I find it ironic as companies search for talent to fill roles in their organizations they tout a culture of innovation and risk taking. It amuses me that leadership espouses these principles, but the reality is often a culture of conformity. We hire for cultural fit more than looking for individuality. We want to find people who believe the same things we believe, and act the way we want them to act. What most organizations want more than anything else is people that will fit in and not question the most recent management fad implemented in their companies. Gone are the minuscule privacy afforded by the cubicle and in its place we now have the open office. Note that anyone that actually did any real work would know that open offices are a joke.

Now this is awesome, sitting right across from someone all day. 

It is no small miracle that employee’s search for solitude to work in a conference room or god forbid working at home. My guess is that any company that summons its workers to come to the office each day is losing anywhere from 25% to 50% in productivity and on top of that they are pissing off the workforce. Brilliant!

I predict that this conformity imposed by many employers will drive away the most intelligent people to somewhere else. Where will these individualist land; that is difficult to know. There is certainly a trend towards people leaving large corporations and striking out on their own, becoming self employed, but not everyone is inclined to do so. Is it possible that there are some intelligent enterprises that can allow an employee be an individual and work when and where they are most productive? Maybe but I wouldn’t look to an employer that has more than 1,000 employees and in most cases around 500 or less.

Asking people to conform to every rule or adhere mindlessly to every stupid process does have ramifications. Let’s just say you throw lots of money at your people so that they feel they really can’t leave because the golden handcuffs have them immobilized. The dirty little secret is that the primary incentive for them is financial, and the quality of the work suffers as the employee becomes increasingly resentful. Again brilliant!

Instead of a team of inspired individuals you now have a pack of financially driven robots that follow every command. Think of it, you got what you wanted, all your people fit in, follow your processes, and believe what you believe. One little problem is that all  this conformity and culture fit has left you with a workforce of zombies where the only differences are gender or ethnicity. Good luck being innovative or dodging the next bullet that the business world has just around the corner.

If every day you have to hold your tongue, swallow hard, and kiss the ass of some moron then good. You now have a reason to do something better with your life. Quit fucking yourself over; you have one life and you don’t need to spend it subjugating yourself to someone or someplace that tries to turn you into something you are not.

Think about it.

Namaste