Overlord Academy

Every prospective Overlord needs an alarm system. This system is not just about keeping the would be hordes from entering your abode, but also to help keep in the minions, prisoners, and guests of state. Never pay a monitoring service! They charge insane monthly amounts for doing absolutely nothing. All you need is the right equipment, some simple software, and you can monitor the system yourself! The Overlord Academy is currently in the process of revamping it’s alarm system. Soon I will be able to arm, disarm, panic button whatever, from the ease of any arm chair in the world. This is in thanks to the state of the art network and VPN system as well as custom in house alarm management software.

секцииJust a general FYI. The move of the Academy is finished, and is being considered a success. Despite the caverns of “junk” which had to be relocated, the move went off with only minor glitches.

As I have worked tirelessly to flesh out plans for World Domination, I have been forced to work and participate in what others have termed the real world. I hate the real world, it really is not much fun. I must admit, though, that many of the ideas that you read here have a basis in what happens there. Today’s lesson is no different.

Every position in the corporate world is given a particular segment of work to accomplish. As work is being accomplished and pushed out of the queue, new work is being pushed in. Your finished work is becoming new work for someone else, and so on. As this process continues, it becomes obvious rather quickly, that there needs to be some sort of organization as well as a great deal of communication.

Usually, organization will work itself out, sometimes requiring a push here and there, but communication never seems to be handled properly. There are many different forms of communication, in person, email, IM, forms, software and even the ever so helpful documentation. Every one of these forms has inherent flaws. Either you cannot be spread out, or not enough detail, or too tedious. The list can really go on and on.

As the Evil Overlord you need to always know what is going on with your organization. You do not always need to know the nitty-gritty details, although sometimes you might. Meaning, of course, that you need information reported to you in a dynamic fashion. How do we do this?

First and foremost, you need to establish a procedure. Each level in the organization needs to report specific information in specific directions. Sometimes this information is identical, sometimes it is tailored, but it should all be entered into the same ultimate system to allow for your audit drill downs, and quick summaries. Multiple systems become unwanted baggage, and will quickly become ignored by your subordinates.

For team communications, in person, email, IM, and simple documentation all can work. Simply make sure this information is captured and entered (email and IM can be connected to a system and automated.) Moving from one team to another may require documentation but should happen in the same system. As each task, project and bug is finished, the single application is noted. Making it simple for anyone at anytime to quickly see what is being worked on, how much has been completed, where hang-ups are occurring, who to get rid of, who to keep, and most importantly for you the Evil Overlord, who are your potential back-stabbers.

Communication is critical. Your success or failure is tightly coupled with this simple, yet crucial, concept.

Conventions are great. You gather thousands of people who are normally competing for the same business opportunity, give a few speeches, provide some training, throw in a bit of a store, and soon they will all be working for you. A few of them may become offended and join the other guy, but still, conventions are great!
Currently, the company I am working for, as my day job, is holding a convention for all of our associates. Every year they try to outdo the previous year. Because of the economic times, and the desire to be profitable, the allowed budget was cut a bit. So obviously, some things had to be cut. Unfortunately, one of the things cut seems to be good sense.

When we hold the Overlord Convention, there are a few things which I promise will be followed. Some of this list includes the following:

1 Do not inform IT of your plans for network, computers, security, etc. an hour before it needs to be setup.
2 Name badges are great, it allows interaction to be personalized. Make sure it is easy to identify staff from the masses at a simple glance. Helps security out a lot!
3 Have the store layout and all displays pre-planned out. This greatly facilitates setting up the store, and also keeps murderous thoughts out of the employees’ minds.
4 Properly identify and lock down the employee break area. Non employees are not welcome and hurt the morale of those you depend upon.
5 Make sure all staff members know the company planned events, as well as other events which may be happening in the area. We want our staff to appear intelligent, not like a gathering of country bumpkins.
6 Make sure all areas are properly identified. If you want attendees to visit an area, it helps to be able to find said area.
7 Provide adequate training for staff members. If they are expected to demonstrate something they should know how to use it. Hands on experience is probably a good thing.
8 The biggest mistake I have seen is one person being in charge of too many things and not sharing that information with those who could help. If people are aware of something needing to be setup beforehand, then all components, tools, and man power can be pre-arranged.
9 Small things will always creep up that need to be addressed. This is to be expected. Do not shun help. You will accomplish more if you would spend a few minutes to explain the issue then if you were to just do it yourself, ignoring other problems which may be occurring.

