Excitement

Plankton is a great place to work but let’s face it: software development is never going to give you the adrenaline rush that is felt by an ambulance driver, fighter pilot or nude weatherman. Here are a few tips to make your office day exciting:

• Corridor Chicken –See how someone reacts if you walk directly towards them in the corridor. If they get out of the way, you win! Let them know this.
• Radio silence – See if you can go a whole day without opening your email. Not even once, not even to check to see if you have a meeting.
• Whiteboard Reservation – Go into a meeting room and write random things on the whiteboard, then, in the top right hand corner, write “Please Leave”. See how long it remains there.
• Mythbusters – Send staff wide emails about “interesting facts” that you know are actually urban legends. See how many people respond. Bonus points if they refer to www.snopes.com

Small Talk

Morning coffee is great, however it can be awkward when you try to make small talk with people you see everyday. Even the standard fall backs of sport, television and the news wear thin after 5 consecutive days. Here are some conversation starters that may help:

“So, tell me exactly what you have done in the four or five waking hours since I last saw you.”

“You know, a friend of my brother’s boss once had a girlfriend whose dad knew someone who worked in a milk factory, and if you’d met that guy you’d think twice about drinking that stuff every day.”

“I don’t want this to sound too forward, but you have really beautiful eyes.”

Feel free to ask

If you have any questions about anything, feel free to ask the person who sits next to you. With the layout of the office, people are almost always sitting next to at least one person, and this company is proud of hiring people who are willing to help. If you are in a seat where you don’t sit next to someone, it’s most likely because you have been deemed to be anti-social, and you should probably just look stuff up on the internet (in your own time).

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.

Hungry and Cold?

If it’s cold and windy outside, then don’t go all the way to the supermarket - or even the corner store - to get yourself a snack. There is a veritable cornucopia of food to be had right here in the Plankton fridges. If you rummage around the back especially, you will find yoghurts and other less definable foodstuffs that I can guarantee no-one will miss. After all a “Best Before” date is really only a guide.