Black Queen's Plan Revealed! Secrets Leaked!

It was recently revealed the the Black Queen's Top Secret Management Handbook was accidentally sent to an obscure cartoonist named Scott Adams. Adams then sold the book to HarperBusiness. HarperBusiness then published the handbook under the title Dogbert's Top Secret Management Handbook. The Black Queen's office denies any knowledge of any kind of management secrets (or any knowledge of management for that matter.) Here are some excerpts from the published handbook so that you can judge for yourself.

From Section 1.1 Acting like a manager
...you will be expected to spend as much as forty hours per week doing management stuff, regardless of how much management is needed. Obviously, unless things are seriously broken, most of what you do will be "filler"

Management Time Fillers

• Renaming the department
• Status Reports (Job descriptions? Strategic Planning?)
• Teamwork exercises
• Office relocations
• Writing mission statements
• Random Organizational changes
• Making view graphs
• Micromanagement

From Section 1.7 Technology Primer for Managers
If you're too lazy to skim technology magazines for good ideas, simple combine any two good concepts , then challenge your staff to make it happen. For example, you could say "Why don't we make all of our electrical outlets digital?" or "Why don't we use SmartyPants Boards for Inventory?"

From Section 1.12 Ways to Avoid Making Decisions

• Form a task force of people who are too busy to meet
• Send employees to find more data
• Lose documents submitted for your approval

From Section 1.14 Leadership
Leadership is also about empty, meaningless expressions. Here are a few you should memorize.

• Work smarter, not harder.
• It's a new paradigm
• It's an opportunity, not a problem.

From Section 2.1 Employee Satisfaction
Employee Satisfaction Alternatives (pick one)
1. Increase salaries
2. Improve the working environment.
3. Do an employee satisfaction survey and ignore the results.
Choice 3 is the correct answer.

As you can see, the Dogbert "handbook" bears an eerie similarity to the management style of the Black Queen. Can you doubt that she wrote the book on this?

Secret Plan Revealed

We recently had a telephone interview with Gold, long known for her brilliant tactical mind and innate logistics ability.* Gold, having time on her hands since being stupidsized by the Black Queen, has discerned the outlines of the Black Queen's plans for the Duchy libraries. To explain the Plan, we have to go into a little history. First, King Hairboy used the Sword of Rightsizing on the Library Queen and her protectoress, the Undisputed Reigning Queen of K-12 Education in the Realm of Arizona. The Diva was assigned to watch over libraries, however, the elimination of the K-12 Queen left a Power Vacuum in the Duchy Castle. The Black Queen moved into vacuum and wrested control of the libraries from the Diva and started her machinations. First it was necessary to eliminate any central library organization, so the Black Queen introduced Strategic Planning to keep Dotland busy for a while. Then she decreed that the librarians could not use the services of Dotland in an attempt to discourage and isolate the librarians. This caused a certain amount of restlessness and the Black Queen was forced to bring in the White Tornado, allow training and make lots of promises, none of which have yet been kept. The White Tornado and the promises have allowed the Black Queen to stall for most of a year. At any sign of organized opposition she brings up Strategic Planning and Job Descriptions again. That brings us to the present. What does Gold think the Black Queen's future moves will be?
The Black Queen has already committed to buying and installing expensive library software without buying any hardware and while banging away at TiTS with the StupidSizing Mace. With non-functioning library software, old hardware, no TiTS support, no Dotland support, the librarians will no longer be able to buy books, catalog books, look up books, check out books or any other library activity. At that point the Black Queen will be able to say "The libraries are no longer being used. That proves that libraries and books are old technology. We need to turn all of these useless libraries into Technology Classrooms and equip them with SmartyPants Boards. Since the libraries are useless, you can eliminate Dotland. With the SmartyPants Boards we will no longer need teachers, either, a clear savings."


*Silver reports that people keep asking her questions like "How many shelves will these 10 boxes of books require?" assuming that since Silver and Gold were inseparable, Silver also has a brilliant logistical mind. Silver's logistical mind can be summed up by telling you that Silver once broke an entire set of expensive, French, heat-tempered, stacking, glass mixing bowls because she thought she could replace the middle bowl of the stack with one hand.

Annals of Technology

A reliable source reports that the Duchy has a new weapon in their arsenal for the continuing battle against knowledge in all forms. The new weapon is the Blunt Intrument of Intercultural Proficiency. The Instrument is currently in the final stages of testing with administrators. Administrators will be bludgeoned in a series of classes at an undisclosed location. If, at the end of the testing period, the administrators are still able to disagree with pronouncements from PD and HR, testing will be extended and the bludgeoning repeated. If the tests are successful, the Instrument will then be used on teachers and staff.

