person's you know spirit and morale like at the end of the episode when  Michael said you know good work to Dwight he's like oh you know you know he was thinking that he was praising him for helping Pam who's fallen off her seat drunk but actually he was like no all your audio work and it was just like there's such a lovely fulfilling moment for Dwight in that in that particular moment.

Nick Warner

Yeah, and bucks the trend slightly because most of it all of it really are marginalized or the team members with the Dundies that were then handed out  so so totally it means the world to most people, but certain people, it means absolutely everything too, that inclusive recognition for you know just saying good job or anything where you can kind of set them apart or point out where they've set themselves apart from the from the the chaff if you like  so ensuring that recognition is inclusive but also respectful and aligning with any company values which they don't seem to be any that set out in Dunder Mifflin and avoid awards that could potentially offend marginalized team members, celebrate diversity yes and we kind of touched on that slightly that he does have Michael Scott have the framework to to do that but it's about making everyone feel valued for you know unique contributions and you could put Dwight in that bracket because very much get the impression that the office however flawed he might be in himself could not function without his keeno mentality

Sara Chandran

that is one way to put it: keeno mentality. that is Dwight in a nutshell yeah i think you just put that so beautifully because even like in in the office space i don't i feel like you know michael spends so much of his time in his own office and i feel like you know when he does come out it's to irritate people it's not actually to understand like what people are feeling what they're working on what's going on for them and i think you know with managers it's about taking that time out to get to know your colleagues get to know your employees because yeah as you say then when it comes to these awards you can actually put something together meaningfully that actually makes someone feel good about the work that they've been putting and they're like okay i'm seen i'm heard i'm valued and here's an award to show that

I think you know awards are only one part of it because i think you know they're very sweet and they're nice to have those kind of  i guess workplace culture events to try and you know boost morale but sometimes we need to just give people pay rises we need to pay them equitably we need to recognize them with promotions and progression and routes like that  sometimes a little trophy with a bowling ball person is probably not like the best thing 

Nick Warner

yeah no for sure i mean  yeah employee development should be kind of put at the forefront really it's not always possible for promotion and you certainly can't ever promote  everyone but if you sort of give the idea and create the culture for ongoing development and training and managers should invest in employees professional growth to enhance their skills that will go some way to providing more job satisfaction and perhaps even overall productivity amongst the the workforce as well  michael scott erodes a lot of trust that might be put into it because he he's got very erratic behavior, at the best of times and i i certainly wouldn't look up to him as a as a trust figure

Sara Chandran

i totally i totally agree i if i had some issues or i had like a willingness to be promoted i probably wouldn't go to michael scott because i don't genuinely think he would have my back and actually do the work to get me that promotion i feel like he'd be that person that goes yeah yeah i'll work on that and then just brush it aside and then you check in with them and it's like so where is this training course and where is this progression route and where's all these development plans and it's like oh yeah yeah i haven't got the time but i'll i'll promise i'll get round to it and it just goes on like that for so long and then people just end up leaving obviously we don't leave the office because then we'd probably have like two episodes because everyone would have left by now  but yeah so like in the real world that's when we you know they say people don't leave workplaces they leave bad managers and i think basic you know in essence what happens a lot of the time 

Nick Warner

Very true and i've had managers in the past not necessarily affecting me personally but i've witnessed it where people have been held back because the manager sees that person as indispensable to them and kind of holds back their career because either they don't want to go about training up someone else to  to reach the same standards as the person that wants to leave or if they you know can't be bothered to fill the gap in them in themselves so it's a it's a real sort of toxic trait when your focus is as a leader anyway when your focus isn't on the development of the team or recognition beyond like an awards ceremony i mean this is an annual ceremony in the don days but the the actual culture of recognition should be taking place throughout the year day to day acknowledgement of hard work amongst the team there should be a habit for a manager to express and that generally anyway would in turn create a more positive and encouraging environment his leadership style massively impacts anything you would perhaps call culture in that team his uh his behavior sets the tone his actions  his attitude it's what shapes the the the hostile nature of that award ceremony when it kicks off it kind of saves the day towards the end but it's more through lock than judgment really 

Sara Chandran

i feel like every episode it like ends up being okay and i'm like how how is this to suddenly become really like rosy and perfect and everyone is friends again and everything is great i'm just like there's something here that i don't quite understand 

Nick Warner

Honestly it's only that way 

Sara Chandran

but i feel like you know even though it's kind of rosy at the end even when people come back in the office yes they've had that one nice moment and everyone's kind of happy but they then go back into the office and they think they're the same as they were before and it's just like okay here we go again and you just kind of yeah try and navigate that space 

Nick Warner

however good a time people might have had in the end that is going to be a hot gossip around the water cooler people aren't going to forget it and it's like a self-fulfilling prophecy of a downward spiral really when it comes to having a negative energy in the workplace

Sara Chandran

I find it really interesting when you were saying yes the Dundie's are once a year and it makes me think about like 360s and like when you have your end of year feedback and you get that kind of development and constructive criticism hopefully from your colleagues and managers and things like that about things that you can develop and improve but there's this like thing called recency bias where we actually only remember information from like a few weeks before that moment so actually when we get those 360 pieces of feedback or we have that yearly check-in or whatever it is actually the feedback and the insights that you get from your manager or whoever's giving you that feedback is likely to only have been from the last few weeks or even a couple of months so actually you're not getting a representative view of the entire year so as you said you need to build that habit within the organization where there are checkpoints throughout the year that you give feedback and you give development you give training because you know there's no one point in the year where it's like okay this is the moment because actually it needs to be embedded throughout the entire journey of an employee 

