Postscript

A few blogs back, I was opining on the merits of being mean and powerful (i.e., rich).

I implied that there were basically two groups of people in the workforce: Nice Guys and Mean Bastards. I should correct the record:
There is a gamut of other people with whom one comes in contact whose dominant characteristic is neither mean nor nice. This includes the inept, stupid, lazy, unimaginative, people with no sense of humor, sheep, people who take a job because it has a good pension plan, and chickens.

All the people who match these descriptions can be expected to behave badly when the chips are down. You cannot count on any of them, because they will sacrifice your friendship if they believe that the relationship jeopardizes their own job security. Not all of them are nasty brutish and short, but it seems to help.

The tragedy of this story is, of course, that most of us spend the majority of our waking existence working at some sort of job. Day in and day out we go to the office or plant. We spend our energies trying to get something done as a group, despite the divisive tactics employed by weak or wrongheaded management.

Loyalty, once considered a premium attribute, has fallen into disrepute. Hellhole management does not want your loyalty these days, just your obeisance. Management's loyalty to the workforce does not exist. That edge of the loyalty sword disappeared during the massive layoffs and outsourcings of the past decade, plus the restructuring of pension guarantees. In the extreme cases - such as Enron and Worldcomm - we see the dark side of capitalism, where a few greedy and powerful princes can ruin the fortunes and disrupt the lives of millions of people.

This is not to say that we - the rank and file worker types - are perfect. No, we have plenty of foibles, frauds, secrets and schemes up our collective bargaining sleeves. We steal office supplies, take long lunch breaks, fudge our expense reports, surf the net while we are on the clock, and some of us even take naps during bathroom breaks.

I suppose these are merely the whinings of an idealist, who thinks he would have become richer and more powerful if the key factors for success in business included being a mensch instead of a schmuck.