Danger!

Run for your lives! The Duchy is reorganizing. There hasn't been a major reorganization in the Duchy since King Hairboy's bloodbath of several years ago, when King Hairboy wielded the Sword of RightSizing with a mighty hand. Then the Duchy Bored wielded the Sword of RightSizing on King Hairboy. Duke Phfffr hasn't used the Sword the way his predecessor did but he has allowed the Black Queen to borrow the Rack of Strategic Planning. I think she tried to use the Rack on the Diva but the Diva was too fast for her. We know she used the Rack on Dotland, however, the Dots are tough and flexible and the Black Queen was unable to break them either. The Sword is actually a weapon whereas the Rack is an instrument of torture. Does this mean that the Black Queen prefers torture to battle? Let me think. The Black Queen normally operates in secret, says one thing and does another, makes promises she has no intention of keeping. Yes, she probably does prefer torture (or maybe assassination) to outright, open battle.
Currently the whole Duchy is quaking, waiting to see where they will be in the org chart or IF they will be on the org chart. (Aside: I once worked for a company that never fired anyone, they just left your name off of the org chart. If you didn't take the hint, they removed the door from your office (this, boys and girls, was in olden times, before the invention of the Cubicle). If that still wasn't enough of a hint, they moved your desk out into the hall. The next step was probably to move your desk into the lobby, but this was a software company and programmers are easily bored. They usually got tired of the game before the desk to the lobby move. )
So, be ready! Arm yourselves! The reorg is coming!

Followup on rumors

The possible palace coup is looking less coupish. According to an unidentified source, the Black Queen has said, "Rash decisions were made. Those decisions are being rethought." I imagine she looked grim when she said it. Sounds like Her Blackness pulled some strings. I wonder who those strings are attached to?
The robes for the White Tornado's replacement were supposed to be on view starting yesterday and Silver's new robes next week. I didn't see them. Did you?
We are just astonished at that lapse - NOT.
Duchy administrators are still acting like they have a nice little nest egg in some place without extradition and that they will at some point in the future catch the last train out of Dodge and let it all fall down behind them. I'm not quite sure how you accumulate a nice little Duchy nest egg, but the Black Queen is always assuring us that she knows more than we do. Maybe that's one of the things she knows!
As you all may know, Dotland is renowned for Potlucks. The Dotland potluck recipes will now be posted to the Dotland wiki at http://www.dotland.pbwiki.com Check it out.

Rumors!!

Dotland was staggered today by rumors of a coup, a shift in power, a change in the Castle. Is the Black Queen laid low? Can it be true? The Dots kept breaking out in smiles just at the possibility of freedom from tyranny. When will we know for sure? There is supposed to be a new org chart coming soon. Will it tell us? The current org chart doesn't show the Diva and still shows the Laird of TTS even though he packed up his bagpipes and left months ago. Of course, TTS is now TS and that's not shown on the org chart either.

Librarians, physicists and zen masters

I've been thinking about libraries and librarians. Librarian is kind of a multi-purpose word at the moment. For some, a librarian is anyone who works in a library. For others, a librarian is some one with a Master of Library Science. But some states have a test that they say is equivalent to the MLS. And then there are teaching certificates. Nearly all states require children in school to be supervised by someone with a teaching certificate. Some states require the school librarian to provide planning time for the other teachers and therefore require the librarian to have a teaching certificate but not necessarily a library certificate. And some states don't require anything of the librarian. The Duchy insists on the teaching certificate but is kind of fuzzy about the library part of it. And those are just issues about the official definition of a school librarian. I find the Librarian state of mind more interesting than the job definition. In terms of mindset, Librarians have a lot in common with physicists and zen masters. They all believe that there is an underlying order to the universe that can be discovered by study. And they believe that understanding that order is the ultimate goal. I realized this listening to Sage explain that Melvil Dewey didn't need to know about cell phones to have allowed for their existence. You can probably think of some librarians who really don't have a Librarian mindset because they clearly don't believe in an underlying order. And there are clearly people without credentials who have the Librarian mindset. I'm not sure where I'm going with this but maybe we should just people by the content of their mindset rather than the color of their credentials.