All this being said, let me just point out one small fact. Although conventions are great and important, I sure do hate working at them.

As you gain power and notoriety, you will begin to notice that you have more friends and family than you had previously known. Some may be legitimate, but for the most part, these are charlatans. These charlatans are looking for a free ride, and willing to get it any way they can, even if it means supporting a corrupt maniacal dictator like yourself. Since there is no greater enemy than family spurned, you will be forced to accept some of these freeloaders into official positions in your empire.

While these freeloaders are looking for an easy way through life, you are looking for someone who can get the job done. Using the manipulation pattern, and some carefully crafted questionnaire forms, you can easily determine the talents of your supposed friends and family. Trick them into accepting positions that they just cannot stand to see not done. Trick them into doing actual work. This way, they will think they are protected from your murderous rage, and you get something done for relatively cheap. They do not need to know what the going salary is for a particular job.

Something that the freeloaders will not understand, and which you can use to your advantage, is that you have no qualms whatsoever in sending close family members to the rack, or imprisoning them, or any other countless evil things to do. You are after all the Evil Overlord. If one of them starts to get a big head, deflate it. Easy.

That being said, I am always looking for a new court jester.

I am fairly certain that most of society knows what a care package is. Especially in the sense of a VIP gift bag. The Evil Overlord needs to implement a Do Not Care Package system. I am sure once implemented it will quickly become more popular than the care package ever was. Instead of only using for special events, the Do Not Care Package can be used at any time one wished to convey their disappointment, disgust or even just their innate vileness.

The true beauty of this new system of showing your true feelings is that you can time these gifts to arrive at the perfect time to cause the recipient further embarrassment or other uncomfortable situations. For example, at a couple’s 50 year anniversary, you could send the wife compromising photographs of her husband. You of course want him to have a better understanding of where he ranks with you. (For you slower learners, you have a problem with the husband not the wife.)

The really neat thing with this new system is that it truly can be used whenever. You do not need a special reason. You could send the Do Not Care Packages to your heart content, or save them all for that one special moment to capitalize on their pain and anguish.

Perfect for the Evil Overlord!

Halloween is hands down the best thing to come from the Pagan beliefs of old. As Halloween is done with, and as the kids all suffer from sugar overdose, let us ponder how Halloween can be used in our empire. First of all, Halloween allows even the most timid to break out of their shell and act the fool. Granted, as shells are broken dangerous ideas are born, but in the eventual sugar overdose, those ideas are soon forgotten in the sugar rush blur. We do not really care about that, we care about increasing our control over the masses. The biggest benefit comes from the costumes. Very quickly you will find those with the most imaginative minds. The most creative, the most likely to come up with fresh ideas. As Overlord you can choose, find this new talent and make use of them, or let them remain anonymous, quietly plotting your down fall.

Hold annual costume contests. Offer large prizes to entice participation. Even offer smaller prizes to all who dress up, sort of like giving them a bone. They will think you are letting them have fun, but you will be secretly taking notes. Use Halloween to your advantage. Exploit your workers. Strengthen your control over them. Bring the kids to the office, give them candy. Now the workers think their families are being taken care of. Major moral boost and in the big picture, cost you very little.

Having put much thought into how best to convert the younger generations to your way of thinking, coupled with a forced trip to a cartoon based theme park in southern California, an Overlord Theme Park would be a perfect tool. Walt realized what he had in California, but recognized flaws in the initial design. He started plans for a better design in Florida, but died before completion. This is for the best, since his heirs have screwed up so badly, that they will never be able achieve what we will hope to achieve. 

Building upon Walt’s plans, we will do things differently. For starters, we will have the luxury to build wherever we want, because as Overlord, we do not care what we destroy to build what we want. We want to build where good weather is almost guaranteed, and getting to and from does not present new problems. Southern California would be ideal, minus all the liberals and tree huggers, and the extreme overcrowding. Nevada is too hot and dry. Utah gets snow and despite being a desert, a lot of rain. But manageable in southern Utah. Arizona is hot, dry, but has potential in more mountainous areas. So there are some good locations, wide open, and close to all ready established freeways.  We follow the plans for that place in Florida, one giant basement under the entire park. Access ways throughout the park allow for character movement without being seen, as well as keeping an eye on potential troublemakers. All utilities can be piped around in this area as well making future expansion easy and more flexible. Garbage cleanup is a must and can be gathered through vacuum tubes (central vac) also in this basement area. Storage safe from the elements can also be located here. In essence, we have a very useful space, completely out of the site of the public. Use your imagination. 

