A screed about Internal Business Culture Dysfunction.

I gave this a lot of thought, but most people I gave it to said it sailed over their heads like a well thrown frisbee. I know I'll have better luck here.



Epidemic Corporate Culture Dysfunction

For any number of reasons that we will not delve into here, the modern corporate culture in management is rapidly disintegrating to the level of persecution neurosis. This differs from paranoia, in that no one is out to "get" anyone specifically, and besides, this appears not to be the psychological defect displayed. Instead, you have something one might call "Negative Team Building," similar to the recruiting structure of street gangs. Managers and Supervisors are assembling cults of personality, to the detriment of work and the debasement of the worker; a true modern tragedy.

The proof of this behavior is as subtle to the participants as weeding your lawn with hand grenades, even though no one will admit it is actually happening. This should not come as a surprise, one of the first symptoms of dysfunctional behavior being denial. Essentially, there are three methods the abusive supervisor uses for collecting the Faithful into one's "gang," all of them currently in common use.

The first is direct intimidation. The strongest evidence of this is shown in the phrase, "If you don't like working for me you can…." Sometimes this is put as "If you don't like working HERE..." but this is smoke and mirrors. It's still a call for personal support couched in the form of a threat. The closest comparisons to other insecurity dementia are the "fer us or agin us," and "love it or leave it." Hostility seldom breeds true loyalty, but this is not what the abusive supervisor wants anyway. They're looking for cannon fodder.

The next stratum of negative team building regards "spies." When the information trail (especially personal information) within the work center begins to resemble a KGB "Satrap," there is trouble in River City. The worst thing to tell a worker, particularly a productive one, is that "you are being watched." Efficiency immediately suffers as the effected worker starts wasting time looking around to see who is keeping an eye on them. This pathology actually works both ways, as the abusive supervisor makes the odd assumption this "covering my behind" behavior has the effect of an added level of supervision; nothing could be farther from the truth.

The third, secrecy, has always been used to keep subordinates off balance but the massive abuse of secrecy is the third leg of the "Troika." Need to know is never efficient; open systems, as in computer networks, is the classic example. When people are told they don't need information, the internal question is "Why not?" and in the dysfunctional structure, never is an adequate answer given. All this accomplishes is the worker now keeps their secrets, the abusive manager must dig up more spies, the worker finds better ways to keep secrets…etcetera, ad nauseum.

Dissatisfaction is the mildest result of these dysfunctional strategies, with impaired efficiency and lost work ethic close behind. The most tragic result is that the independently functioning creative worker relies on the support of the supervisor and interrelationship with co-workers; this dynamic is now wrecked, maybe on a permanent basis. In attempting to trap flies in this web of intrigue, management has instead snared their most valuable butterflies, a true tragedy.

The rare individual that still functions at peak output under these circumstances has their own psychological issues of co-dependency and misplaced loyalty. This is possibly the most tragic circumstance of all, in that the betrayal of this employee involves abuse of the most vulnerable. When this individual finally cracks, the results are felt from the organization down the personal acquaintances of the employee. This sort of individual is the person whose reaction is never immediate, always delayed, and usually extreme, such as beating their child, cheating on a spouse, drinking heavily, or doing bodily harm to themselves or others.

Aside from this person and the myriad of other employees is another common victim of the debacle who is hard to feel sympathetic toward, but who is equally debased and abused: the "spy" doing the dirty work of the abuser. If this individual is performing under threat, their actions are indeed pitiable, but this is seldom the case. Some spies feel they are "covering their own behind," and while this is sad, it is not the most common form of the phenomenon: most spies fill this function because they enjoy it. The abusive supervisor only has to identify the potential, and the spy usually volunteers their services.

In summary, while a person in a position of authority may feel threatened, the ethic inherent in the position demands a higher level of honesty and commitment to the subordinate. Now, more than any other time in the history of modern business, this relationship is viewed as optional, and fair game for exploitation. This is a truly sad state of affairs

I'm living this in both my jobs. My co-workers and I have gone from caring about our jobs to malign neglect and are moving to outright hostility towards our game-playing, egocentric managers-sad state of affairs.

