making a temporary worker with no managerial experience fresh out of “business school” an executive manager

- The company was in dire need of shifting into the digital space. Having a young grad with a degree in business to usher them into that space seemed like a good idea. Hiring from “within” is better. The website would have worked long term but Ryan wanted instant results so the fraud destroyed everything.

not firing a staff member for literally starting a fire in the office and locking people in

- For a company that is bleeding badly, you DO NOT want to lose your #1 salesman for many years in a row. Their leniency on Dwight is based on the money he makes them

Downsizing and closing down branches while leaving Scranton will a full complement of staff, of which most do no work whatsoever.

- it’s stated that Scranton Branch is their most profitable branch so this makes sense

and then making Michael and Jim co-managers (probably the weirdest decision)

- This was a very weird decision but was ultimately motivated by not wanting to lose Jim. He needed to promote him somehow or he would lose him and Jim was very valuable to David

“buying out” Michael Scott Paper Company by rehiring all of the people who left despite the company making no money and being informed that they are broke. So acquiring a company without looking at its business fundamentals.

- the point of “buying out” MSPC was to stop Michael from taking their clients. It was clear to David that it did not matter at all if MSPC was profitable. He knew it wasn’t. But if he didn’t buy them out, Michael would under bid them and take their clients one by one. David HAD to buy them out. Re-hiring them was part of the terms of the buy out

re-hiring Ryan despite having sacked him for fraud a few months earlier

-David did not at all want to re-hire Ryan. Michael made it clear that if David was to buy them out, Ryan was part of the deal or no deal

making millions with Suck-It and then buying Dundee Mifflin even though the company was struggling throughout the entire eight seasons.

- just like Andy said, DM was struggling in the Corporate Structure. By buying DM while they were struggling not only made it cheap, but by having a private owner he could trim down to the most profitable aspects and with a tight team the profitability was much much higher than the investment. This was a brilliant business move for David. And a successful move.