PART A
Here’s a list of five particularly timeless tips from the Simple Sabotage Field Manual:
Managers and Supervisors: To lower morale and production, be pleasant to inefficient workers; give them undeserved promotions. Discriminate against efficient workers; complain unjustly about their work.
Employees: Work slowly. Think of ways to increase the number of movements needed to do your job: use a light hammer instead of a heavy one; try to make a small wrench do instead of a big one.
Organizations and Conferences: When possible, refer all matters to committees, for “further study and consideration.”
Attempt to make the committees as large and bureaucratic as possible. Hold conferences when there is more critical work to be done.
Telephone: At office, hotel and local telephone switchboards, delay putting calls through, give out wrong numbers, cut people off “accidentally,” or forget to disconnect them so that the line cannot be used again.
Transportation: Make train travel as inconvenient as possible for enemy personnel. Issue two tickets for the same seat on a train in order to set up an “interesting” argument.
PART B
The first section of the document (…) addresses “Organizations and Conferences” — and how to turn them into a “dysfunctional mess”:
— Insist on doing everything through “channels.” Never permit short-cuts to be taken in order to expedite decisions.
— Make “speeches.” Talk as frequently as possible and at great length. Illustrate your “points” by long anecdotes and accounts of personal experiences.
— When possible, refer all matters to committees, for “further study and consideration.” Attempt to make the committee as large as possible — never less than five.
— Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible.
— Haggle over precise wordings of communications, minutes, resolutions.
— Refer back to matters decided upon at the last meeting and attempt to re-open the question of the advisability of that decision.
— Advocate “caution.” Be “reasonable” and urge your fellow-conferees to be “reasonable” and avoid haste which might result in embarrassments or difficulties later on.
In a second section targeted at manager-saboteurs, the guide lists the following tactical moves:
— In making work assignments, always sign out the unimportant jobs first. See that important jobs are assigned to inefficient workers.
— Insist on perfect work in relatively unimportant products; send back for refinishing those which have the least flaw.
— To lower morale and with it, production, be pleasant to inefficient workers; give them undeserved promotions.
— Hold conferences when there is more critical work to be done.
— Multiply the procedures and clearances involved in issuing instructions, paychecks, and so on. See that three people have to approve everything where one would do.
Finally, the guide presents protocol for how saboteur-employees can disrupt enemy operations, too:
— Work slowly.
— Contrive as many interruptions to your work as you can.
— Do your work poorly and blame it on bad tools, machinery, or equipment. Complain that these things are preventing you from doing your job right.
— Never pass on your skill and experience to a new or less skillful worker.
Alex Gomez-Marin 