Ah, The Office. A show we all know and love. Nine glorious seasons of Dwight and Jim bickering, Michael launching inappropriate insults (mostly at Toby), and Angela silently stewing in the corner or just talking about her cats.

If there’s one thing we can all agree on, it’s that The Office was the most inefficient workplace of all time. Most of the time, Michael was completely stifling any productivity or professionalism with crazy games, bizarre training sessions, or out-of-office extravaganzas. But what The Office lacked in productivity, it made up for in entertainment. 

But still, as someone who works for a productivity tool, I can’t help but look at The Office as a massive missed opportunity for implementation of a project management software. The time they would save? Years. The increase in professionalism and organization? It would have been groundbreaking. And because of that, I’ve decided to break down a few ways that Hive, the project management tool that powers teams at Starbucks, Google, Comcast and Toyota, could’ve totally changed the game at Dunder Mifflin.

Meeting Notes for Michael’s Useless Meetings

First and foremost, the thing that needed to be done away with immediately at Dunder Mifflin were Michael’s useless meetings. His version of a “meeting” was just an excuse to further befriend Pam or Jim, or collaborate with Dwight on some strange, but hilarious, scheme. If Dunder Mifflin had Hive, everyone could’ve used Meeting Notes to list out talking points for the meeting beforehand, so they could’ve easily determined if the meeting was even worth having. Documents could have easily been shared via Hive before the meeting to prep, and after the meeting, each action item could then be assigned to various office members for increased efficiency. 

Flexible Project Views for Every Team

It’s no secret that most of the characters at Dunder Mifflin’s Scranton branch were very different from each other. They had wildly different personalities, work styles, and energies that they brought to each episode. Luckily for them, Hive has tons of different project views. Angela could view a set of accounting tasks in Table View, which mimics the look of an Excel spreadsheet, Pam could keep track of her tasks (and freelance design projects) in Kanban View, Jim could keep a close eye on his (and Dwight’s) tasks in Team View, and Michael could utilize Portfolio View to take a macro-level look at projects across the company.

Hive Projects for Conflict Reports

In the second season, there’s an episode called “Conflict Resolution” where Michael discovers files of conflicts recorded between employees that have been lost in the shuffle. These conflicts, because they were lost, had been misplaced, and he aims to solve all of them with conflict resolution tactics. If Dunder Mifflin had Hive, each conflict could’ve easily been tracked as an action card by HR in a private project (only available to the HR team). From there, individual sub-tasks could’ve been assigned to collect data on or solve each individual conflict, instead of letting them pile up for months.

Hive’s Salesforce Integration > Michael Hiding Sales Leads

We all know that Michael Scott isn’t the most organized or process-driven individual. Except for when it comes to events like the Dundies. This is especially true when he starts working with Sabre and decides to physical hide the sales leads that come down the pipeline. What ensues is a wild goose chase for physical documentation of the leads, which end up getting lost. If Michael had Hive, this could’ve all been solved with Hive’s Salesforce integration. A few clicks, and he could set up tracking for opened or closed new business to populate directly in Hive with a corresponding project or action card.

Hive Forms to Avoid the Health Care Debacle

In this episode from season one, Dwight is in charge of choosing Dunder Mifflin’s new benefits plan. He makes everyone write down their ailments on a physical sheet of paper. Jim and Pam take this golden opportunity to make up fake diseases to prank and confuse Dwight. Dwight then locks Jim in a conference room and tries to fire him. However, this could’ve all been streamlined with Hive Forms. Dwight could simply send out an easy-to-fill-out form via Hive, and collect all responses in a project for review. 

Proofing and Approvals for Michael’s Dunder Mifflin Commercial

In the “Local Ad” episode from the fourth season, Michael creates a ridiculous Dunder Mifflin commercial for the Scranton branch. There’s back and forth with corporate about using a consultant to create the ad, which Michael refuses. He ends up creating his own self-funded and self-shot ad, which he debuts for the team. To help streamline this process, Michael could’ve used Hive’s Proofing and Approval feature. With Proofing, each office member could review and add comments on one video file, which would make them easy to consolidate and sift through (Michael probably wouldn’t have used any of the feedback, but at least it would’ve been available).

Project Management Tool > Client Gift Baskets

In season 4, when Ryan is promoted and comes back to the Scranton branch trying to improve technology across the organization, Michael and Dwight are convinced that giving gift baskets will bring back dissatisfied customers. It doesn’t work, and the ex-customers proclaim that they won’t return to Dunder Mifflin until they improve their technology and processes. If they’d had a tool like Hive, or considered implementing Hive during this time, they could’ve won their old customers back with a promise of new technology and workflows.

Hive Analytics So Jim & Michael Wouldn’t Argue Over Raises

In season 6, when Jim is promoted at Scranton, Dunder Mifflin’s leadership lets Jim and Michael know that every employee will not be getting their desired raise. Obviously, chaos ensues as they try to figure out which employees should be given the raises. They both argue about who would get the raise, with Jim ultimately deciding that sales should be awarded the raise. All of this nonsense could’ve been avoided if they’d been tracking each employees workload, tasks completed and goals in Hive with Hive Analytics. With a customized analytics dashboard for leadership, it would be much easier to gauge performance and contribution to the whole organization on an individual level.

Overall, it’s obvious that Dunder Mifflin as a whole, especially the Scranton branch, could’ve benefitted from Hive. But while it would’ve helped massively, there is something to be said about the chaotic disarray and it’s ability to entertain. Do you have any other favorite moments from The Office? Leave them in the comments below.