The Demotivation Industry

FastCompany has an interesting piece on the de-motivation company, Despair.com. The folks that poke fun at the motivational industry in corporate America:

For Kersten, the heart of the problem lies in what he calls the "noble employee myth," a product of what he dryly calls the "motivational educational-industrial" -- or "ME-I" -- complex. The central elements of this myth are that employees are good and productive labor is natural for them. Management is responsible for creating the circumstances that unleash employee motivation and should be blamed when employees fail. Profits should not be pursued at the expense of employee satisfaction. On it goes -- the very kinds of things you'd expect to read if Jean-Jacques Rousseau happened to be unleashed in an HR department.

[big snip]

"I thought work could be redemptive and healing. But after dealing with problem after problem, it was clear that it would have been better if the people who were unhelpable had been fired. Which, eventually, I had to do. They were too immature. Later, I ran into some of them at a company reunion. They thanked me. They said it was the best thing that could have happened to them at the time."