by John Comer

My good friend and colleague Bob Platt married a lady from the land of Diana (but he got the real princess). Living with a lovely Limey all these years has trained Bob to appreciate the dry wit that characterizes British humor, like the following actual excerpts from Royal Navy and Marine officer fitness reports.

“His men would follow him anywhere, but only out of curiosity,” one report opined. Another warned, “I would not breed from this officer.” And yet another said, “He would be out of his depth in a car park puddle.”

“This young lady has delusions of adequacy,” her superior noted. “She sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them.”

The most classic British barb, however, showed up in one report’s summation: “This man is depriving a village somewhere of an idiot.”

Merry old England doesn’t have a corner on dorks, of course. Some American job applicants quoted in Fortune Magazine did not need a British superior to gaff them. They did a thorough job on themselves.

On his resume one applicant wrote, “Failed bar exam with relatively high grades.” Another bragged, “Wholly responsible for two (2) failed financial institutions.” Yet another preened, “As indicted, I have over five years of analyzing investments.”

In the blank that said “Marital status” one fellow answered, “Often,” and in the blank that said “Children” he responded, “Various.”

Another job-seeker pled, “Please dont (sic) miscontrue my 14 jobs as job-hopping. I have never quit a job.” One prospective secretary actually wrote, “I have lurnt Word Perfect 6.0 computor and spreadsheet progroms.” Now there’s a keeper!

Jesus said, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.” It appears that some of them are also a bit dense. Unemployment insurance might be a cheap price to pay to keep these winners out of the marketplace.

Could it be that the fellow who wrote Ecclesiastes worked in Personnel? He’s the cynic who said, “The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned.”

But to all of us, both to bosses and to the bossed, he offered wise advice, “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might.”