Are you tired of having happy employees? Is workplace satisfaction just a politically correct idea made-up by hippies and witches? Are you sick of hearing about life-work balance?
Join millions of bad management #success_stories with my exclusive method. With only 7 simple steps you'll make sure no one is smiling while you’re in charge, and your team is irreversibly demotivated.
Remember - if they're not crying on the daily - you're not doing it right.
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Bulletproof method #1: Do not acknowledge efforts
It is imperative that you remain completely indifferent to the efforts of your staff when they do their job, and especially if they go above and beyond. Do not acknowledge any work done, as it may create a sense of happiness or pride in what they do. Instead, try to answer emails only when it serves your goals, and once your employee(s) achieved what you requested, abstain from words like “thank you”, “well done”, or “good job”. In fact, we recommend radio silence for at least 7 – 10 working days after a big assignment has been completed to your satisfaction.
If you are still tempted to email anyone back, try getting angry instead: “Well done? How about shut up and move to the next assignment, you ungrateful little screw in the system. You should be thankful your salary is paid every month”.
You could consider toning it down (uh, political correctness, am I right?) and write something along the lines of "This is literally just part of your job". Either way, it works like a charm.
Bulletproof method #2: Never give compliments
When an employee does exceptional work, for example saving you time, effort, perhaps money, or elevating revenues, the company’s reputation or even your own position, you mustn’t give him or her any compliments.
Remember that compliments make employees cocky and full of themselves, thus eventually they’ll stop working so hard to please you. If you absolutely must say something good, make it brief and vague. Make sure your employee(s) always keep wondering how much you appreciate him or her. They may never discover they are doing great work.
Compliments are the enemy of productivity – only demotivated employees will work hard to stay in the game!
Bulletproof method #3: Give 24/7 feedback, but only the negative one
Everyone loves feedback. Create a constant stream of giving feedback, especially about how to do better and where to improve. Create a “feedback culture” in which after every tiny task there is an endless multi-layered scrutiny process of an employee’s improvement potential.
Make sure you only focus on weaknesses, and almost never on strengths.
Create an endless feedback loop on all ranks and never let anyone walk out of a meeting without at least 4 improvement points and a flaming desire to burn the building. To know if you’ve done it right, ask your workers after about a year of employment what his/her strengths are. If they give you a confused lamb eyes and go into a spiral of self-doubt and an abyss of insecurities, you know you’ve succeeded.
Bulletproof method #4: Work only with people who look and think exactly like you
Never hire anyone of the opposite sex, or those with a different tint of skin-color, on your projects or assignments. Make sure you only work with people who look like you, and preferably think like you as well. Avoid diversity in your team at all costs, as it only creates confusion and conflict, mostly in your own brain.
Remember, being inclusive is great because it’s a sexy topic and makes you look modern – however, just because you hired some females and foreigners doesn’t mean you actually need their input in your team. Carry on doing what you've always been doing, and see the prosperity pour in. Make sure you leave employees from marginalized communities in society to fend for themselves inside your organization, and offer no support (and NEVER empathy, it's a jungle and they must kill or be killed). If they do a bad job and eventually leave – it is yet another proof that they were just not cut out for this type of work in the first place. Hey, you did all you could by hiring them. Great success for management for keeping only the top of the line in the firm!
We are aware that some of you may be more modern than others, so for those ones who support diversity and inclusion we suggest to work with people who look a bit different than you, for example wear happy socks or have a different hairstyle, or even gay people and foreigners that have assimilated to what you consider normal society well enough, but - they have to think just like you and make no fuss about being different. Two birds in one strike, you modern leader.
Bulletproof method #5: Create a golden circle around you and play favours
If you followed the advice on the previous point, you will notice that you have created a circle of golden boys that are always picked for the cool assignments. Make sure to play favours and repeatedly choose them for just about anything. In promotion discussions, shamelessly indorse only those people, while casting doubt at those who you never work with and don't really know well (but they looks spooky and their opinions suck). It doesn’t matter that you don’t know what other people’s skills and capabilities are. It only matters if your golden circle are moving further along the organization with you. Ignore all others and make sure they know they are not picked to work with you and they have no chances of winning with you.
Bonus tip: Ignore staff that you don’t like when they walk by, and don’t even nod hello. Make sure they notice your contempt towards them, and feel as if they are not good enough to even be noticed.
Bulletproof method #6: Disregard actual work and only comment on behaviour
Make sure that during interaction with your employees, and of course during the endless feedback cycles, you only discuss employees’ behaviour and not actual contributions in terms of work. For example, if one of the foreigners people you hired talks a lot with their hands, completely disregard the content and only mention that s/he are very emotional and that is inappropriate in the workplace. Any legitimate arguments must be always converted to discussing behaviour and perhaps even appearance at the workplace.
If an employee with a colourful personality shows unfortunate workplace behaviour like having an opinion or emotions (empathy is THE WORST) or being a human being in any capacity other than work-related tasks, make sure they know it's not appropriate. Throw away months of hard work and countless relationship and business value they bring – and only discuss factors such as behaviour, personality and how theirs doesn't quite fit the corporate culture.
Make sure they come out of such talks knowing that the only way they will succeed is if they neatly fit into the box you have prepared for them, and become clones of other employees. That's the business, baby.
Bulletproof method #7: Demand that employees detach from their humanity when entering the workplace
It is a myth that employees are people, too. You must enforce that upon entering a place of business, all emotions and human traits are to be left at the door.
Have you seen an employee cry? Make sure they know it’s completely unprofessional, and that they must go through coaching to resolve their emotional problems.
Has an employee confined in you that they are going through a tough time at home? Make sure you solve their problems immediately by suggesting that “you don’t have to save everyone in your life, people make their own choices”. Wow, thanks! I’m cured! They will say joyfully as they return to their work stations.
The same goes for all activities that do not directly and solely focus on work. See previous point about behaviours that may suggest empathy or compassion to another. Those are behaviours exhibiting weakness and mustn’t be seen.
Final words..
Remember, only a consistent stream of demotivating behaviours will result in the desired effects of hardworking employees that hate their lives. The problem is never you. Using any form of emotional intelligence will sabotage your efforts and may create a happy work environment in which people feel self-assured and competent.
Psychological safety is for the weak!
Want to share your success stories and brilliant ideas?
We can all benefit from sharing knowledge about how to demotivate people. If you have been successful in following these tips, or you are the employee of a manager that has properly demotivated you, share your story!