A software engineer, hardware engineer, and departmental manager were on their way to a meeting in Switzerland.
They were driving down a steep mountain road when suddenly the brakes failed. The car careened out of control, bouncing off guardrails until it miraculously ground to a scraping halt along the mountainside. The occupants of the car were unhurt, but they had a problem. They were stuck halfway down the mountain in a car with no brakes.
"I know," said the manager. "Let's have a meeting, propose a Vision, formulate a Mission Statement, define some Goals, and through a process of continuous improvement, find a solution to the Critical Problems and we'll be on our way."
"No," said the hardware engineer. "I've got my Swiss army knife with me. I can strip down the car's braking system, isolate the fault, fix it, and we'll be on our way."
"Wait," said the software engineer. "Before we do anything, shouldn't we push the car back to the top of the mountain and see if it happens again?"
barr012 - 13 years ago
The CIA had an opening for an assassin. After all of the background checks, interviews, and tests wer done there were three finalists —
two men and one woman. For the final test, the CIA agents took one of the men to a large metal door and handed him a gun>”We must know that you will follow your instructions, no matter what the circumstances. Inside this room you will find your wife sitting in a chair. You have to kill her.” The first man said, “You can’t be serious.I could never shoot my wife.” The agent replies, “Then you’re not the right man for this job.”
The second man was given the same instructions. He took the gun and went into the room. All was quiet for about five minutes. Then the agent came out with tears in his eyes. “I tried, but I can’t kill my wife.” The agent replies, “You don’t have what it takes. Take your wife and go home.” Finally, it was the woman’s turn. Only she was told to kill her husband. She took the gun and went into the room. Shots were heard, one shot after another. They heard screaming, crashing, banging on the wall. After a few minutes, all was quiet. The door opened slowly and there stood the woman. She wiped the sweat from her brow and said, “You guys didn’t tell me the gun was loaded with blanks. I had to beat him to death with the chair!”