Your company wants you to be loyal. You should feel lucky–after all, your job is a privilege (think of all those who would like to have it). And you know (despite what you’ve read about Enron and WorldCom) that management has your best interests at heart. Your goal is to devote yourself to the pursuit of corporate profit, make your company number one, and reap the benefits of its success.Or is there something else you want to do with your life?Bonjour Laziness dares to ask whether you really have a stake in the corporate sweepstakes, whether professional mobility is anything but an opiate. It shows you how to become impervious to manipulation and escape the implacable law of usefulness. In short, this book explains why it is in your best interest to work as little as possible.
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“Provocative . . . highly readable . . . refreshing . . . [and] practical. . . . An exhilarating complaint against work.” –The Los Angeles Times
“[Maier] has become a countercultural heroine almost overnight by encouraging . . . workers to adopt her strategy of ‘active disengagement.’” –The New York Times
“A graceful attack on the corporate world [and] a trenchant dissection of ‘corporate culture’ [with] practical suggestions for subverting the workplace.” –The Village Voice
“[Maier] has become a countercultural heroine almost overnight by encouraging . . . workers to adopt her strategy of ‘active disengagement.’” –The New York Times
“A graceful attack on the corporate world [and] a trenchant dissection of ‘corporate culture’ [with] practical suggestions for subverting the workplace.” –The Village Voice
About the Author
Corinne Maier works part-time as an economist for EDF, a French corporation. She is also a practicing psychoanalyst and the author of nine books. She lives in France.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Bonjour Laziness,
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This review is from: Bonjour Laziness: Why Hard Work Doesn't Pay (Paperback)
This is a great book and a "going-to-the-shrink" experience for those of us who are surrounded by incompetent and cowardly co-workers. Also inspiring - ever wondered when is the time to climb up the ladder - well, «since you spend all day doing the job of the person above you, the higher up you are, the less you have to do», says Corinne Maier - so hurry up!. However, she also notes that "it's better not to be too high up either, since you spend all your time performing...., in plain view".
I must also compliment the translator of this book from French - Sophie Hawkes did a great job!
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Good for people working in enterprise,
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This review is from: Bonjour Laziness: Why Hard Work Doesn't Pay (Paperback)
This book is good if you hates enterprise environment. It describes some problems of this environment in a little bit amusing way.
The problem is, the book is not funny if you have never experienced the enterprise from inside. (It is not like Dilbert, which is funny almost for everyone.) But if you work in the enterprise and has a feeling that something is not right, this book can help you find that you are not alone. It is also sarcastic and depressive. It doesn't try to find any solution, it just states, that enterprise is bad in general. But it is better than nothing.
7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Her wit is based on misperceptions,
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This review is from: Bonjour Laziness: Why Hard Work Doesn't Pay (Paperback)
This book isn't funny if you work in business. The author tries to ridicule business behavior, but she does it out of context. Early in the book she satirizes "business jargon". She says its "all nonsense". But it's not nonsense, it's just technical language that takes training to understand. Example: she quotes a couple sentences from a corporate strategy guide for a computer conversion. But when i read it, it really did make sense, it did describe what the project plan's goal was. Now, she may not have understood it, because she's not trained in computers. But that doesn't mean it's nonsense.
She also makes fun of how companies aren't really democracies, that they exist solely to make a profit. Well, i thought, um, yeah, that's true. And the point of a farmer investing in fertilizer and water is to grow food. If the workers endlessly discuss "strategy" and "fairness", we'll starve. Does she have better plan? No. She just implies what is, stinks. I'm not a corporate apologist, but her satire isn't effective. Go with Scott Adams or "The Office" or the movie "The Corporation".
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