The Office"Business Ethics"
Original Air Date: October 9, 2008
PG Ignacio - Sr. Staff Writer
pg@thetwocentscorp.com
The Scranton Branch of Dunder Mifflin is required to go through Business Ethics Training. Where better to hold this training then the most popular gathering place of the entire office – the conference room. Great things happen in the conference room – Diversity Day, choosing a health plan, Purses for Sale, a boring Christmas Party, getting to know Diwali, a co-worker’s forced coming-out session, holding a pizza delivery boy hostage, conflict resolution, exit interviews, and the ever popular brainstorming sessions.
But on Ethics Day, there is a new facilitator and her name is Holly Flax.
Continue reading...
[Photo: nbc.com]
Posts
The Office
ReplyDelete"Business Ethics"
Original Air Date: October 9, 2008
PG Ignacio - Sr. Staff Writer
pg@thetwocentscorp.com
The Scranton Branch of Dunder Mifflin is required to go through Ethics Training. Where better to hold this training then the most popular gathering place of the entire office – the conference room. Great things happen in the conference room – Diversity Day, choosing a health plan, Purses for Sale, a boring Christmas Party, getting to know Diwali, a co-worker’s forced coming-out session, holding a pizza delivery boy hostage, conflict resolution, exit interviews, and the ever popular brainstorming sessions.
But on Ethics Day, there is a new facilitator and her name is Holly Flax.
The branch is required to have a brief training on ethics due to the past actions of Ryan Howard when he was employed at corporate. If you missed last week’s premiere, Ryan has returned to Scranton as a temp, replacing Pam as the receptionist. Well, Michael gets bored with the scripted ethics training, as if Toby were still here leading it, so he jumps in and tries to get some excitement going.
Unfortunately this leads to confessions of unethical behavior in the work place. It begins with confessions that are rather harmless, like downloading pirated music to the company computer. Michael even admits when he discovered YouTube he watched it for 5 days straight in his office – accomplishing no work at all. Harmless, right? Until we get to Meredith’s confession. She has been sleeping with the rep from Hammermil in exchange for discount on paper and Outback Steakhouse gift cards.
Holly is appalled and insists to Michael that this must be reported to corporate. Michael turns the situation into a chance to go out to lunch with Holly to talk it over. We find Holly and Michael having their first disagreement as friends and co-workers. Holly believes Meredith’s actions should lead to termination. Michael thinks she should just be punished, but not let go. Michael refers to the team as a family, but Holly insists it is just a work place. She instantly became Toby in Michael’s eyes.
It’s all up to corporate now. Well turns out corporate doesn’t really care. They actually like that they’re getting discounting and are more concerned that Holly didn’t complete the required Ethics training for the office. When she has to try to get the office back in the conference room at a quarter ‘til quitting time, who helps round up the troops? Michael Scott, of course – friendship back on track.
The side story going on was a great. A classic Jim versus Dwight antics at its best. Dwight made a point in ethics training that everyone steals company time except himself. So what better way to turn it back on him? Jim uses a stop watch to time everything Dwight does that is not related to work. It all starts with timing his yawn. Jim even eggs Dwight into personal conversation by purposely incorrectly describing the show Battlestar Galactica to Andy. Later in the episode we find Dwight actually beating Jim at his own game by never leaving his desk…ever…not even to use the bathroom…yes, this is the second time we see Dwight use a container that was once occupied by soda. In the end, Jim does catch Dwight away from his desk for 19 minutes and 4 seconds. Where was Dwight? He must’ve gotten beeped on his pager and had to attend to some personal business in the warehouse.
Jim: “You’re so unethical.”
Dwight: (looking at camera) “Yes, I am.”
I thought this was a great episode. Anytime the conference room is involved and we see the entire involvement of the office, it turns out to be very entertaining. The Jim timing Dwight bit was genius. It will be interesting to see how the Holly and Michael relationship continues to unfold. I’m kind of glad we didn’t see Jan, Toby, or Pam being flirted with at school. The opening was very good with Jim announcing their engagement to the entire office. I loved Dwight’s quip – “She’s not a virgin.”
What did you think of this week’s episode? Leave your TwoCents…try not to do it on company time though.
I'm totally doing this on company time.
ReplyDeleteLast night's episode was FANTASTIC! There were many great lines ("Honey, have you had sirloin steak?") and it was interesting not having Pam around.
Between this show, Earl and the SNL Weekend Update Thursday, it was a good night for TV.
I loved it. It was sad to see Michael and Holly have a hard time, but really, I doubt anyone is surprised about Meridith's actions. I loved Dwight's look to the camera after the 19 minute break. It was pretty sinister.
ReplyDelete