Manage Expectations

People constantly assess you by comparing who you are today to their general expectation of you. If, for example, you are a generally happy person, then when you are having a bad day people will notice. If, on the other hand, you are surly most of the time, then people won’t see any difference if you have an off day.

You can use this phenomenon to your advantage by slowly but regularly lowering people’s expectations and then, suddenly and irregularly, raising them. If you are never clean shaven, for example, then eventually people will come to expect that of you. On the rare occasions that you do shave, you will receive comments like “Hello handsome”, “Who’s the new guy?” and “Seriously, show me some ID or leave immediately”. Don’t do it too often, though, as you will begin to create new expectations.

Coffee Machine Milk

Don’t you hate it when you go to get yourself a coffee and the coffee machine tells you that the milk container is empty? It’s such a hassle to put new milk in the container. Well, perhaps this is the perfect time to change your milk preference! If the full cream container is in the coffee machine then trade it over to low-fat (haven’t you always wanted to lose some weight?). If there’s low-fat in there, then switch it over to full cream (after all, you want milk in your coffee, not water, right?). That way, it’s a simple switch of the containers, and some other poor sap will have to refill it when then want a coffee.

Curtain

Remember that the curtain in the café area should only be closed under the following circumstances:

• When there is a function in the café area
• When there is a board meeting in the Lorne Room
• When pretending you are Kermit the Frog in the Muppet Show.