Rules are meant to be a set of guidelines to be followed so that it makes life easy for decision makers or those in charge .
We have a interesting so called rule in our office. The staff is not allowed to take copies of any document on the office copy machine. Well i do understand the logic behind this decision. The interesting part is not the rule but how the rule is actually implemented. Our staff is basically divided into 3 major parts.
- The Gods also called the Management.
- The semi gods also known as the HR,Accounts,Administration.
- Last and the least, the mere mortals also know as the software guys.
Lets assume a scenario where in a copies of a personal document needs to be submitted for tax purposes
The Gods make the rules so they never face such problems. The semi gods usually help them in such trivial tasks and therefore the Gods never realise that such problem exists. Since the semi gods actually implement the rules there is no problem for them also after all they are the gods. The mortals as usual are the ones who get screwed if they find themselves in such a situation. They usually have 2 options available with them
- Go to the nearest local copy machine shop which is minimum 20 minutes from the office and which also would cost him 20-30 times the cost of the copy he wanted to make.
- Plead to the semi gods that they please forgive this grave mistake this time and let them have a copy on that divine machine.
More interesting is the fact that printer copies are free. So anybody who is especially in love with the Print button on his machine will know that he can print any number of copies without any restrictions. With the amount of cartridge and paper being wasted I bet they could arrange for 5 copy machines for the staff .
As usual the GODS don’t seem to care about such trivial things. The semi gods CANT because there is no special RULE written for it .
As long as the “copy machine rule” exists the local copy machine shop would be in good business and his kids will be able to enroll into a good college.
May be I should tell him to send a Thank You card to my office gods 🙂 .