Comment by shimman
7 hours ago
Argue the need to implement workplace democracy:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workplace_democracy
The idea that we shouldn't be able to vote for our bosses is completely ridiculous. If we had truly collaborative workplaces it would probably unlikely another $50 trillion worth of value once you give workers the ability to exercise their voice (passionate workers want stable working environments, if executives are never held accountable by their subordinates how can we argue such an unfree system is worth preserving?).
As a worker, you can exercise your voice... by getting another job. That is your vote.
The power of your vote is proportional to the value you bring.
A while back I threatened to quit because I had a team dynamic that was untenable. I made a management change mandatory.
I got a new boss. The old boss was later terminated.
You can also exercise your voice by... talking. That might mean trying to convince leadership, it might mean trying to coordinate a bunch of people who agree with you but don't want to act on their own, or, who knows, it might mean something else. But there are quite a lot of things you can do that are short of threatening to quit or simply leaving.
(And sometimes just leaving really is the best step!)
I would argue that’s an asymmetric game. If your boss’s boss or higher already dislikes your boss, then convincing leadership would be easy. But bad bosses don’t become the big bad boss by winning over their subordinates. They spend more time with their own boss than you do, your boss is likely going to have a better relationship with their own boss than you do, simply by proximity. Assuming they aren’t just a flat asshole of course.
A vote would in turn provide a mechanism to prevent such abuse. The boss works for the people not for their boss. Likewise the boss is no longer bound to the whims of their own boss. Their boss is the people below them. A group they will inevitably rejoin with new found appreciation for the troubles of management.
No, this is called exit and it assume that monetary reasons are the only important thing in an economy. That is false, workers should be allowed to exercise their voice about bad management and change bad management. If you want to leave that is fine but thinking that every worker wants the same thing as you is extremely foolish.
Congrats as a single individual doing something, LMK when it amounts to real material change like obtaining a pension, or securing more PTO, or getting better health insurance.