But the Dolphins tee has a problem with word quality as well as quantity. One actual line reads: “I am disciplined, physically and mentally tough, and proficient in my position tasks and drills.” Someone forgot to localize the text of a Japanese video game. Proficient? Are the Dolphins a football team or a standardized testing company? (In fairness, the U.S. Army credo also uses “proficient,” which is why the Marine Corps credo makes fun of it.) The Dolphins should have edited their T-shirt down to its essence:
MIAMI DOLPHINS: A COMMITMENT TO PROFICIENCY
Season tickets are still available!
The manifesto written on the Dolphins tee is familiar to anyone versed in corporate or educationist jargon. It’s a mission statement. We all know who writes mission statements: the ineffectual middle managers who need make-work assignments to keep them out of the actual decision structure. When the assistant curriculum supervisor tries to shanghai a teacher onto the mission statement committee, the proper response is, “So sorry, but that meets on the day I teach the Burmese refugees how to dial 9-1-1.” The committee spends hours laboring over each and every word while real work is done elsewhere. “Should we say highest quality or highest possible quality? Or maybe just proficiency? Maybe we should form a subcommittee to determine what language similar companies used, then reconvene next week.”
The worst part of it all is that the people writing the mission statement have no idea that they are sidelined low-level administrators with little more than a title and a paycheck. They think they’re doing real work, when really they’re being quietly ignored until the company can find a quiet way to get rid of them.
Except that Cameron Wake was in charge of the Dolphins credo, not Joe Philbin. Wake knows how to sack quarterbacks, but if he really wants to cause some pain, he should show them his PowerPoints.
Article Appeared @http://miketanier.sportsonearthblog.com/i-am-a-miami-dolphin-why-are-you-staring-at-my-chest/