NBC's hit sitcom The Office is about many things, but if it is about one thing more than anything else, it's Regional Manager Michael's Scott's journey to becoming a better boss and a better person. Michael starts out in season one as a pretty unbearable boss. He's constantly harassing his employees, making inappropriate jokes, basically doing anything he can to get attention. But the truth is that, behind his need for attention is actually a desperate need for friendship and love.
Slowly, throughout the course of the show, he begins to learn (with a little help from his employees) what he can do to earn it. It was slow going, and he slipped up a few times over seven seasons, but overall it's always a joy to reach his last episode and see how much he's grown.
10 Regressed: "Gay Witch Hunt"
Michael has a lot of little victories in season 2, and his meetings even start to be a little less offensive, until he finds out Oscar is gay. In this case, as in many others later in the show, Michael tries so hard to prove that he is accepting, but he ends up being more offensive than he would have been if he had just left things alone.
Not only does he out Oscar to the entire office, he also forces a "symbolic" kiss on him, leading Dunder Mifflin to settle with Oscar for a lot of money and a three month paid vacation so that he didn't sue. This was a pretty big backpedal in progress on Michael's part.
9 Better Boss: "Sexual Harassment"
Michael begins this episode by forwarding inappropriate emails and making all of his employees look at them, and joking around with his obnoxious and foul friend Packer, making light of a sexual harassment case at corporate. He assumes that when the company's lawyers are coming, they're coming to yell at him, but when Jan reminds him that he is upper management and the lawyer is to protect him, he changes his tune.
After that, he goes outside and tells Packer to behave himself, and defends Phyllis instead of making a joke about her. He goes a little overboard, but it's still a huge moment of growth for him.
8 Regressed: "Dunder Mifflin Infinity"
Michael is more than excited to have his old buddy Ryan in Jan's old position, until he arrives at Dunder Mifflin and starts talking about big technology changes. Michael freaks out in the name of "ageism," goes on a tirade and tries to get old customers back by giving them gift baskets.
When that doesn't work, he drives his car into a lake, and then goes back and yells at one of the ex-customers to give the gift basket back. Not exactly stellar management. It also doesn't help that he hit Meredith with his car the episode before this one.
7 Better Boss: "Did I Stutter?"
Michael spends a lot of this episode trying to avoid Stanley after he disrespects him and is insubordinate in front of the whole office in a meeting. When he is forced to confront the fact that he has to say something, at first he fake fires Stanley. Finally, when that doesn't work, he talks to Stanley "mano y mano" and asks him why he's acting this way.
He finishes the episode by putting his foot down and telling Stanley, point blank, that he doesn't have to agree with him, but he does need to respect his authority in front of the other employees. Stanley agrees, making this one of the first times Michael has successfully settled a conflict in the office, instead of trying to delegate to Dwight or Jim.
6 Regressed: "Frame Toby"
Michael does a lot of backpedaling in the middle seasons. When Toby comes back to replace Holly, Michael kind of snaps, and in an attempt to get him out of Dunder Mifflin for good, he tries to frame him for drug possession. He does this by buying what he thinks is marijuana from the Vance Refrigeration guys, sticking it in Toby's desk and then calling the cops.
Now, as Michael says in the episode, "Since when is it illegal to put Caprese salad anywhere?" And it's not! Still, the sentiment behind it is definitely not "World's Best Boss" behavior.
5 Better Boss: "Michael Scott Paper Company"
Needless to day, Michael does a lot of growing as a boss when he leaves Dunder Mifflin to start his own company with Pam and Ryan. From realizing David Wallace was treating him disrespectfully and quitting, to getting his team and business model together, to being smart and cool under pressure and demanding their jobs in the buyback, he grows as a boss far more in these episodes than in almost any others in the series.
He may have spent a lot of his time throwing cheese puffs at his coworkers, but he still made a big enough dent in Dunder Mifflin's business that they had to buy them back, so make of that what you will.
4 Regressed: "The Meeting"
Jim made great strides as manager of his own company, but as soon as it seems his position as boss is being threatened, he quickly backtracks. When Jim has a private meeting with David Wallace, it seems like Michael thinks he might be out for his job. So when Wallace asks what Michael thinks about Jim's leadership skills, Michael turns negative and nearly ruins Jim's plan to get them both a promotion.
In the end, it ends up working out for both of them, as they become co-managers, but not trusting Jim is a huge step backward for Michael.
3 Better Boss: "Murder"
In this episode, the whole office is panicking that Dunder Mifflin might go under. Even Jim begins hyper-focusing on work and treating everything like it's going normally. So when Michael decides to play a game with the office, at first Jim yells at him, but Michael yells back, "They need this game, Jim! Just let us have this stupid little game!" Jim then realizes that Michael isn't being crazy: he's doing it to keep everyone calm.
Michael grows in this episode, not only in managing the office and standing up for his practices, but in being able to work in tandem with Jim in the end.
2 Regressed: "Costume Contest"
In this episode, Michael backtracks pretty far, not only in belittling Darryl's good ideas and not forwarding them to corporate, but also by freaking out when Darryl goes over his head anyway and having a meltdown in front of everyone - while dressed as Darryl. He lets it get into his head so much that he yells at Kevin just for telling Gabe about Lady Gaga dance moves before him (which Kevin solemnly vows not to do again).
To Michael's credit, before he knows Darryl went over his head, he does apologize and try to make it right, so this still isn't as hard a backslide as it could have been.
1 Better Boss: "Michael's Final Episodes"
Michael's final episodes on The Office are what really solidify his character development, both as a person and a boss. From "Threat Level Midnight" where he finally learns to laugh at himself and "Todd Packer" where he finally lets his crass, rude "friend" Packer go to "Goodbye, Michael," where he gives a genuine heartfelt goodbye to everyone in the office and skips his own goodbye party to avoid making everyone sad about him - these are the starkest contrasts to the character he began the show as: one who would never give up a chance to be the center of attention.
Over seven seasons on The Office, Michael grew from a person everybody loved to hate, to one that everybody couldn't help but love. It wasn't easy growth for him, but anyone on the show, or fan, would agree that that kind of work is 100 percent worth it.
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