PHB
The original Pointy-Haired Boss is the fictional manager in the Dilbert comic strip. The phrase pointy-haired boss has acquired a generic usage to refer to incompetent managers. See Dilbert for the original character; this article is about the generic concept.
It is also possible to speak of someone being pointy-haired or having pointy hair, metaphorically meaning that they possess PHB-like traits.
The academic version, a Pointy-Haired Dean (PHD), is remarkably similar.
Traits
Typical traits of a PHB:
- Does not understand what his employees do for a living.
- Enjoys using buzzwords such as "synergy", "leadership", "evangelize", "competency", "collaboration","Empowerment","Quality" , and "team-enhancing", often to escape having to commit or be precise.
- Pretends to understand technology, but is really clueless.
- Easily mesmerized by silver-tongued sales people.
- Decisions seem random or capricious.
- Gross failures of logic, such as holding long meetings to discuss why a project is behind schedule.
- Likes meetings because he/she does not know how to use email properly or does not want his bad decisions committed to writing.
- Steals his employees ideas and presents them as his own, almost always to the same employees
- Is always right.
- You warn him/her to do X or else Y will happen. He doesn't do X. Y happens. You somehow get the blame.
- Doesn't seem to remember anything beyond a month's range.
- Rewards employees based on how well they stroke his/her ego instead of how well they do their job.
Related acronyms
The usage of "PHB" to refer to a character type resembles the usage of "BOFH" and "PFY", both also derived from specific fictional characters. Less closely related is the military term "REMF", which is descriptive rather than a reference to fiction.