In many situations, I think you're spot-on, and one observation I'd add is that this would seem to be a matter of 'trickle-down dysfunctional politics.' In other words, if a company's 'actual culture' operates on a shoddy ethical foundation, how else would one expect its workers to think they should behave? If you stand back, it just looks like the culture of secrecy, insubordination and dishonest dealings of the CEO eventually soak all the way down to the rank and file, and everybody thinks his duty is to screw or be screwed. Both employers and employees seem to have the attitude, anymore, that nobody owes any loyalty to anybody else. After all,any given job could be outsourced or repurposed -- if they rename your job, they can hire somebody for less money or just ship it overseas.

I don't know where it's going, either. Dysfunctional politics like you describe generally lead to production drops, because people are, as you note, spending all their time playing mind games with each other instead of doing their jobs. They do it because they no longer feel secure, and there's no cohesion within the company, or adherence to any positive ethical structure; and the ethical structure of the actual behavior, as opposed to the 'public relations' many companies disseminate, degrades. The fish rots from the head down, as many here have been saying about the administration.

Yeah, it does sound like you're doing that -- using Org Psych terms and observations to apply to the 'big role model in the sky.' When lying and cheating (and getting away with it) become the standard of success for the 'CEO President,' rather than quantifiable measures of production or success, how else might the rank and file behave?

Very interesting, and something I've caught myself doing since I finished the class.

From the Reagan years to the present day, the downward spiral of personal integrity has been an inverse reflection of the increasing wealth of the American Aristocracy.

Aristocracy can be a "good thing" if "noblese oblige" still holds sway; the new ethic is "I got mine, get yours" and if yours conflicts with mine, NO QUARTER and NO PRISONERS.

I am no longer surprised by the hatred and cruelty shown by the human race. There was a study done a few years back where one subject was supposedly hooked up to electrodes, and another on the other side of a wall had their hands on the controls. The Controller was urged to up the voltage, and the Victim was urged (silently; they were in on the test) to scream, plead, and eventually fall silent as if unconscious or dead. The Controller, almost to a man, WILLINGLY upped the voltage at the urging of the test conductor, even far into the lethal range: all it took was an authority figure telling them to do it. Most seemed to get a "charge" out of it, so to speak.

The human race is lined up, waiting their turn to throw the switch which causes another human agony.

and I agree, we have the capacity to go pretty damned low. Growing populations, diminishing resources. It could get ugly on planet Earth if we don't pull our collective head out of our collective ass.

Then devising new ways to force compliance is a natural outcome. It is simply a case of whichever company adopts these stances becomes more efficient thus gaining and advantage over other corporations.

Its a very easily understood evolutionary process. The trouble is of course that evolution does not know where it is going. It could easily be heading for a dead end. Resulting in a system collapse too great for it to find a corrective path to take.

Another problem is that the reason for using the corporate entity at first was the advantages it offered our society. It was the tamed beast. But it has evolved and changed much over the years. It no longer serves us as it did in the beginning. In its constant need to increase profits it has eaten into whatever benefits it offered the society in the first place. This is where the majority of profit taking is occurring these days.

There seems to be a need for a shift from allowing evolutionary cultural forces to run our systems to taking control of them. Our own cultural system underwent such a transformation about 500 years ago when we took control back from the social institutions of our culture.

We created a new social entity in the form of the corporation and allowed its structures to build our economy with its own evolutionary process. It has grown to resemble the feudal lords of the Dark Ages. Complete with its own doctrine (freetrade) to back it claims of dominance. It is time again for us to take responsibility for a social construct within our society and cleave its ties to control. We cannot allow these forces to control us. We must take responsibility for our own future.

...I saw this at my prior employer. They brought someone in whose philosophy was "divide and conquer"

I was one of many gone inside of 9 months after.

JM