“There's no requirement that jobs be meaningful. If there was, half the country would be unemployed.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“That's the thing you learn about values: they're what people make up to justify what they did.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“Elizabeth is smart, ruthless, and emotionally damaged ... [i]f Elizabeth's brain was a person, it would have scars, tattoos, and be missing one eye.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“You come to work every day but you hardly get to know anyone. I don't even know the names of half the people I see in the elevators. They say the company is a big family, but I don't know them. And even the people I do, like you two, and Elizabeth, and Roger - do I really? I mean, I like you guys, but we only ever talk about work. When I'm out with friends, or at home, I never talk about work. The other day, I tried to explain to my sister why it's such a huge deal that Elizabeth ate Roger's donut, and she thought I was insane. And you know what, I agreed with her. At home I couldn't even think why it mattered. Because I'm a different person at home. When I leave this place at night, I can feel myself changing. Like shifting gears in my head. And you guys don't know that; you just know what I'm like here, which is terrible, because I think I'm better away from work. I don't even like who I am here. Is that just me? Or is everyone different when they come to work? If they are, then what are they really like? How can we ever know? All we know are the Work People.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“Monday morning and there's one less donut than there should be.
Keen observers note the reduced mass straightaway but stay silent, because saying, 'Hey, is that only six donuts?' would betray their donut experience. It's not great for your career to be known as the person who can spot the difference between six and seven donuts at a glance.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“Last month we had to sit through a presentation on eliminating redundancy, and it was a bunch of Power Point slides, plus a guy reading out what was on the slides, and then he gave us all hard copies. I don’t understand these things.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“There are stories — legends, really — of the “steady job.” Old-timers gather graduates around the flickering light of a computer monitor and tell stories of how the company used to be, back when a job was for life, not just for the business cycle. … The graduates snicker. A steady job! They’ve never heard of such a thing.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“Sales is a business of relationships, and you must cultivate customers with tenderness and love, like cabbages in winter, even if the customer is an egomaniacal asshole you want to hit with a shovel.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“It is a building designed by committee: all they have been able to agree on is that it should be rectangular, have windows, and not fall over.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“To succeed in sales, you need skills—not skills entirely consistent with moral integrity and emotional well-being, but skills nevertheless.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“Verstehst du, im Grunde sind doch die Mitarbeiter das Problem. Du zahlst, wenn du sie einstellst, du zahlst, wenn du sie rausschmeißt, und dazwischen muss du sie auch noch bezahlen.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“Warum wollen sie unbedingt, dass ich den Auftrag storniere?' Der Mann klingt auf einmal misstrauisch. 'Seid ihr überbucht?'
'Ich will Ihnen nur helfen. Wirklich, unsere Kurse sind grottenschlecht. Es ist immer die gleiche Teamwork-Botschaft, nur unter verschiedenen Namen verpackt.'
'Ich hab nichts mit Teamwork bestellt. >Leitung von C++-Programmierern im Rahmen terminsensibler Projekte< - das wollte ich.'
'Das ist der Teamwork-Kurs. Und alle anderen sind auch der Teamwork-Kurs!”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“Du weißt doch noch, die Leute beschweren sich immer beim Management, dass ihre Work-Life-Balance nicht mehr stimmt. Also, am nächsten Montag haben sie eine Personalversammlung zu diesem Thema angesetzt. Um acht Uhr früh.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
“Last month we had to sit through a presentation on eliminating redundancy, and it was a bunch of PowerPoint slides, plus a guy reading out what was on the slides, and then he gave us all hard copies.”
― Max Barry, quote from Company
Max Barry
Born place: in Australia
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“I don’t have any chocolate bars right now.”
She pressed her lips together as she placed two small fingers at the bridge of her nose and shook her head as though she had lost all hope for him. Finally, she sighed as though more than put out. Her eyes were twinkling, though, the shadows of fear easing.
“I’ll take you on your word then,” she sighed. “But you really should stock up on chocolate bars. It’s more precious than gold when dealing with kids, ya know.”
― Lora Leigh, quote from Elizabeth's Wolf
“In his suicide note, Kurt Cobain wrote, "It's better to burn out than to fade away." He was quoting a Neil Young song about Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols. When I was twenty-four, I interviewed John Lennon. I asked him about this sentiment, one that pervades rock and roll. He took strong, outraged exception to it. "It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out, " he said. "I worship people who survive. I'll take the living and the healthy.”
― David Sheff, quote from Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction
“It took all of her moral strength not to kick him—just a little—while he was so conveniently at her feet.”
― Karen Hawkins, quote from How to Abduct a Highland Lord
“There are two questions: where have you come from, and where are you going? But the brain doesn't have separate regions for the past and future; only the present is differentiated by the brain.
We split time into three parts. The brain, it seems, splits it twice only: now, and not now.”
― Jeanette Winterson, quote from The Stone Gods
“Love is candy from a stranger, but it's candy you've had before and it probably won't kill you.”
― Daniel Handler, quote from Adverbs
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