Visible to the public, outside and inside the park, very careful planning and effort needs to go into landscaping, building placement, shopping, and attractions. Quick and easy access needs to be provided which still maintains absolute security (your life is worth it right?) and minimal loss to potential income. Get the people in and out fast with no hidden surprises, while collecting money. All attractions need to be fun, with minimal wait times. People hate waiting. All attractions need to be based on a character, story, or other form of entertainment, making it easier for the public to become attached. Attached people have a hard time giving something up. This translates into more money and brain washing opportunities. Although we absolutely despise tree huggers and the whole hippie movement, we do want lots of trees, and other plant life. If nothing else, it provides shade, and other cooling factors. If you had to stand in line, would you rather be standing in the middle of an asphalt square, or under a tree? 

If you feel that a city sized park is what you want, be sure to provide free transportation around the park. If the back of the park never gets visited because it is too far away, you have wasted time, money, and overcrowded other parts of the park. Making a bad experience for attendees, and a disillusionment in your abilities as Evil Overlord. 

Finally, change is good. If a ride gets old or stale, don’t hang onto it for sentimental reasons. Continually give the park a face lift. New rides and attractions equate to potentially new visitors. Large, permanent, even trendy structures may seem like good ideas, but eventually the newness wears off, and you find yourself stuck with an eyesore with very limited usefulness. Learn from Walt’s mistakes, and admire his ideas. If used properly, generations will find themselves endeared to you instead of rebelling against you.

Layoffs in any form can be very detrimental to the Overlord’s empire. Layoffs, which include firings, and mutual separations, harm moral since friends and acquaintances are leaving, and creates a potential hole in security because of knowledge now walking freely in the open.

The fix for this is really simple, and yet current corporations cannot bring themselves to implementing the proper course of action. The proper course to follow when needing to terminate someone’s employment is to simply terminate the individual. You transfer them into a “new” department, and then, when ties to others in the company have been severed, you do the typical Evil Overlord thing, and shoot them. You can do something elaborate, send them on a training somewhere and have the plane crash, maybe make some money from the insurance issues, but that gets kind of messy.

This does not address the true issue though, and that is the problem with your hiring practices. If there is a people conflict, odds are your managers do not know how to get along with their employees, or simply do not care. And very likely, one or the other involved never should have been hired in the first place.

Granted, you should work on, and solve the underlining problems, but let us face it, you chose to be an Evil Overlord not because of you understanding heart, but because of your ruthless, bloodthirsty nature. So go ahead and terminate those employees however you see fit. Anyone who complains, shoot them as well.

The problem with taking vacations as Evil Overlord, is that no matter how well prepared you leave the office, some problem will arise fifteen minutes after you leave. Instead of remaining focus on regular duties, everyone focuses on this new issue. The odds are, had you remained in the office, you would have deemed the issue unimportant and nothing would have been done anyways. Instead you have the entire employed force working on a stupid issue and not accomplishing anything else. In the end, solving the one problem will only bring up thirty more problems, and that is what you will have to look forward to at the end of your vacation. No work done, and new disasters to have to take care of.

While away, someone will always need to be able to contact you, but if you are not careful, your vacation will quickly turn into not a vacation. If you truly cannot trust your underlings to think for themselves, and to obey orders, set aside no more than one hour each morning. At the end of the hour, cut all communication. You need to relax, you have too much on your shoulders, and if you do not relax, you are going to be wound up tighter than any politician working on a pet project.

It is true, when you return to the office, you will have a huge back log of emails, phone messages, and paper documents to go through, but if you planned accordingly, you will be just fine. If you cannot plan for, or anticipate this potential mess, you are better off not taking a vacation. In truth, you are better off not pursuing a career of Evil Overlord. You are a pansy, worse than the french, and should just turn back now.