The Queen on the couch

What motivates the Black Queen? What makes Queenie run? Part of the reason we have trouble with the Black Queen is lack of understanding. She says she's just cutting central administrative expense. But she doesn't seem to care whether or not the cuts she makes will result in an educational establishment that still functions, i.e. educates. In some ways, it's like she's just going through the motions. Is that the real problem? Is the Black Queen just another Duchy burn out, counting the days to retirement? She certainly doesn't seen to enjoy her job. Clearly the Diva enjoys her job. The White Tornado has a pretty thankless job, attempting to paper over the ruptures caused by the Black Queen's bull-in-the-china-shop approach to management. However, the White Tornado finds ways to enjoy that job. The White Queen seems to enjoy her job. Even Duke Phfffer seems to find paths to job satisfaction. The Black Queen just seems singularly joyless. Long term depression? Serious self-esteem problems? Some have suggested that the Black Queen is extremely power hungry. Why would someone so joyless want more power. She doesn't seem to enjoy the power she now has. Or does she go home at night, disappear into her bedroom, close the door and then chortle hearily over that days exercise of power for the sake of power? Geez, I hope so. Otherwise, I'm going to start feeling sorry for her.

What's in a name

The Black Queen has changed the name of her office again. Now it's CITI which must stand for:
Class of Ignorance, Technocrap, and Idiocy?
Compendium of Immature, Trivial Ideas?
Circle of Idiots, Twits and Incompetents?
Cadre of Inattentive, Totalitarian Incubii?
Cookbook of Insipid, Tasteless, Ideas?
Other suggestions?
I discovered the name change browsing around the Duchy website. I came across the Duchy org chart and noticed that The Diva is not even listed on the org chart, even though the Diva is running OMA (Opening Minds through the Arts), the hottest education program around these days. That led me to think about how every different OMA is to the Duchy dibbled-to-death approach. Even though test scores go up with OMA, what people notice in OMA schools is Joy, Fun, Happiness, Satisfaction. Interestingly enough, if you read the parent responses on the school quality surveys, that's exactly what parents want for their children. Funny how none of those words are ever linked to the Black Queen. Why is the Duchy castle so joyless? We could all send them jokes. Would that help? (Can you even imagine the Black Queen laughing at a joke?)

Rumors r us

Rumors
Silver's new robes are ready for preview this week.
The Bored would meet with Destiny this week.
The Bored would decide about principals this week (that's pals, not ples, clearly the ples kind are in short supply in the Castle)
Facts
The Black Queen is advertising for a staff assistant II (07-2236). If those are Silver's new robes, they're well-disguised.
Destiny wasn't on the agenda, unless it was disguised as a professional development management system.
Neither principals nor principles were on the agenda, although Cultural Proficiency was on the agenda.
Speculation?
Who knows what evil lurks in the heart of the Black Queen? The Shadow do.

The way of the Duchy

I think I'm finally beginning to see how things work. I could not understand why the Black Queen would try so hard to make the Dots get fed up and leave. After all, if she wants to get rid of the Dots, she has the power. And then I realized what would happen if she turned the remaining Dots in Dits like Pink and Navy. In order to make the Dots into Dits, she would have to claim that there was no more work for Dotland. And after claiming there was no work for Dotland it would be extremely embarrassing if the villages complained about work that the Queen said didn't exist not getting done. In addition she wouldn't be able to hire replacement Dots ever. However, if the Dots would quit, take better jobs, retire, whatever, then the Black Queen could say " We are trying very hard to hire replacement Dots but the paperwork just keeps getting lost. " This is an excuse that she could use for years (after all, look at Silver's new robes that still haven't come) and she could use the Dots salary to buy more new tech toys. Probably the SmartyPants Boards could use Hello Kitty holders for their markers and things like that. Unfortunately for the Queen's plans, the Dots are hard to discourage. After all, working in a library is sort of like being in the Marines...the few, the proud, the Librarians and all that.

Breaking up is hard to do

The latest Duchy debacle has reactivated calls for breaking up the Duchy into smaller Duchies. (Is it like Dune where the giant sandworm sort of explodes into millions of little baby sandworms? Do we want a lot of little baby Duchies?) Several proposals have been put forward for breaking up the Duchy. I have my own proposal. I think it could be broken up into two duchies. The first would encompass the area bounded by 10th Street on the North, Park on the West, Broadway on the South, and Fremont on the East. The North boundary is somewhat flexible. It's possible that the North boundary could be moved from 9th to 10th. This would pick up any stragglers and allow space for parking. That new district could be called District Zero. The second Duchy, called District One, would encompass the rest of the current Duchy. I think a lot of Duchy employees would agree that such a reorganization might drastically improve education. All in favor say Aye.
Of course, most people don't realize that the Duchy is already breaking itself up. (It's a process similar to shooting oneself in the foot but involves a chainsaw, the Black Dot Queen, and Site-Based Management.) First they took away central support of library purchasing, meaning that all of the villages are on their own dealing with vendors, po's, requisitions, and other paperwork. Then they took away central hiring of library assistants, meaning that the villages had to figure out for themselves how they were going to talk someone with an associates degree into taking a no benefits 10 hour a week job. Then they took away the money for Summer School meaning that each village has to come up with the money for summer school themselves. So this summer there will probably a lot of disappointed parents. Sooner we will just have a lot of isolated villages and, in the center, The CASTLE, thrashing around like a maddened octopus. Hey, this could work out! After the villages are completely isolated and the Castle is busy with the chainsaw, the villages could band together in a buying co-op to bulk buy library books, hire assistants, and have summer school!