Nick Warner

yeah yeah totally and that comes down to sort of clear expectations it's totally set from leadership from the from the top down that kind of culture turning mistakes into learning opportunities and that regular feedback so if anyone is falling down in a certain area they can make the efforts to then go and invest in training or in self-development and that kind of thing the team dynamics affected as well if it's skewered one was that bit i didn't have any clue about that was it conscious bias 

Sara Chandran

recency bias yeah

Nick Warner

I wasn't aware of that at all if you want to sort of see how an overall team environment is shaped by picking something from statistics or observations from you know 12 months ago it's not going to go anyway to helping someone improve themselves so there's a communication challenge there that needs to be addressed needs to be clear and effective communication in the workplace to highlight any instances that do need to be fixed and you know I don't think Dunder Mifflin succeeds in engaging its employees in that way. 

Sara Chandran

I think you know  when i think about kind of going back again i i keep going back and forwards with this because there's just so much to like talk about when it comes to the Scranton office and Michael Scott  but yeah like in terms of that once a year and then feedback and making it part of the culture  i i had a previous episode  where we talked about how Pam  gets involved with or finds out about the internship about graphic design and so she's like interested in in taking that up and i feel like because Michael doesn't take the effort to recognize or take time to understand and learn more about his employees he doesn't know to put them forward for these opportunities and so i think that's a really good question forward for these opportunities because he just doesn't see that as part of him and what he should do which i think every manager should you know you're supposed to there empower and uplift your employees and put them forward for things because not always  people don't always put themselves forward for things because there's like imposter syndrome or nervousness and all kinds of things that kind of become barriers to putting yourself forward and you might not even know these things exist right and i feel like had you know Michael been more professional and had really clear understanding you know he probably would have given Pam an award about you know the most creative person and actually giving that recognition for a really key skill that she has that she has a lot of love for and i think those things can be like a way to propel someone to their next kind of journey in the workplace 

Nick Warner

Yea i mean i feel like it doesn't really regularly assess the team or if they are regularly assess the information if it's passed to him he's not really taking it on board he doesn't have a good gauge of morale amongst the team at all i don't really get the impression that he perhaps knows the team well that personally it's not well organized or inclusive when he does create these events and they just go on to create awkward awkward moments amongst everyone he does have quite like you know we mentioned the good heart earlier the the fact that he's not a lost cause when it comes to being an inclusive leader and embracing that diversity he's also got a very resilient side to him so he's constantly faced with these scenarios that that do go wrong and although he comes out smelling the roses a lot of the time he can't get away from the fact that he demonstrates massive resilience to anything that's sort of thrown his way even when it doesn't go well when the awards are kind of dead in the water and he's looking like he's about to burst into tears and the day is ultimately saved he does demonstrate you know the value of perseverance and although not necessarily learning from his mistakes he's he's always striving to see the job through although it's only really to his personal taste without really taking anyone else's opinion on board so you don't have to kind of give him a bit of credit for that but when it comes to the the nitty gritty and getting to know the team really well i don't think he's perhaps got a leg to stand on there no he definitely hasn't  

Sara Chandran

I love i love that you have that  we're able to give that perspective because i sometimes i like oh you know you know yes he's a good heart and you can't help but love him because of kind of his the reason why he's doing these things because ultimately he just wants to be liked  he just wants to be friends with his clients but you're so right he does have  i don't know where he gets it from but this resilience and this ability to kind of take those negative moments you know take it on the chin and just kind of like move forward which i think is quite a good skill to have as a manager because you know there are moments throughout the entire series where like there's talks of like redundancies and the scranton branch closing down and all of these kind of things and i feel like he he gives a level of transparency that maybe the the head office doesn't give and i think that's so valuable to the team and i think they always know that yes michael probably isn't the most suitable and uh you know great manager but actually you know at his essence he is human and he will say it as it is and i think you always know that you know you get you get the truth somewhat with with michael

Nick Warner

Yeah sure I mean he's quite  adaptable in himself, for himself and he can survive a lot himself he wouldn't say he's necessarily you know encouraging much innovation he's not very flexible when it comes to any agreements his employees might have and he doesn't show much willingness to involve the culture of the office or a way of doing things but for he himself yeah he's uh he's very adaptable to situations and because he sort of does wear his heart on his sleeve although he doesn't really recognize much personal information about individual team members you can sort of still see him as quite an honest person because he doesn't change tact he's always unapologetically himself and it wouldn't stoke sort of an A* internal working culture but it would at least let you know where you kind of stood with the boss even if his head is in the cloud you certainly know it's there it's nothing's masked at all 

Sara Chandran

yeah absolutely uh  this has been wonderful  we are coming up towards the end is there anything else you want to mention or say about the Dundie's Michael or anything else to do with the the Dunder Mifflin world 

Nick Warner

Well, I think it provides valuable insight into nuances that have to be taken on board when it comes to employee recognition, the importance of tailoring approaches to individuals and recognizing what's offensive and what you can get away with and that it's a delicate balance and it's also a delicate balance between humour and professionalism in the workplace and reflect on mistakes as well and make improvements learn from mistakes the only way to go about doing that and managers are often the ones that can learn the most valuable lessons by fostering that positive environment and building stronger relationships with their teams. 

Sara Chandran

Beautiful. I love that wrap-up. Thank you to everybody who was listening. I hope you enjoyed this podcast episode with Nick. I certainly did. If you have any questions or want us to look at anything in particular in terms of episodes and future topics, do let us know. We'll have all the information in the description. We look forward to seeing you in our next episode. Thanks, everyone.