YOU KNOW YOU'VE BEEN MANAGING CHANGE FOR TOO LONG WHEN. . .
Carol Kinsey Goman

You ask your waiter what the restaurant's core competencies are.

You decide to re-org your friends into "cross-functional teams."

You refer to your date as a "pilot project."

You prepare for a date by developing a list of "critical success measures."

You can spell paradigm.

You actually know what a paradigm is.

You write executive summaries of your love letters.

Your valentines have bullet points.

You worry about putting the right "spin" on your wedding invitations.

You refer to your marriage as "the merger."

You celebrate your wedding anniversary by conducting a performance review.

You believe you never face problems in life - just "opportunities for improvement and learning."

You refer to your family picnic as the "offsite team-building event."

You begin to believe there really is a difference between reengineering,

downsizing, rightsizing, and firing people.

You start to think of adultery as "benchmarking."

You refer to family members as "associates."

You think that the dog's refusal to obey means he's in denial.

You give constructive feedback to your goldfish.

You create your grocery list as a powerpoint presentation.

You begin every sentence with "Since nothing remains constant except change..."

You refer to a conversation with your neighbor's two-year-old as a "brainstorming session."

You ask your spouse to tell the kids to behave, and you think of it as "cascade communication."

You refer to your optometrist's eye chart as the "vision statement."

You call your 96-year-old grandmother a "Luddite."

You're certain that the consultant you hired just said something insightful.
You think of Dilbert as a whinny little change-resistor.