Dear John

Tonight my boss called everyone in on my shift and wished us a Merry Christmas and made a few weak attempts at comedy. Then strategically, he threw in, "We'll be firing some people for poor productivity. They don't even know who they are. We're not telling them until after Christmas." He said all this with a tone that even telling us was almost an afterthought, rather than the sole reason he called the meeting.

What a guy.

My company has a corporate culture based on 2 premises. 1) All employees must be idiots, or they would have found another job by now. 2) Idiots respond only to fear

I wonder if John ever stopped to consider that he's threatened our jobs so many times that no one listens anymore. I wonder if he thinks thinly veiled threats are his only recourse to addressing any employee concerns.

I wish he would consider the alternative. I wish he'd consider making an attempt to change the culture our company has used probably for 40 years of belittling employees and mistreating them. We had a 9 figure lawsuit stemming from locking the employees in the store. Another multi-hundred million dollar lawsuit for systematically stealing from employees by shorting their paychecks. Another one for discriminatory hiring practices (keeping out blacks). And so many more I couldn't keep track of them if I wanted to.

Maybe instead of doing what they've always done, they could try to change. Instead of mistreating employees, maybe valuing their contributions may motivate them more than stealing from their paychecks.

Maybe paying a living wage might incent employees to do their best everyday instead of subtly threatening everyones job at a meeting on Christmas eve.

Maybe treating your employees like you'd treat your brother might make them actually want to do a good job. Perhaps cutting our hours at Christmas isn't the right thing to do after giving board members ten million dollar bonuses because the company stock went up 11% this month. I wish there was a hell because then you greedy corporate vampires would burn like road flares in a fireworks factory.

Sincerely,

Your employees