The beat goes on

Duke Phfffr announced in the town crier that the Duchy is being unfairly maligned, that it's hard to hire and retain technical staff in a competitive market place. Like the Laird of TiTS left to take a higher-paying job! If so, why did the opening line of the resignation letter contain the phrase "I have been subjected to outrageous conduct" Admittedly not treating employees like S**T does help in hiring and retaining staff. There is the saying "S**T runs downhill." I always thought that the head of TiTS was above the waterline. Guess I was wrong.
In other news, the Black Queen told the Dots that they would have to move to make room for the Alchemists who were starting a production line to turn FOSS into gold. The Alchemists were quite surprised to hear that. Wonder what the Black Queen told the Alchemists about the Dots?

Discord in the Duchy?

Everybody was talking about yesterday's amazing revelations. Duke Phfffr said that the "turmoil" in the Duchy wouldn't have any impact on the students. Oh, really? If the actions of the Castle denizens have no impact on the students, then what's the excuse for the existence of the Castle? What is the sound of one administrator falling?
One of the Dots said, "Here we are going to work every day, quietly going about our Dotly duties and our administrators are acting like this?!"
And why is the acquisition of a new version of Follay such a BIG SECRET? Let's see, the Laird of TiTS was accused of shady dealings involving procurement. Now the Lime Green Knight and the Black Queen are involved in a purchase that MUST be kept secret. Who exactly are they trying to keep it secret from? Could it possibly be the STATE and FEDERAL investigators they are hoping to keep the secret purchase from?
So many questions and NO ANSWERS.
In other news, the Dots were ordered to rearrange some of their Wednesday afternoon soirees. The upper echelon of the Castle needs to learn about something new called NOVUS Agenda. Without the V, that would be NO US. As Purple said "They are the NO US in ...." Very succinct statement of the Castle philosophy!
And the Dots were told that they MIGHT be moved down the street to the Carpenter's Guild Hall. The Diva wanted the Guild Hall for her troupe but the Castle said that it would be entirely unsuitable for the Diva or anyone else and was going to be sold immediately. (The Diva is now miffed.) Now Her Blackness says the Dots should move there, even though (or maybe because) it has no place for sending and receiving pigeons and no contact with the rest of the Duchy. Even more than pigeon space, the Dots should make sure that there are door handles on the insides of the doors. Remember, private prisons are now legal. Her Blackness also requested new job descriptions from the Dots today, all of the Dots except Silver, that is. White Tornado considers the request a bad omen. Silver considers it harrassment. (Silver is just jealous because the Queen doesn't want her job description.) Last time she asked for job descriptions the Dots provided their normal 4 volume abridged set, with accompanying charts and graphs. This time, the Black Queen was careful to specify that she wanted bullet points only with no long words. Silver was heard to mutter "I'll give her bullet points, all right!"

Distress in the Duchy!!

Wow!! Who knew!!
The Dots thought the Black Queen was out to get them. Who knew she was after TiTS as well! I read the infamous resignation letter and it could have been written by any of us Dots. You go, guy!!
I suppose the villian in TiTS problems might not be Her Blackness but that means that the Duchy has two people that behave like that. Seems statistically unlikely.
Wow!!

Dots and plots

The Interim Director (IDEA) of LibraryLand and Dotland is no longer exactly Interim. IDEA is now demi-permanent...that is officially permanent until the end of the year. In honor of her new status, she has a new title - The White Tornado. After she blows through Dotland, the Dots are all slightly dazed and have a tendency to ask plaintively, "Are we still in Kansas or not?" However, even the White Tornado has her limits. Today the Lime Green Knight voted her off the island. (Silver never even made it on the boat, much less to the island.) Sage is assuming she will be next since she spoke to White T after the vote, apparently violating one of Lime G's rules. Who knew there could be so much drama and intrigue over libraries? In other plots, Sage and Silver have learned that GoG is planning on initiating all new librarians into the mysteries of Follay. Sage and Silver are trying to develop an anti-GoG to protect new librarians, so far unsuccessfully. GoG is, after all, a powerful agent of KAOS (Keep All Order Suspended) It is rumored that books come unshelved and scatter themselves across the floor when GoG walks though a library.