I see too often companies giving individual bonuses on productivity, that creates a "if you fail I win" mentality. Punishing people for mistakes is also quite common. You end with colleagues that can't trust anybody, everything is a competition against the guy sitting at your side.
Punishment and reward systems make "office politics" toxic and a game for opportunists instead of a forum to get to the best decisions.
Experiencing this in a FAANG microcosm is what made me realize the same thing of the economy as a whole. When government (Latin for “control of the mind”) controls the incentives it never has to get its hands dirty accomplishing its goals. The economic reward means someone else will inevitably do it for them, even when that reward is something that’s literally worthless[0] except as an idea which much be mutually agreed upon. The very existence of billionaires is the exact same kind of individual bonus, but on a global scale.
[0] RE: https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/faqs/Currency/Pages... “Federal Reserve notes are not redeemable in gold, silver or any other commodity, and receive no backing by anything. This has been the case since 1933. The notes have no value for themselves, but for what they will buy. In another sense, because they are legal tender, Federal Reserve notes are "backed" by all the goods and services in the economy.”
Money is not "literally worthless"; the state guarantees that you can use them to pay your debts, by cancelling all debts that you pay using dollars, whether your creditor agrees to it or not.
I see too often companies giving individual bonuses on productivity, that creates a "if you fail I win" mentality. Punishing people for mistakes is also quite common. You end with colleagues that can't trust anybody, everything is a competition against the guy sitting at your side.
Punishment and reward systems make "office politics" toxic and a game for opportunists instead of a forum to get to the best decisions.